Breaking news: USA yield curve has just inverted:
The latest US recession indicator – the inverted yield curve.

Posted by: vk | Jul 5 2019 1:20 utc | 103

Bemildred @84
Hard to be wiser for Spain in following such advice.
I think Iran can stand firm for while longer. Either way US and its immediate vassal reveal impotence, and the remaining european vessels of the Imperia are instantiated for what they are, meaning upper hand for Iran in case a more serious compromise lands the table.

Posted by: Vasco da Gama | Jul 5 2019 1:34 utc | 105

Marine ID tracking (map video) showing course of tanker: https://twitter.com/MarineTraffic/status/1146691532348698624, British position that they only boarded it after it inexplicably veered north into “Gibraltar waters” (disputed by Spain, according to position they only ceded port, not ‘sovereign territory’ or something).
Airspace ID tracking (map video) showing British helicopter intercepting tanker at that location: https://twitter.com/BabakTaghvaee/status/1146797553087930368, but this doesn’t actually speak to what happened to tanker before that, IMHO highly likely that British boarded it via boats, taking it over to direct it into “Gibraltar waters”. The tracking evidence seems designed to be “just enough” to evade opposition, but of course ignores what could possibly explain abruptly northward course except British boarding and takeover.

Posted by: ok | Jul 5 2019 1:56 utc | 107

@107 ok – both your links – Sorry, that page doesn’t exist!

Posted by: james | Jul 5 2019 1:58 utc | 109

Only amoral assholes need reems and reams of legalize to tell them what is right and what is wrong. And it is these very same amoral a-holes who ignore those very same laws.

Posted by: O | Jul 5 2019 2:08 utc | 111

O @ 100, 104 and pestercorn 102
Quite correct although to be fair Trump, Netanyahoo and Putin are all solidly part of the ownership class rather than owned.
VK @ 103
The actual news is the yield curve has now been inverted for 3 months.
A quarter of inverted bond yields has occurred prior to every US recession since at least the 1950s.

Posted by: donkeytale | Jul 5 2019 2:18 utc | 113

Lol. Right.

Posted by: donkeytale | Jul 5 2019 2:22 utc | 115

@james 109: as somebody else less than politely noted, the only problem with the URLs is a comma (“,”) which isn’t part of actual URL (i just included it as part of my own post’s grammatic structure, but unfortunately the forum here included it with the URL), so just delete that and reload it and the source remains fully accessible.

Posted by: ok | Jul 5 2019 2:38 utc | 117

Lysias @ 94, Passer By @ 96:
The issue is how to move the oil from the Caspian Sea into the Black Sea. Constructing a pipeline across Russian territory would be easier than dredging a shallow body of water close to hostile Ukrainian territory and then widening the Kerch strait so that oil tankers can move up the Volga River, cross into the Don River via canal and go down towards and into the Sea of Azov and then into the Black Sea with no trouble.
But then why not send the oil by pipeline all the way from Iran through the Caspian Sea, Russia, the Black Sea, Turkey and the Mediterranean Sea? At some point during transit, the oil can change ownership from Iranian to Russian and Iran gets whatever imports it needs.

Posted by: Jen | Jul 5 2019 2:52 utc | 119

@117 So it was a comma and not a period. Time for new glasses. I hope james isn’t too upset by my brutal impoliteness.

Posted by: dh | Jul 5 2019 3:11 utc | 121

@ok 116
You are confusing it, and I only write this in case others have been by what you wrote.
Companies can be targeted, countries/governments can be targeted, individuals can be targeted. Here the reason for detaining the ship was that it was thought trading with a sanctioned Syrian company.
It “just happened” to be carrying Iranian oil ALSO, which is not directly under EU sanctions afaik, and was not the reason given for detaining it.
People say hijacked, meaning hijacked, “hijacked” or “”hijacked””. When you say hijacked you mean taken outside of all legal norms as well. No one else has assumed this and yet you are stating that this has occurred, you are going to have to find proof first that the ship was forced illegally into Gibraltar waters. That will keep you busy, indefinitely probably. For the rest people are talking “hijacking” meaning within an at least quasi-legal framework.

Posted by: gzon | Jul 5 2019 3:24 utc | 123

@121 dh – LOLOL! thanks, and thanks @ok for trying too… as psychohistorian mentioned @ok – it is helpful if you learn how to use the html tags.. that is the info to the right side of where you put your name and e mail address..

Posted by: james | Jul 5 2019 3:49 utc | 125

How is it self-evident from the Southfront article that Russia is trying to force Iran to leave Syria when the authors of that article…
Posted by: Jen | Jul 5 2019 3:10 utc | 120
Oh I don’t know perhaps that the Russians are playing footsies with Iran’s biggest enemies in the region Saudi Arabia and Israel. Perhaps that those s-300’s haven’t done jackshit to stop israeli incursions or even when the Israelis use a Russian plane for cover that got Russian servicemen killed, Putin walked it back. Did you even watch the video?
Putin and the Saudi’s acting like they run OPEC would seem like a major problem for the Iranians.
Did you even look at the other headlines I posted?
Here is another one for you.
Jun 10, 2019 – Russia, Iran in tug of war over Syria military reform … of Bashar al-Assad’s government in exchange for Iranian military forces leaving Syria.Putin and the Saudi’s acting like they run OPEC would seem like a major problem for the Iranians.
https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/06/russia-iran-syria-military-reform.html
Again this all before the Israeli/US/Russia security summit that occurred a few days before Israel killed some more Syrian civilians on July 1st. That the “great” Russian ally has yet to remark on.

Posted by: O | Jul 5 2019 3:53 utc | 127

We’ve seen many variations of the “Putin is a Zionist” propaganda narrative.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Jul 5 2019 3:25 utc | 124
Go educate yourself about Chabad
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/the-happy-go-lucky-jewish-group-that-connects-trump-and-putin-215007
https://www.jewishpress.com/news/jewish-news/chabad-2/netanyahu-cites-boundless-inspiration-from-lubavitcher-rebbe-during-chabad-mitzvah-mobile-ceremony/2018/11/23/

Posted by: O | Jul 5 2019 4:05 utc | 129

Vasco de Gama: 105: Thank you. It would be very British to include annoying/entangling Spain and Sanchez, to get them to share the blame for this piracy. Plus they keep the seized assets, as in Venezuela recently. Here in the USA, domestically it’s called “civil asset forfeiture” and it is very, very popular with our cops. Part of the war on cash.
Yes, they expose themselves more than they know. Attempts at intimidation down work when done in a cowardly way.

Posted by: Bemildred | Jul 5 2019 5:01 utc | 131

Apparently the party divided, 425 member House of Representations has lost one binary controlled member to independence on July 4. Objecting to the two party binary (either for Trump policy or Against Democrap” <=choose only one). The Reputatard reported departure makes Amash a 39 yr old Independent, a powerful, real choice, as a 2020 white house contender. Caveat: <= the vote outcome of the electoral college, not the vote outcome of the popular vote of the governed American people, determines the Article II elected, salaried positions of el Presidente and side kick .. . Disagreement with the party over Trumpy's need to play the game of impeachment was the straw that broke the link between Amash and the Reputatards. Trump called Amash’s departure from the GOP Great news for the Republican Party.. and personally attacked Amash "as one of the dumbest & most disloyal men in Congress" on Twitter, I am told. I might agree with Trump for the first time in two years, Reputatards need to maintain the purity of their corruptions. Don't forget 5g is proving to be as dangerous as the science shows it to be. A potentially very dangerous technology being installed by the private sector with FCC and Trump support. Its object to control your behavior from birth to death. Never before has Economic Zionism had such an opportunity. Tens of thousands of health threatening phased array antennas negotiating on battle field interrogation 868 Mhz @60 Ghz, its high frequency, pulsed microwave communications signal designed to invade your home, to support the multi zillion $market known as the IoT, likely at the expense of the health of you and your kids, your loss of freedom via environmental regulation of you access to information and your time to live life.

Posted by: snake | Jul 5 2019 6:10 utc | 133

Jen #119
The easiest way to get oil from Russia to Iran and visa versa would be to route it through the substantial oil & gas infrastructure surrounding Baku

Posted by: m | Jul 5 2019 7:42 utc | 135

Posted by: bevin | Jul 4 2019 16:26 utc | 2
How much lower can the UK go?
There are many options and everything is possible.

The Guardian:
Three in four MPs ‘probably have poor mental health’
Party whips add to MPs’ mental health problems, study shows

Posted by: curious man | Jul 5 2019 7:44 utc | 137

>>>>: Jen | Jul 4 2019 22:55 utc | 77

Your idea has probably been mooted in the past but there are various considerable physical and geopolitical obstacles in the way.

Nah, not really

Oil and gas would need to be piped from the Persian Gulf over the Zagros Mountain range in southwest Iran and other very hilly country in western Iran.

There is already a crude oil pipeline from the Persian Gulf to Neka on the Caspian Sea via Tehran.

Tankers could take the oil through the Caspian Sea to Astrakhan and then up the Volga River to Volgograd, go through a canal and then down the Don River into the Sea of Azov.
The Sea of Azov is very shallow and would have to be dredged to accommodate large oil tankers. The tankers also have to go through the Kerch Strait which is narrow (it’s 15 km at its widest point) and not deep (deepest point is 18 metres) so that would also have to be dredged.

Any tanker which could pass through the Volga-Don Canal (maximum draft 3.8m) would have no problem with the Sea of Azov or the Kerch Strait. Crossing the Black Sea in a storm might not be safe but the smaller tankers (5,000 tons) could transfer their loads at sea to a larger tanker outside the Kerch Strait.

Plus the Russians have just built a new bridge there and dredging could weaken its supports. There have been enough problems recently with Ukraine attempting to provoke Russia by sending ships into the Sea of Azov without requesting proper authorization, without adding more to them.

I don’t really see how this is relevant since the Russian government is capable of multi-tasking effectively.

Suppose oil tankers carrying Iranian oil did manage to enter the Black Sea, they now have to go through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles and travel through the Aegean Sea towards Syria. At any point during this part of the trip, they can be seized by EU forces if the ships have to travel through Romanian, Bulgarian and Greek maritime territory.

The captain would have to be drunk or corrupt if he decided to sail through Roumanian or Bulgarian territorial waters when going from Russia to the Bosporus, and Greece is not so much Washington’s poodle as the United Kingdom is. Don’t forget that the Russians sail ships loaded with military equipment through the Bosporus and Aegean Sea to Syria without any NATO intervention all the time. This just demonstrates what a fucking stupid idea it was for the UK to intercept that tanker even with crude oil allegedly destined for Syria, but it just confirms that the Conservatives, including Johnson are a bunch of morons.

The logistics involved in creating a route are considerable but I think investors would quail more at the potential for conflict.

Nah, the infrastructure is already there, it just requires a bit of effort, not much, to put all the pieces in place. As for commercial involvement, that is a very stupid American idea – if a government really wants something done, it best it does it itself, at least at the higher levels.

Building a pipeline from the Persian Gulf through Iraq would cost less and avoid unnecessary encounters with hostile EU nations and their neo-Nazi crazy ally.

It’d take too long and pipelines are difficult to defend against determined terrorists and Syria currently has quite a lot of those lying around the country, particularly the ISIS stay-behinds near As-Suknah and the US/ISIS wannabes at Al-Tanf.
There was a pipeline from Kirkuk to Baniyas but the Americans damaged it in 2003 and it has been out of service ever since. Perhaps somebody in Washington was forward planning for regime change in Syria back in 2003. There have been plans to reconstruct/rebuild that pipeline ever since but nothing has happened.
If the Iranians really wanted to deliver crude oil to Syria without NATO/EU/US/UK intervention at the moment, they’d arrange a swap with Iraq for crude oil to be delivered to a coastal tanker (50,000 tons) in Ceyhan port. That tanker could then sail down to Baniyas in Turkish and Syrian territorial waters beyond the reach of the Royal Navy.

Posted by: Ghost Ship | Jul 5 2019 9:26 utc | 139

BBC’s Persian service has an interesting article online now regarding the supertankers seizure,
http://www.bbc.com/persian/iran-48871590
According to the article the tanker decided to take the longer route due to it being to large for the Suez canal, Im not familiar with naval jargon but basically the tanker’s lowest point from sea level is 22 metres and the Suez’s maximum limit is 18 metres, it also says that there has been 8 smaller Iranian tankers delivering oil to syria’s Banyias in the past few months so it can not be that the tanker took the longer route because Sisi would not allow it true the Suez.
Also the article mentions that the tanker is in fact too large for the facilities at Banyias and that was almost certainly not its destination, it then goes on to speculate that the actual customer should have been a European country and tanker was headed to somewhere in eastern Mediterranean in order to transfer the oil to the customer country’s tanker on the high seas as Iranian Tanker have been known to do in recent months. My hunch for the customer country is either Italy or Greece, specially Italy as Eni has very friendly relations with NIOC and it even bought oil from Iran during the blockade of 1952.

Posted by: ArioBarzanes | Jul 5 2019 9:41 utc | 141

UK FM Jeremy Cunt,
‘China should honor HK’s freedom,
We cant just gulp and move on,
All options, including sanctions, are on the table’
The fukus evil twin, all run by the same
insufferable psychopaths, such
interoperability
heheheh

Posted by: denk | Jul 5 2019 10:15 utc | 143

Posted by: Jen | Jul 5 2019 2:52 utc | 119
There is pipeline Volgograd – Novorossiysk already, Azov Sea is not part of the calculations. Why would Russia try to export via Azov anyway? They obviously know what they are doing, and made Novorossiysk their biggest oil export terminal on the Black Sea, with various pipelines leading to that city.
Additionally, exporting Russian oil to Syria does not seem to be a problem unless the obstacles are political, within Russia, since as mentioned above Russia exports oil to India from Black Sea ports.

Posted by: Passer by | Jul 5 2019 10:48 utc | 145

M @ 135, Curious Man @ 138, Ghost Ship @ 139, Passer By @ 145:
Thanks for the ideas and suggestions – all very worthwhile!

Posted by: Jen | Jul 5 2019 11:52 utc | 147

Snake @ 146 and anyone else who is interested:
One of the major bonyads in Iran is the IRGC Cooperative Foundation. You can read about its functions, organisational structure and the businesses it invests in and supports at this IranWire link. The IRGC Cooperative Foundation may not necessarily be a typical bonyad but the article at the link gives a good overview of its activities and reach.
Another significant IRGC-connected institution is the Khatam-al-Anbiya General Headquarters which employs about 170,000 people and contracts work out to 1 million contractors in construction and engineering projects.

Posted by: Jen | Jul 5 2019 12:09 utc | 149

There’s this thing called Wikipedia where one can read reasonable answers to such things instead of asking here.
Here’s the page on Gibraltar.

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jul 5 2019 13:11 utc | 151

Iran’s Expediency Council secretary calls for seizing British tanker in retaliation . . .here
“The Islamic Revolution has never been an initiator of tension during its 40-year-old history, however, it has not hesitated to respond to bullies and thugs,” Mohsen Rezaee tweeted on Friday.
The former IRGC chief added, “If Britain doesn’t return the Iranian tanker, the duty of responsible [Iranian] bodies is to seize a British oil tanker in a retaliatory measure.”

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jul 5 2019 13:25 utc | 153

psychohistorian | Jul 5 2019 2:49 utc | 118
@ ok telling other MoA barflies to compensate for their lack of respect to the web site owner and to the rest of us barflies by not forming their links as requested
Makes you not worth my time to read because of your disrespectful actions towards others.
If you hang around long enough you will find others feel the same……..you respect us and we will respect you….otherwise you are a child or a disrespectful troll
This is a seriously aggressive ott and petulant outburst towards “ok”, from someone proclaiming the rules of good behaviour here. Fine if that’s the way you choose to conduct yourself towards others, but, for the record, you don’t speak for me. For me, something like showing a little understanding and latitude towards another (perhaps a relative newcomer (?) who maybe didn’t choose the most sensitive, with a more modulated nudge, would be my way of doing thing, so I object to being lumped into the aggressively protective clique, thank you. I do understand that sometimes people get out of bed on the wrong wide, but that can apply just as much to “ok” as to you or me.

Posted by: Petra | Jul 5 2019 13:38 utc | 155

Petra @ 155
Thank you from a member of the neo-MoA Barfly Clique (“neo” meaning “not”, h/t Bemildred) yet who very much enjoys reading and commenting at MoA all the same.
This sort of petty/childish/bullying behaviour should be moderated, IMHO, for this blog to continue to expand and thrive intellectually. At best it reflects a bad look on the proprietor and the rest of us, as you suggested.
Yesterday I commented about this weird “entitled insider” tendency in the “Do People Comment too Much?” thread:

As for trolls, I am with the commenter who stated somewhere (maybe not even this thread) that labelling someone a troll simply because they may present an idea that is considered antithetical to the “prevailing MoA zeitgeist” (which of course is itself a fallacy) is indeed one of the very, very few issues I have with this site’s commenters, especially among those who consider themselves “long time regular users” or some such nonsense, as if that status somehow confers upon them special privilege to be a dick whenever someone disagrees with them.

However, to be fair to Psycho he has divulged that he suffers from a brain injury, which I realise can cause the injured person from time to time to display impetuous, rude and perseverating behaviour.
This is not exculpatory but should be taken into consideration. At the very least an apology to ok would suffice. We all carry our own baggage and burdens and these are only (very infotaining at times) words on a computer screen when all is said and done.

Posted by: donkeytale | Jul 5 2019 14:29 utc | 157

How to identify a troll: They present and defend the standard narratives being promoted at the moment by the corporate elites via their mass media.
If someone promotes a narrative that could be found on the current day’s pages of the New York Langley Times or the Washington Bezos Post or on a CNN or BBC broadcast, then they are a troll wasting everyone’s time, whether the troll him/herself is aware of it or not.
After all, why would anyone come to a forum like the MoA comments section if it was Bezos’ or Murdoch’s opinions they wanted to hear? Clearly anyone disseminating those opinions here is thus trying to make certain that the establishment narratives get reinforced even in non-establishment fora like this. Thus they are trolling for the establishment.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jul 5 2019 14:46 utc | 159

@151 … yeh, ok, great idea, … I’ll run right on over now and look up “rhetorical question”… (sigh)

Posted by: imo | Jul 5 2019 14:59 utc | 161

Sadly, dodging personal responsibility has long been fashionable in America and is at the core of “Identity Politics”. The behavior of the nation, like the behavior of the individual, is always the fault of others. The nation, like the individual, is just a victim of circumstances beyond its control.
Funny how a denial of this is presented on the day after America’s supposed birthday in which (what else!) war is celebrated.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jul 5 2019 15:09 utc | 163

“…please remember that simply describing something doesn’t automatically mean the presenter is in agreement with what he describes.”
Very true, and you will note that I was not among those attacking aspnaz in his discussion of America’s current attitude towards using nuclear weapons earlier this week… just as an example.
“…you must first show that everything printed all the time in the MSM is always a lie.”
Not so, and that’s not what I asserted, and such misrepresentation is expected from a troll. I clearly stated that promoting “…narrative[s] that could be found…” in current corporate mass media is what identifies one as a troll, not referencing particular facts that are revealed in the imperialists’ publications. A corporate mass media article can be chock full of valid facts while spinning a completely false narrative. Indeed, on issues of geopolitics the empire’s propaganda machinery always does just that.
As for my mind being “sealed-off”, it is true that corporate mass media’s imperialist narratives have little chance of finding purchase in my head. I am quite well inoculated against those narratives. Since you promote those narratives this may seem to you that my mind is closed to all ideas, which isn’t necessarily so. It is just your WaPo-vetted narratives that I am closed to.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jul 5 2019 15:40 utc | 165

Don Bacon @164 askes: “What’s your evidence?”
I’ve lived there, but I’ve also lived other places that didn’t have this illness so I can compare.
Had you not noticed how difficult it was to find anyone who voted for Nixon back in the mid-to-late 1970s? How about how easy it is to find people who now claim to have opposed America’s attack on Iraq back in the early 2000s? These people may have edited their memories (it is an established fact that people unconsciously do this) to cast themselves as heroes in earlier times, but people in the US who really did attend anti-war protests in America back in 2002 and 2003 know that those protests were tiny and the numbers calling for war were huge. How could that have changed? Only by most of those who today claim to have opposed the war lying about their opposition. They actually backed war, and were thus evil, but want to cast themselves as the good guys today.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jul 5 2019 15:52 utc | 167

@ Don Bacon 164
You might not get an answer, because when people theorise about a collective, they nescessarily generalise about the individual. The irony in that is that it offers exactly the sort of blanket of ambivalence that discourages personal responsibility.

Posted by: gzon | Jul 5 2019 15:56 utc | 169

Peter Ford comments on UK seizure of oil tanker bound for Syria

For five years until now since Banyas was sanctioned tankers have been making their way past Gibraltar heading for Banyas and the UK has not seen fit to intervene. Why now?
This is obviously Hunt trying to look macho; the UK currying favour with Trump to get a better trade deal.

Patreon/Vanessa Beeley

Posted by: Bemildred | Jul 5 2019 16:05 utc | 171

FYI–Iraq War Protests:
I attended the massive protests in San Francisco, but they ought to have been 10x larger, and I was incensed at other family members who said they opposed BushCo but found ways to weasel out of attending–a glaring lack of moral courage that still irks today.
I never voted for or against Nixon; I was too young. It’s sorta like the millions who never attended Woodstock but now say they were there. The soft life and pursuit of things as opposed to ideals neutered the post-WW2 body politic, helped along by the contrived Culture Wars, all of which make it easy to slip into cynical mode.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 5 2019 16:20 utc | 173

Donkeytale @ 33
IMO, apropos “…comic horrors described still remain unfinished…”, just now 1/3 through Mark Twain’s “The American Claimant”. Nore awesome Twain.

Posted by: chu teh | Jul 5 2019 16:38 utc | 175

@ WG 167
Thanks for answering my request for evidence that Americans dodge personal responsibility.
Let American readers decide on their responsibility-dodging in the world scene, given that they (we) are never offered the opportunity for any input to important matters, international especially. In fact it is an often-presented proposition in the US press that the president (the “commander-in-chief”) is solely responsible for international affairs, and the Congress often goes along with it, as recently on war powers.
It ain’t our fault, and we have no way to change it. Marching in the street? Been there, done that. No impact.
One final thought, with my opinion: Your supposition that Americans are sick responsibility-dodgers, compared with foreigners, is pure baloney. I’ve lived in many countries too, probably more than you, and this has nothing to do with that, it’s only a tactic to posit yourself as a learned international expert. (I will say that the press is somewhat freer in some countries than in the US, so people in those countries are more likely to get different opinions, and some truth, than in our propagandized country.)
Hogwash is what your position is. Americans employing personal responsibility have accomplished a lot in this world, starting with activists in our communities where they see opportunity to do good and do it. Especially them, from the mother raising a family to school volunteers to environmental activists and so on. You are not better than they are (and neither am I).

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jul 5 2019 16:42 utc | 177

Gruff @ 167 I attended Washington, DC anti-war protests in 2003 and in 2005, and they were actually huge. Ironically, the media that you so rightly dismiss as biased and unreliable reported them as small, but they were lying.
For instance, in the 2005 one, people from New York told me that some trains had been suddenly shut down, making it difficult for people to get from New York to Wash.
The media did not report about the demonstration, except for the Wath Po, which put it in the “local” section, and “reported” that there were a couple of thousand people there.
In another article, they reported on the amount of people who had come to Washington the day before (without mentioning the demo), and they reported that there were 200,000 people who had traveled from NY to Wash.
I don’t think they were all coming to Laura Bush’s book festival.

Posted by: wagelaborer | Jul 5 2019 16:52 utc | 179

Don Bacon @178, et al–
Whattabout Iran using the tanker as bait to further drawout the 100% untrustworthiness of the EU-3 as 7 July looms? Yet another tick to add to the contemptible list of reasons the Tories need relocation to an asylum replaced by a reasonable, law-abiding Corbyn government that will do the right proper things at home and abroad.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 5 2019 16:58 utc | 181

Trump is finished with the Afghan war
JULY 4, 2019 BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR
Indian Punchline
So the Trumpoids have figured out that all those “advanced bases” are really exposed and poorly defended assets that Iran can take when it chooses.

Posted by: Bemildred | Jul 5 2019 17:22 utc | 183

Don Bacon @ …
I posted this the other day but it seems to be so apt as an answer for you. Hey were all on the same side ! Right ?
https://mobile.twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/879765512292626433
Karlofi great minds think a like I was going to post this then noticed your comments. ps the gig looks good.

Posted by: Mark2 | Jul 5 2019 17:26 utc | 185

@ karlof1 181
Whattabout Iran using the tanker as bait
I have a great deal of respect, based on years of blogging on Iran matters, for Persian thinking. One thinks better when that’s all that one has available at the time. FM Zarif recently bragged about having a PhD in sanctions, and we know that Iran has to offer something spectacular to sustain the narrative, with Iran in charge. (in fact a series of somethings)
I lost track of it, but I did read that someone high up on The Rock is a former Royal Marine commander, and he was responsible for getting the Royal Marines to rope-drop from a helo to the tanker.
So yes, I can see the distinct possibility of Iran involvement, to include:
> the stopover for “foodstuffs” near Gibraltar, contested territory (UK vs. Spain)
> a leak to London that the ship was bound for that refinery in Syria, against an EU sanction (otherwise who knew)
> the leak included news of the stopover at Gibraltar (The Rock)
> a double agent working the military angle to encourage the Gibraltar jarhead to contact his old buddies — US Marines are publicity hounds, probably Royal Marines too
> the spectacular UK Royal Marine takeover (now a piracy to be compensated for)
Thanks for asking!

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jul 5 2019 17:29 utc | 187

Don Bacon @186–
Thanks for your reply! So, when Iran detains a UK-bound tanker a precedent of sorts will be set for any future detentions of Iranian tankers or tankers transporting Iranian crude. So, a different twist to Tanker Wars–detention instead of sinking–how civilized! I can see a toll gate of sorts being erected in Hormuz somewhat like customs: Oil or products bound for any Outlaw US Empire vassal nation and the Empire itself will not be allowed to proceed. And Iran would merely be fulfilling its pledge–if our exports can’t transit freely, then nobody’s can.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jul 5 2019 17:52 utc | 189

@ Don Bacon 189
I know all of that if not the details, yet none of that changes the fact, does it? I wish there were many more like you in US –and elsewhere.

Posted by: Acar Burak | Jul 5 2019 18:00 utc | 191

@ AB 190
Every local meeting in our town, or most every one, starts off with the Pledge of Allegiance to that striped cloth. Actually for most it started in elementary school.
Regarding foreign policy, how many people in the world consider it important, worth thinking about. Mostly people are rightly concerned with their family first, also their occupation and their community. But in the US because the government is a world hegemon the citizens are supposed to be concerned with events in. . .Afghanistan? No, they’re not, and I don’t blame them. We shouldn’t HAVE to be concerned with a poor tribal mountainous country on the other side of the planet. That’s BS.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jul 5 2019 18:12 utc | 193

It gets more complicated if you count Russian refuelling at Ceuta, and the view of Spain’s approach to this.
https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/spain-to-refuel-russian-warship-on-return-from-syria-despite-new-sanctions/
That Spain criticizes Gib. for NATO presence while hosting Rota and Moron.
EU interest in Syria.
Etc. It gets very hard to figure what exactly is going on.
Hope it isn’t to bring Hormuz to EU, if that sinks there like a Trojan then we are back at false flags and false false flags all over again. 🙁

Posted by: gzon | Jul 5 2019 18:26 utc | 195

Sometimes comments here amaze me for all the wrong reasons, so here’s a quick level up:
– Gibraltar has huge strategic significance and the location is only part of it, likely a much lesser part. The rock (the mountain) is an enormous “bunker-fortress” in active use designed to withstand at least one direct hit with a nuclear weapon and survive fully functional, likely more than one. Defeating Gibraltar could require removing half the mountain or all of it and maybe not even then. That kind of place is not unique but it doesn’t come cheap and is not in any way any kind of “survivalist hideout” idiotic fantasy.
– There is a civic society attracted by and built around this base under British rule since 1713 (older than the US) and naturally they have their own unique identity and it’s not Spanish. Gibraltar has been British for longer in an uninterrupted amount of time than it was Spanish.
– The civic society in Gibraltar has zero say in military or UK Foreign Office matters.
– Spain has essentially zero chance of getting Gibraltar. Spain is more likely to be defeated in war by the UK than to get Gibraltar and that ought to tell anyone how ludicrously implausible the idea is and how foolish the Spanish governments and foreign services make themselves look in this case. It seems to be nothing more than Spain emptily placating some Franco-supporters (I’m not even convinced Franco was serious about Gibraltar or if it was just to throw a bone) but one might as well talk about Gibraltar becoming Moroccan.
There is no way Iran doesn’t know all of this.

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jul 5 2019 18:35 utc | 197

@ karlof1 193
Iran has numerous ways to complicate things
Yes, and as I indicated (or implied) earlier I don’t consider myself ever able to predict what Iran might do, I just marvel at what they do. In fifty years from constant US attacks they have just gotten stronger, an inspiration to other countries not on the US ally list.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jul 5 2019 18:39 utc | 199