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Thursday, January 10, 2008 12:00 AM

The U.S. military inflicts more damage on its own credibility

Factually dubious claims about the Strait of Hormuz incident are part of a larger, highly destructive pattern.

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  • Thursday, January 10, 2008 02:23 PM

    Official Version of Naval Incident Starts to Unravel

    Glenn and all,

    You might want to take a look at this report from IPS News at http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40747:

    Official Version of Naval Incident Starts to Unravel

    Despite the official and media portrayal of the incident in the Strait of Hormuz early Monday morning as a serious threat to U.S. ships from Iranian speedboats that nearly resulted in a "battle at sea", new information over the past three days suggests that the incident did not involve such a threat and that no U.S. commander was on the verge of firing at the Iranian boats...

    ~snip~

    ...The U.S. warships were not concerned about the possibility that the Iranian boats were armed with heavier weapons capable of doing serious damage. Asked by a reporter whether any of the vessels had anti-ship missiles or torpedoes, Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff, Commander of the 5th Fleet, answered that none of them had either of those two weapons.

    "I didn't get the sense from the reports I was receiving that there was a sense of being afraid of these five boats," said Cosgriff...

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