Carter provided no detail but said “a navigational error of some kind” led to the two small patrol boats ending up in Iranian water on Tuesday. “It may be that they were trying to sort it out at the time they encountered the Iranian boats and discovered they were inside of the territorial waters of Iran”.
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Donald Trump, as he often does, put it all the most plainly, in describing what he says was a campaign event with construction workers who were weeping with wounded pride: “They were watching the humiliation of our young 10 sailors, sitting on the floor with their knees in a begging position, their hands up, and Iranian wiseguys having guns to their heads”.
And the sailors were later told by their captors to “act happy” while they were being videotaped, CNN reported, according to an unidentified defense official familiar with the debriefing of the “tired and upset” sailors.
Iran’s seizure of the two 49-foot Riverine Command Boats, and the jarring videos on Iranian media of us sailors made to kneel on deck in custody, dominated the brief question-and-answer period that followed the introductions of Austin and Votel.
The eventual release of the Americans – they had been fed and given blankets and were allowed to sail back to a waiting US cruiser with all their equipment – defused the budding crisis. Then they said the boats had run out of fuel, although it wasn’t clear if they meant both boats. Austin interjected that “the gear that they deployed with was largely there when we got the boats back”, but the Navy was conducting an inventory. “But maybe not. Because the Iranians like to taunt us because they don’t have like respect for our leaders, right?” Farsi Island is a naval base for Iran’s naval component of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and is considered extremely sensitive.
The result was the 16-hour detention of all 10 USA crew members by the Iranian military, an incident that provoked worldwide headlines and several rounds of high-level diplomacy before the quiet release of the sailors and their vessels on Wednesday. As an anonymous Pentagon official told the New York Times, “The Iran story is frankly embarrassing”.
The U.S. commander who spoke on camera, identified Friday as 27-year-old Lt. David Nartker, has indicated he felt pressure to talk about how well the sailors were being treated.
Rubio has consistently opposed the Obama administration’s diplomatic efforts to constrain Iran’s nuclear program.
During the Iran-Iraq war the U.S. responded to Iranian sea mining that damaged a U.S. Naval vessel by launching operation “Praying Mantis” that inflicted severe damage on Iran’s navy.
In a message to the Commander of IRGC Navy Rear Admiral Ali Fadavi, Boroujerdi said the “brave” move by the Iranian forces in the Persian Gulf indicated that Iran controls the security of this sensitive region.
There’s the ol’ “our way or war” straw man. Republicans aren’t angry because Obama declined to fire a cruise missile across Iran’s bow to hurry along the sailors’ release.
Attempts to contact William Nartker have been unsuccessful.
“It is disgraceful, and in a Christie administration, they would know much, much better than to do that”, the governor said.
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“No, there was no apology, nothing to apologise for… and there’s no looking for any apology”, Biden said on CBS’s “This Morning” programme.
