Iran Continues Agitprop Campaign While Holding Britons

The Iranians are continuing their propaganda campaign, releasing yet more videos purporting to show that the captured Britons are pointing to locations on maps claiming that they were inside Iranian waters when they were picked up by the Iranians. The Iranians are claiming that all 15 captured have admitted to being inside Iranian waters.

Given how effective those videos are, one has to wonder why Iran would stop airing them. Maybe it has something to do with the British government completely caving in to the Iranian demands?

Iran’s state-run radio on Monday cited what it called “positive changes” in Britain’s negotiating stance and said because of those, television stations would not broadcast additional videos of British sailors’ confessions.

The state-run radio did not detail what it meant by positive changes, nor quote any officials by name. A state-run TV station had said earlier Monday that all 15 British sailors and marines held captive by the country had confessed to illegally entering Iranian waters.

The British government response has been quite lacking, which is in stark contrast to events 25 years ago. On this day 25 years ago, the British fought back against the Argentine government that invaded the Falkland Islands. At the time, the British were supposed to be incapable of fighting a war thousands of miles away and with limited logistics. While they suffered serious casualties when several ships were hit with Argentine missiles, they did push Argentina to surrender and retook the Islands.

UPDATE:
The rumor mill is certainly flying today on this story. There is a report that the US military is preparing airstrikes against Iran for this Friday. How about providing the time and exact locations while you're at it? Iran's busy claiming that the US is already violating Iranian airspace with overflights. Well, this one is just a bit more believable.

"Two US aircraft trespassed into Iranian airspace northwest of (the port city of) Abadan before flying southwest into
Iraq," a Revolutionary Guards commander in Abadan identified only as Colonel Aqili was quoted as saying by the Al-Alam channel's website.

"The planes left white vapour trails, attracting the local people's attention," he said, without elaborating on when the alleged incursion took place.

The incident happened close to Iran's border with Iraq, where the US and British military are deployed in force, he said.

A US military spokesman told AFP that he had investigated the Iranian military's claim and found no evidence to support it.

"There is nothing that we saw that would indicate that that happened," he told AFP.

Then, there's the report that Britain has changed its stance and that a deal is in the works to secure the release of the 15.