re: #686 Killgore Trout

True. I don’t expect the Magical Balance Fairy but there’s some really stupid stuff going on with lefty outlets these days. Just recently Maddow made the stupid claim that diplomatic solutions with Iran had been outlawed. Just as stupid and dishonest as anything on Fox News. A certain amount of intellectual honesty means the same rules about honesty should be applied to both sides. I stopped checking media matters a while ago and I don’t miss it.

But Maddow was right.

The bill contains a provision—inserted without debate in committee after garnering the majority of its cosponsors—that would outlaw contact between U.S. government employees and certain Iranian officials. This would not just tie the hands of our diplomats, it would prevent U.S. troops in the field—particularly members of the U.S. Navy operating in the tense Persian Gulf—from making military to military contacts with their Iranian counterparts.

Why is this so dangerous? Because in the Persian Gulf, near run-ins between American and Iranian vessels are averted more frequently than many realize. If the no-contact provision were enacted, it would outlaw the U.S. Navy’s bridge-to-bridge communications with Iranian vessels in the Persian Gulf – communications that are crucial to enabling safe transit and preventing confrontation in the often crowded waterways through which 20% of the world’s oil supplies flow.
If an Iranian vessel were to approach aggressively a U.S. vessel – as happens all too often – our sailors would be legally barred from making contact with the offending ship. Our sailors would have to send a request up the chain of command to the President, who would have to submit a waiver to Congress. They would then need to wait 15 days for the waiver to take effect before they would have permission to communicate with the Iranian vessel. These sailors barely have fifteen minutes to defuse these situations, let alone fifteen days.

These dangerous scenarios in the Persian Gulf prompted then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen to warn in October, “If something happens, it’s virtually assured that we won’t get it right, that there will be miscalculations which would be extremely dangerous in that part of the world.”