The Pirates of Tehran
By Fred Thompson (H/T: Michelle)

Oil prices fell. The stock market rose. Video images of smiling British soldiers with Iranian President Ahmadinejad were everywhere. So were pictures of the 15 freed hostages embracing family members back home. The relief over the return of the Brits was so tremendous; you could almost hear birds singing.

Maybe it's because military action won't be needed or maybe it's just because the ordeal won't drag on and on, but the world is breathing easier now. A lot of folks are happy. The problem, as I see it, is that Ahmadinejad seems to be the happiest. ...

See-Dubya has more here, Don Surber comments here, Ed Morrissey comments here.

In case you didn't make it by yesterday:

• Iranian Piracy/Brit Hostage Crisis Post-Mortem -- Day 2
  • Americans offered 'aggressive patrols' in Iranian airspace
  • Goody Bagful Of Dishonor
  • What ever happened to "Let's Roll"
  • US Offered Military Assistance To UK During Hostage Crisis
  • Recently Freed Iranian "Diplomat" Says He Was Tortured by CIA
  • Torture, Lies and Videotape

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AP Hopes For More Iran "Compromises."
And That Unicorns Are Real
Rick Moran

I had to read this “analysis” by AP’s Sally Buzzbee twice before I decided it was not a belated April Fool’s joke. In a word, outrageous:

Iran’s abrupt release of 15 British sailors and marines is raising hopes the country might compromise on other disputes, most notably its nuclear program.

The move points to the growing influence of pragmatic conservatives, a faction that backs Iran’s Islamic clerical leadership but is still willing to deal with the West — at least to ensure that the country is not harmed in its confrontations with the U.S. and its allies.

British media credited the breakthrough to Ali Larijani, Iran’s top foreign policy negotiator who leads its diplomatic efforts in dealing with a demand by the West for a freeze in Iranian uranium enrichment.

While a religious conservative, Larijani is seen as a pragmatist with close ties to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He and his allies, including former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, are less anti-Western than Iran’s hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

First, whose hopes are being raised by this stunning propaganda victory of the Iranians? My guess is the AP editorial board and Sally Buzzbee. You sure don’t see these “hopes” anywhere else in the western world:

The Bush administration said Thursday that the release of 15 British sailors and marines held by Iran for two weeks created no new openings in dealing with Tehran, and it urged American allies to return their attention to enforcing new sanctions against Iran. ...

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Kharnival of the Humiliations 
Jules Crittenden

[An excellent roundup. Just go read it.]

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Successful Strategies Usually Get Repeated 
Ed Morrissey

If anyone expresses shock over the latest report from The Telegraph, they expose themselves as having no sense of history. The British newspaper reports that the Iranians plan more hostaging as a result of the successes they scored during the crisis over the last two weeks:

Hardliners in the Iranian regime have warned that the seizure of British naval personnel demonstrates that they can make trouble for the West whenever they want to and do so with impunity.

The bullish reaction from Teheran will reinforce the fears of western diplomats and military officials that more kidnap attempts may be planned.

The British handling of the crisis has been regarded with some concern in Washington, and a Pentagon defence official told The Sunday Telegraph: "The fear now is that this could be the first of many. If the Brits don't change their rules of engagement, the Iranians could take more hostages almost at will. ...

People keep insisting that the Iranians didn't win anything in this confrontation. The Telegraph quotes other British sources that conclude that the Iranians lost ground with other nations that may have supported their right to the nuclear cycle. That analysis figures that Iran may have a more difficult time making enriched uranium if more nations disapprove of the mullahcracy.

That's simply ludicrous. Iran committed an act of war on the United Kingdom. It then violated the Geneva Convention on several occasions. For these acts, it received no negative consequences whatsoever. Britain pressed the US to reduce its military profile in the Gulf, and the British themselves stopped their interdiction patrols. In return, Iran released the hostages and made themselves look like moderates in doing so, and strengthened the political position of the hardliners at home. ...

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Fury as the hostages sell stories

The 15 British military captives who were released by the Iranians have been authorised by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to sell their stories.

MoD officials claimed that the move to lift the ban on military personnel selling their stories while in service was justified because of the “exceptional circumstances” of the case. The hostages are expected to earn as much as £250,000 between them.

The story of Faye Turney, 26, the only female among them, is expected to be the most lucrative. She could profit by as much as £150,000 from a joint deal with a newspaper and ITV.  ...

This weekend relatives of victims killed or injured in the Iraq war and opposition politicians criticised the authorisation as “inappropriate” and “undignified”. It comes only three days after their release and before they have given detailed evidence to an official inquiry. ...

Rose Gentle, whose son Gordon Gentle was killed by a roadside bomb in Basra in Iraq, said the MoD should not allow the servicemen to sell their stories. “This is wrong and I don’t think it should be allowed by the MoD. None of the parents who have lost loved ones in Iraq have sold their stories,” she said.

Critics claimed it had become a media circus, with one former British commander saying the released hostages were behaving like reality TV contestants. Others said they were being used as pawns in the propaganda war with Iran. But some former soldiers said it was a shrewd move by the MoD to control publication of the captives’ stories. ...

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Britannia, waive the rules!
Scott Johnson

Though he uses it for a slightly different purpose, Mark Steyn coins the pun that provides the perfect comment on the Ministry of Defence's authorization of the British hostages to sell their stories: Britannia, waive the rules! In the long Sunday Times (London) story on the waiver of the rules against profiteering while in service, one quote sticks out among many striking statements:

One of the hostages, Dean Harris, 30, an acting sergeant in the Royal Marines, told a Sunday Times reporter yesterday: “I want £70,000. That is based on what the others have told me they have been offered. I know Faye has been offered a heck more than that. I am worth it because I was one of only two who didn’t crack.”

It's a bit of a comedown from "blood, toil, tears and sweat."

You have to go over to the Telegraph for the quote that provides the necessary perspective from the Iranian side: ...

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Iran's bluff humbles Britain 
Mark Steyn

Watching Tottenham Hotspur fans taking on the Spanish constabulary at a European soccer match the other night, I found myself idly speculating on what might have happened had those Iranian kidnappers made the mistake of seizing 15 hard-boiled football yobs who hadn't got the Blair memo about not escalating the situation.

Instead, as we know, the mullahs were fortunate enough to take hostage 15 Royal Navy sailors and Royal Marines. Which were which was hard to say upon their release. The Queen's Navee had been demobbed. The token gal was dressed up as an Islamic woman and the 14 men had been kitted out in Ahmadinejad leisurewear. Which is not just a ghastly fashion faux pas but a breach of the increasingly one-way Geneva Conventions. But they smiled and they waved. Wave, Britannia! Britannia, waive the rules!

The Associated Press reported the story as follows: ''Analysis: Hope For More Iran Compromises.''

Well, if by ''compromise'' you mean Tehran didn't put them up for a show trial and behead them, you might have a point. With this encouraging development, we might persuade them to wipe only half of Israel off the map, or even nuke some sparsely occupied corner of the Yukon instead. With the momentum of this "compromise" driving events, all manner of diplomatic triumphs are possible. ...

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UK humiliation in Iran: Kaus asks, I answer
Bryan Preston

Via InstaPundit, we hear from Mickey Kaus:

Hawks for Humiliation: Am I missing something? Why exactly was the resolution of the latest Iran hostage crisis a “success” for Iran and a “humiliation” for Britain, as the hawkish Charles Krauthammer argues (and Geoffrey Wheatcroft insinuates but doesn’t quite come out and say in his own voice, as opposed to John Bolton’s)? The hostages were released in a one-day propaganda stunt, maybe in exchange for the release of an Iranian we were holding and Iranian visitation rights for some others. But the Iranians were also looking at an awful lot of aircraft carriers steaming around their neighborhood. Didn’t they blink? If that’s humiliation, it’s not far from what a U.S.-U.K. victory in the crisis would look like.

The “humiliation” take on the hostage crisis doesn’t come from a desire to fight or invade Iran. Or at least, that’s not where it’s coming from in my own take on the incident. I would rather several things be tried with Iran first before we get to military confrontation, though the credible threat of our bringing force to bear should always be in the back of the mullahs’ minds. With two carriers currently in the Gulf and a third on its way to relieve one of them, I’m sure the threat of US force is credible enough.

But as to the humiliation, imho the UK was humiliated, first, because the fairly pathetic Iranian navy managed to capture members of Britain’s senior service while they were in Iraqi waters, and without firing a shot, because the British Rules of Engagement apparently don’t allow for proactive self-defense. The UK was humiliated second in its sailors’ and Marines’ apparent haste to offer up confessions and apologies to their captors. The third humiliation came at the end of the standoff, when the sailors and Marines gave Mahmoud a big thumbs up on their way out. Throw in the headscarf, the partying, the goodie bags etc while we’re at it. Iran also got to distract the world from the continuing standoff over its nuclear weapons program for a while, and may have won access to its officers currently held by the US in Iraq.

And then there’s the story that just broke today: ...

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Dan Riehl: "If Britain is a bellwether, the West is lost."

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Former Hostage, Iran, 1979
Frank J.

Commenter FormerHostage wrote a response to my question. Given his first hand experience of the 444 days Americans were held hostage by Iranian radicals from November 4th, 1979, to January 20th, 1981, I think everyone should give this a read:

As my screenname indicates, I can speak with Complete Moral Authority (tm) on this issue.

On the day of the takeover, the Marines were outnumbered at least 1000 to 1. We held the consulate and the communications vault for over 12 hours, helping to destroy equipment and classified material. We were under STRICT orders not to fire our weapons or pop gas grenades (too late for that last one..hee, hee, hee). We were eventually told that we were on or own and to make a break for it. The monkeys even put one of the diplomats in front of the comm vault peep eye with a pistol to their head and threatened to kill them unless the door was opened. It wasn't and they didn't. Once all the material was destroyed the doors were opened and they all got the crap beat out of them.

When we were first taken, the Iranians took us into a room individually and asked us to sign a statement denouncing the US policy in Iran, Israel, the Shah, etc. The Marines signed with names such as Michael Mouse, Chesty Puller, Dan Daly (google the last two...Marine Corps legends), Harry Butz, etc. ...