Ken Taylor, former Canada's envoy to Iran:

• Iran is trying to shed its wild-card image and establish itself as a mature country willing to negotiate by releasing 15 captured Britons, former Canadian diplomat Ken Taylor said yesterday.

It's the very mistake I thought many naive people including even seasoned diplomat like former ambassador Taylor would make in the western world, and the mistake is that many may believe the mullahs of Iran wanted to show their so-called mature face to the world in the wake of the crisis over their nuclear weapons program.

My personal take is that clerics did this hostage taking to achieve a few major strategic goals:

1) To divert the world attention from their nuke programs for as long as possible. 2) To tell the world that we take hostages and we create crises but you 'the free world' can still negotiate with us and our nuclear issues can be discussed as well. 3) Like I said in number 2, they need time to develop and finalize their nuclear weapons program therefore the longer they can drag the issue, the better. Mullahs kidnap some British sailors, hold them, release them and then make the naive western world believe that diplomacy may work with them and that's exactly what they want: To drag this thing as long as possible, because all they need is time and we're giving them the time they need to build the A-Bomb.

The free world must remember that this is the very same regime which has no mercy for its own people and those who oppose it. And the free world must also remember that this theocratic regime stops short of nothing to do what it was created for to do which is to export its radical version of Islam through out the world and spread its shiite poison around the mideast region. The next few months are very critical in dealing with this evil regime.

http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2007/04/mistake.html

Meh it was all a show, they didn't even really negotiate from what I saw....

I believe we call this propaganda....

Isn't the real purpose to encourage the insurgents in Iraq? By capturing them without a fight and making the hostages keep apologizing over something which they probably haven't done or at least is so ambiguous as to be meaningless (cross the border) it makes them and the British look pathetic and defeatable. I doubt if anyone really believes that a strict border violation has occurred, however this suits the Iranians far more than something of more substance.

Horatio Nelson must be turning in his grave.

Originally Posted by Donkey

Meh it was all a show, they didn't even really negotiate from what I saw....

I believe we call this propaganda....

Second that