Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Jumping the freak-out gun

I didn't comment about yesterday's mini-freakout on the right about the American sailors who were detained by Iran after they (possibly) strayed into Iranian waters. I didn't comment because I didn't get the time to. But also because it really wasn't clear how it would play out. These kinds of things happen fairly often, especially in the Persian Gulf where there is a lot of international traffic and the lines between territorial waters and international waters are really close. If the American boats did stray into Iranian waters, the Iranians would be fully within their rights to detain them to find out if they entered intentionally or were really spies. (Imagine for a moment if an Iranian military vessel strayed into U.S. territorial waters) What they shouldn't do is to jail them without proof of any wrongdoing. But when I went to bed last night, it just wasn't clear what Iran would do.

By the time I woke up this morning, Iran was already letting them go. Iran did the right thing after all.