Likelihood of Success

Al the Pundit was brutal on Tony Blair threatening Iran with its favorite mosquito, the United Nations —

Blair threatens to bring out the big gun —a UN resolution

He had no idea just how funny this would turn out. Mr. Blair? I’ve got your “international condemnation” right here:

The U.N. Security Council expressed “grave concern” Thursday over Iran’s seizure of 15 British sailors and marines and called for an early resolution of the escalating dispute, but Iran’s chief international negotiator suggested the captives might be put on trial.

The council’s statement wasn’t as tough as Britain had hoped, though, and the divide seemed to deepen.

The Security Council’s statement was a watered-down version of a stronger draft sought by Britain to “deplore” Iranian actions and urge the immediate release of the prisoners, primarily because Russia and South Africa opposed putting blame on the Tehran regime, diplomats said.

Poor Mr. Blair can’t even get the Security Council — the General Assembly? give me a break — to ringingly condemn an act of piracy and kidnapping on the high seas! It would be interesting to run a test of what exactly Russia — oh, please, South Africa? give me a break — will go along with the West on in the U.N. these days. Nuvo-imperial Russia has become the perfect weathervane of which direction is the wrong side on just about every issue.

I just love it, all the history we’ve had since the end of history!

UPDATE:  Cold Fury is brutal and more brutal on the sight of Britannia’s waterlogged capitulation.

I’ve written already about Tony Blair’s most un-excellent adventure, as has everyone else. But here’s my tiny original thought:

Ahmadinejad has pushed this so far — so self-parodyingly, pathetically far — that he, even more than Tony Blair, is now completely up a tree. He cannot possibly climb down. His whole sale is defiance, and now he has to actually achieve outright humiliation of the British before there’s any chance he can let these people go home.

He just might get that, of course.

A new renewed offer from the Arabs to Israel:

Arab leaders at their summit Thursday agreed on a call for Israel to accept their land-for-peace offer and open direct negotiations with the Arabs. Unlike past summits that at times saw overt feuds break out, the gathering of Arab kings, emirs and presidents showed unusual public unity as it revived the peace offer, which they first made in 2002 only to meet rejection from Israel. . . .U.S. allies Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan hope the smaller groups will be able to be more flexible in promoting the offer to win acceptance, despite the summit’s rejection of changes. . . .

The initiative offers Israel recognition and permanent peace with all Arab countries in return for Israeli withdrawal from lands captured in the 1967 Middle East war. It also calls for setting up a Palestinian state with east Jerusalem as its capital and a “just solution” to the issue of Palestinian refugees forced out of lands in what is now Israel. . . .

Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa rejected amending the peace offer, saying, “They tell us to amend it, but we tell them to accept it first, then we can sit down at the negotiating table.” But he said the Arabs must “do more to convince” the Israelis on the offer.

That’s right: “They tell us to amend it, but we tell them to accept it first, then we can sit down at the negotiating table.”

Does that sound unreasonable to you? That is because you are stuck in your racist, orientalist way of thinking. It is not unreasonable, my friend. Yes, I call you friend! Be my friend while I explain this to you. (Here, hold this bowling ball with a firecracker on top while I explain.)

It isn’t really unreasonable, for one simple reason: Arab states do not consider treaties binding in the first place. They are merely pretexts for the temporary cessation of overt violence.

So Israel does not have to fear this formulation, my friend. It should accept the offer, then negotiate it, and then learn to swim.

Guido Fawkes at Dodgeblogium points out that — absent a humiliating (but, given Blair’s chits with GWB, very likely) military bail-out by the U.S. Navy, the once-dominant Royal Navy does not have much to threaten Iran with (I’ve added a link):

Blair can bluster and posture all he likes, the Iranians will strip our boats (they never ever returned the last lot they seized equally illegally!), beat up our seamen and their RM colleagues and then, after parading them with sham “confessions” on Arab TV, will send them home ignominiously. And Blair and his coterie of luvvies will do exactly nothing about it at all.

What is more, with our fleet reduced to a squadron, and with no strike aircraft and no carriers to call on for air support (shades of the Japanese invasion of Malaya in 1941 and the sinking of HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse!), there is not even the capacity to strengthen our presence in the Shatt al Arap. So much for the infamous Civil Service canard that a single ship is more powerful than an entire fleet. Even the World War 1 Grand Fleet would have had more capacity to intervene against these bandits than the single ship deployed in this disputed waterway – no matter how modern or powerful her weapons are, they are useless if they cannot be fired to annihiliate the enemy. Even the now antiquated guns of HMS Belfast would have been able to lay down a barrage in support of the boats that would have given the Iranians pause for thought, so imagine what several of her class would have been able to offer – including extra boats, arms and men to intervene whenever the Iranians tried a raid. War cannot be fought from the Cabinet Office or Cabinet Room in Whitehall, it has to be left to the man on the ground – and he has to have complete freedom of action in all situations!

Okay, I can’t necessarily sign on to “complete freedom of action in all situations” — but this is just awful for England and, as you can infer from Ian’s remarks, was completely predictable. (What could I have been thinking when I said it could be otherwise?)

It’s also the stickiest of wickets for Tony Blair who is, remember, a liberal who nonetheless went into that dirty bathtub at the side of the U.S. precisely on the premise that England is a major, if second-rank, power that has national interests in that region and can and should do something about them. It cost him a huge chunk of his popular support — which is actually fine and noble; leaders should be prepared to spend political capital to do the right thing for their countries — but now, on the eve of his own “Okay, that’s just about enough leadership” withdrawal — this.

Now what? Can Blair possibly use force (assuming Ian is overstating the dearth of strategic options) when he has no support at all to be there in the first place? Can he not use force and just reinforce the claim that England would only end up weakening, not strengthening, its global position by virtue of engagement in the Mideast? And then, of course, Ian’s point — what force? George Bush’s force? How humiliating and how absolutely politically bitter for Blair, who deserves better, at least morally.

UPDATE: Cap’n Ed puts it in stark terms.