"How will the US respond?" Topic

"Iran seizes oil tanker linked to crisis between US and Tehran, military officials confirm"

Ahhhh tis worse: it was Iran who seized the tanker.

"Iranian forces have seized an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, two U.S. military officials confirmed"

🤔 What will we do?

I guess they were not trying to stifle those Houthis. 😉

Again the only way to stop this is to take out military targets in Houthi territory, Shia militias in Iraq & Syria plus their big brother Iran. Again the US has the firepower. Just not the will. No one is going to support these enemies of the world. Not Egypt, Jordan, the KSA, or many others. Well maybe Syria, but they have their own problems and have for a couple of decades.

Drones, TLAMs, high-tech strike aircraft, etc. gives the US the ability to take care of "business" … But it lacks the will based on very poor understanding of geopolitics/Realpolitik. And a skewed perception of what is going on in reality. You can't talk sense to supporters of terrorists or the terrorists.

"Bloomberg confirmed that the Marshall Islands-flagged tanker "St Nikolas" is the vessel that was hijacked. A previous report says that St Nikolas was seized by the US last year, sailing under a different name, "Suez Rajan," for transporting unauthorized Iranian cargo."

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Iran seems to be treating it is somehow vengeance for last years seizure – a Greek owned boat, with a Marshall Islands flag, a multi-national crew, loaded with Iraqi crude heading for Turkey (IIRC)…. Honestly not sure its quite the flex maybe they think it is? As much as they like to claim dominance over the Arabian Gulf I honestly don't see them going any further, but then may be they will have an attack of stupid.

Well this just broke

Subject: US and UK prepare to launch strikes against Houthis in Yemen | Yemen | The Guardian


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But are we purposefully telegraphing this?

They won't be able to do much about it. Their radars will see it coming most likely anyway. Maybe the current US leadership does not want to escalate, as is their predilection, so if that is their plan … well … 'nuff said…