Hypocrites challenge Corbyn’s call for evidence in tanker controversy
Blaze: An oil tanker burns in the Gulf of Oman. But was Iran really responsible?
Isn’t it childish that, in this age of climate change and environmental catastrophe caused by fossil fuels, our leaders are squabbling over oil again?
The Conservative government has supported claims by the United States that attacks on two oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman – on one of the world’s most important tanker routes – were caused by Iran.
Apparently the removal of a mine from one of the tankers by Iranian special forces was portrayed as proof of that country’s guilt by the US government under Donald Trump. He said he guessed one of the mines used to attack the ships did not explode “and it had Iran written all over it”.
The UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, under prime ministerial wannabe Jeremy Hunt, said an investigation by the United Arab Emirates had concluded that the attacks had been caused by a “sophisticated state actor”, and Mr Hunt said he was satisfied that the actor in question was Iran.
Let’s pause for a moment and compare this behaviour with the Tory government’s response to United Nations claims that its policies had caused an increase in poverty here – DWP secretary Amber Rudd, and Theresa May, said it was impossible for such a conclusion to be formed after such a short period collecting evidence; less than two weeks. The report on the tankers has appeared in less than two days, it seems.
So we have an arguable double-standard in the Tory government’s stance.
But that hasn’t stopped ministers from attacking Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, simply for suggesting that a little conclusive evidence should be collected first:
Britain should act to ease tensions in the Gulf, not fuel a military escalation that began with US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear agreement. Without credible evidence about the tanker attacks, the government’s rhetoric will only increase the threat of war.
— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) June 14, 2019
Happily, the response from the public has been to challenge the Tories. Consider, for example, this reponse to Mr Hunt:
Jeremy Hunt brands Labour leader 'pathetic' over Iran comments https://t.co/cVh6WlPlyO Remember Gulf of Tonkin, WMD etc where US proof turned out to be false. It's not soft on Iran, or excusing any of their crimes, to demand evidence we can trust before sounding the war trumpets.
— JewishVoiceForLabour (@JVoiceLabour) June 15, 2019
Let’s face it – a previous UK government tried to convince us that a war with Iraq was a good idea, based on evidence that was later disproved. That was in alliance with the United States, too.
The people slagging off Jeremy Corbyn for this tweet are the same people who cheered for the Iraq War when Tony Blair, George W Bush and John Bolton insisted Saddam Hussein had WMDs. Don't be fooled again.
A war with Iran will make the war with Iraq look like a pillow fight. https://t.co/cXFs58tqjg
— Frank Owen's Legendary Paintbrush🥀🇵🇸🇾🇪 (@OwenPaintbrush) June 15, 2019
It is the attack on Mr Corbyn that is most offensive, though:
https://twitter.com/AutisticOu/status/1139940423982616576
https://twitter.com/ToryFibs/status/1139805044210110464
https://twitter.com/ToryFibs/status/1139885137481650178
https://twitter.com/Muqadaam/status/1139915507451269121
That is the fact of this matter.
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This: https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/06/the-gulf-of-credibility/?fbclid=IwAR2bJTRS_rzhlz-2_EiUcetMXv8h5dSPnYdCdnOT85eAmVdLSBiWDQbaKZ0
https://thehill.com/policy/defense/448535-oil-tanker-captain-disputes-part-of-us-account-of-attack
And the US version of what happened is disputed – by the crew of the Japanese tanker that was attacked!
Hi Mike,
Possible removal of something from the side of a ship – bur a mine?.
If something was removed it was more likely to have been a magnetic mooring point used by the Iranian boats to stay close to the ships hull while rescuing personnel.
Likely to be pretty standard equipment for the sort of jobs done with these boats
Can be bought “off the shelf”
https://www.offshore-technology.com/contractors/environmental/miko-marine/
One has to say that the USA has form in this context. Just as a matter of interest (going back a while in some cases, admittedly), here are a just FEW examples: the Spanish-American War of 1898 (casus belli – a probable false flag operation by the USA against the USS Maine in Havana harbour, unless it was opportunistic relabeling of an accidental internal explosion in the ship); the Philippine–American War, 1899-1902 officially, though in practice it went on to 1913 (“The war resulted in the deaths of at least 200,000 Filipino civilians, mostly due to famine and disease. Some estimates for total civilian dead reach up to a million.”); various excursions, overt and covert, over the years in many if not most of the countries Central and South America and the Caribbean; Vietnam – American involvement kicked off by the Gulf of Tonkin ‘incident’, which never actually happened; the yellow-cake uranium and biological weapons lies to ease the US (and allies) invasion (and ‘shock and awe’ bombardment) of Iraq in 2003. Oh yes, and there was, of course, that 1953 Iranian coup d’état orchestrated by the US Central Intelligence Agency and the UK’s MI6.
Why on earth would Iran attack a tanker from a country with which it is negotiating and oil deal – it is a nonsense. Also if this vessel had been hit by a torpedo it would have had a huge hole blown in its side and it is very doubtful it would have survived.
It is obvious the USA is looking for a war against Iran, whose only offence is to sit on large oil reserves which the US wants, just as it did with Iraq’s oil. Prepare for Jeremy H(C)**t, to slavishly follow the US lies and take Britain into yet another unwinnable war which will cause yet more devastation in the Middle East.
Let us not forget that there is no real evidence, as Scott Ritter has pointed out, that Russia has violated the INF missile treaty.
And now comes the suggestion by William Nitze that the US might be violating the treaty. But this has not stopped Hunt from swallowing the Trump administration lies on this subject. And now Hunt is prepared to help promote a war with Iran in order to improve his Conservative Party leadership election chances.
Nitze writes:
“The United States may be seeking to avoid scrutiny of our own possible noncompliance with the treaty. The Aegis ashore systems deployed in Romania and planned for Poland could be modified to have the ability to launch nuclear-tipped cruise missiles in excess of the range limitations set by the INF and could be armed with these missiles very quickly.”
https://www.thenation.com/article/trump-inf-treaty-russia-national-security/
No, because environmental catrastrophe only exists in your bigoted, unjournalistic head
Thank you for your scientific explanation of all the evidence. I… Oh!
Where is it?
Cui Bono? US and Israel have made repeated calls for war against Iran, the US has everything to gain from it, Israel has always wanted to destroy Iran and Britain is a lackey to them both. Who then, stands to gain from the tanker incidents? Certainly not Iran. Wake up and smell the pig sh*t you are being fed!
Jeremy Corbyn understands only too well what the Tories are up to along with our propagit MSM and as usual has asked for something reasonable rather than settle for egregious perfidy by his opposite number.
Mind your language, please!
What does “propagit” mean?