here is the link you requested, I presume it was the Poll results you wanted. To Date (2 April 07) 31000 votes – 67% voted in favour that Britain should go in and take its sailors back, by force if necessary.

http://news.uk.msn.com/navy_sailors_seized_in_the_gulf.aspx?voteshowresults=1&pollcontent=-1140266873&jsdisabled=true

The Iranians might be supprised that polls carried out show that 70% of the British public would support military action against Iran if diplomatic efforts fail!!

Do not forget Thatcher and the Falklands, this made her a hero and Mr Blair although he likes his nicey nicey image would love to be remembered as a hero. And although the UK military isn’t a massive force, they have a lot of friends and the US owes the UK big style. Not that the US would need much of an excuse to bomb some Iranian guard, I feel.

Lets just hope it ends peacfully, and that a more moderate government comes to iraq.

That’s so incredibly naive, I wouldn’t know where to begin!

America & America’s puppet regime in Iran brutalized that country… All the way back to when the USA ousted the democratically-elected Mossadegh in the 1950s.

The little madman hopes to become a martyr.

You could well be right about the Iranians’ motivations. They have been playing a very careful game for years, but this move has the look of desperation about it. I suspect the Iranians have experienced a few shocks that they hadn’t planned on that have upset their careful strategy.

1) The UN Security Council has voted sanctions on them (now two sets of sanctions) and they are hurting the Iranian economy, as well as withdrawing international support that is needed for their strategy to play out. They had no doubt counted on Russian or Chinese intervention to block sanctions. They did not get it.

2) The Russians (Putin himself!) pulled their support for the Bushrer reactor project. Without that support Bushrer will never come on line. Putin has apparently decided that Russia does not need a nuclear Iran only 3,000 miles south of Moscow, possibly acting as a magnet for Israeli warheads.

3) The Surge. Regardless of whether the Surge achieves all of the objectives the Bush Administration has set for it, it has clearly already upset the calculations of the various factions in Iraq, as well as in Iran. Bush has done something neither Iran nor the Iraqi Shiites expected that he would–or could do. The Surge is clearly changing the dynamics on the ground in Iraq. The Iranians have to be wondering what else they have gotten wrong in their assessment of the US.

Thing have not been going the Iranian’s way in 2007. They may be looking at the ruin of many years of planning and political-diplomatic effort. Might be they are trying their own version of “double down and win.”

As you say, a very dangerous game.