The Appalling Strangeness: So this is freedom?

So, they are free then. A gift from Iran to the British people. Very generous Ahmadinejad is too.

It took me a while to figure out what had happened, because the course of events seems quite surreal. Iran captures our sailors (most probably in Iraqi waters, judging by the Iranians changing the co-ordinates of the seizure to prove themselves right), takes them prisoner, mumbles about putting them on trial for spying, then puts them through various wince-making and unconvincing confessions on the tele, before Ahmadinejad announces their release in a hyper-active press conference. And then sending them on their way with gifts, apparently:

And whilst the sailors are imprisoned in one of the least friendly* regimes in the world, our government embarked on a mild propaganda war against Iran, and aside from that seemed to sit on their hands, hoping for the best. Sure, a lot of the diplomacy will have been in secret, but our government never really seemed to do anything more than make the right noises.

It is the end of a tense two weeks in British-Iranian relations, but as the dust settles and the 15 go off to enjoy their funky Iranian gifts in Devon, it is difficult to see who actually won this little confrontation. The commentators and pundits are in total disagreement, as the front page of The Independent nicely shows. And the reason is simple - no-one can really claim victory from this little crisis.

Last night I was convinced that Iran had won, but now I am not too sure. They don't seem to have gained anything other than a bit of publicity from this kidnapping. And the UK certainly didn't gain anything - they lost 15 sailors for a fortnight, and seemed incapable of doing anything other than waiting for their release.

But then again, what more could either side have got? Iran was always going to have to return the sailors at some point - had they kept them for much longer, or even have gone as far as putting them on trial, then the international outcry would have been tremendous and the sanctions deeply damaging for Ahmadinejad's increasingly unpopular (in Iran) regime. Equally, the UK could do nothing other than wait and hope. Blair et al could not apologise** without losing face in the West and further damaging the UK's already terrible reputation in the Middle East. Equally, they could not attempt to rescue the troops - the sub-Rambo talk of special forces grabbing the sailors back is deeply naive.

Which begs the question, what was the point in all this?

I reckon the answer is simple - nothing. There was no point. Someone, somewhere, fucked up. The UK sailors were not sent into Iranian waters as spies, and equally the Iranain government did not order the kidnapping of the sailors. Either the UK forces accidentally strayed into Iranian waters or (far more likely) Republican Guard units over stepped their boundaries and procedures and seized the British troops. Now the medals have been handed out for the cameras, I think someone in Iran will be getting a bit of a kicking. Or, as Jackart so eloquently puts it:

"I suspect Tehran was as surprised as the 15 Sailors about the capture and some Republican Guard commander might catch a sly bullet over this fiasco."

Quite right - I think Britain was staggered to lose 15 sailors, and I think Iran was staggered to gain the 15 sailors. And from that point on, there was no doubt the sailors would be returned, it was just a question of both countries trying to save as much face as possible.

Which is why I think that now the sailors are back home and now Ahmadinejad has had his moment of glory, this crisis will be swiftly brushed under the carpet. Neither side could ever have won from this crisis, but the sailors spent two weeks as prisoners in a hostile country
because neither side wanted to be seen to have lost.