Over the weekend, RNS had a visit from some leftard commenting under the name “Joseph Partida”, who praised the Brits for not going overboard and bombing the Iranians for kidnapping on the high seas (AKA: Piracy) a group of the military personell.
I wonder what Mr. Partida has to say about this new snippet of information
Blindfolded Britons tell of the moment the guards’ guns clicked
All 15 of them had been blindfolded, handcuffed and pushed against a wall by their Iranian captors.
Then they heard the sound of guns being cocked – and believed they were about to be shot by firing squad.
The most terrifying moment of the British hostages’ 13 days in captivity was revealed yesterday as seven of them faced a press conference.
The mock execution happened the day after the Navy sailors and Royal Marines had been seized while patrolling at the mouth of the Shatt al-Arab waterway, which divides Iran and Iraq.
Lieutenant Felix Carman, 26, of Swansea, said that on their first night in captivity their treatment was not too bad.
But the following morning they were flown to Tehran where the “atmosphere changed completely”, he said. “We were blindfolded, our hands were bound and we were forced up against a wall.”
All 15 prisoners, including young mother Faye Turney, heard the Revolutionary Guard cock their guns.
One of the hostages screamed out: “Lads, lads, we’re going to be executed – do something.”
Another was physically sick, said 21-year-old Royal Marine Joe Tindell, who believed he was hearing the sound of a colleague having his throat cut.
“I assumed we were all going to be executed. We were all standing there waiting for it to happen.
“I just thought that was the end of it. It was the only time in my life I really felt scared.
“From there we were rushed into a room and then stuffed into a cell and didn’t see another human being for six days.”
The men said the hostages were subjected to “constant psychological pressure” which Lt Carman described as amounting to “torture”. While it stopped short of physical abuse, it helps explain their apparent willingness to appear in Iranian propaganda broadcasts before their release on Thursday.
Their captors said the choice was clear – admit they had strayed into Iranian waters or face seven years in a Tehran jail.
Leading Seaman Turney, a 26-year-old mother, was not present at the press conference at the Royal Marines Base at Chivenor, north Devon.
But her fellow prisoners described how she was put in solitary confinement and, for four days, told by her jailers that the rest of the group had been sent home and she was the only captive left in Iran.
Of course, Partida will probably just claim that it is all Bush’s fault. Nevermind that the Iranians have been doing this exact same thing since 1979.
Asshole.
…and never mind that staging a mock execution is specifically against the Geneva Convention, being listed as a forbidden torture.
Of course, you’ll never see THAT in the press.
Did anyone else hear that Blair has suspended all boarding activities in the “contested” waters as a reaction to this?
I’ll bet THAT battle strategy isn’t taught at Sandhurst.
Oh, for the days when the Admiralty would have simply ordered the HMS Really Big Battleship to sail into whatever harbor those Iranian speedboats had sailed from and start shelling things, starting with every speedboat in sight, until the hostages were returned.
Such behavior might not win you any friends on the international cocktail circuit, but it does teach the bad sort that you’re not to be f**ked with.