President Ahmedinejad, today, announced that he will release the 15 British soldiers Iran abducted from Iraqi waters. He said he will pardon them.
This seems like good news, but it is very mixed. Certainly the goal of getting the soldiers back is being met. If that were the sole goal, however, Britain would have capitulated to admission of being in Iranian waters long ago.
The problem with this resolution is that the claim of British forces being in Iranian waters remain and acceptance of the pardons implies guilt. Even if no other concessions were extracted for the sailors' release, this is a net PR win for Iran.
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4 comments:
'Forgiveness' is a 'gift' you can't reject or return... even if you don't 'deserve' it.
I think the release is PR neutral; I think the pardons make Iran look silly and is a PR loss for them.
If the British government said, "Yes, we agree. We had no business being in those waters." Then I might agree with you. So far, all of the responses I've seen from the British government have been expressions of relief and diplomacy:
"Throughout, we have taken a measured approach, firm but calm, not negotiating but not confronting, either."
And the Prime Minister even threw in a little forgiveness of his own:
"To the Iranian people I would simply say this. We bear you no ill will."
Actually, I call that a PR win for the British.
The thing is, acceptance of a pardon is admission of guilt. So if the UK accepts the pardons for it's sailors, it might as well have said, "Yes, we agree. We had no business being in those waters."
That is why it is a net gain for Iran to do this. A pardon, in the legal sense, is not 'Forgiveness' in the moral sense.
I don't think the British government "accepted" the pardons, they just expressed their relief regarding the return of their people.
However, even if it was "required" that the British soldiers admit "guilt" as a condition of their release, that would be tantamount to a shotgun admission. I don't think the rest of the world will look unfavorably on such a "compromise" in the interest of saving lives. So even under those conditions, the PR does not favor Iran.
But, as I said, I don't believe there were any terms or conditions on the release and I've not seen any apologies or admissions on the part of the British government...
Unfortunately, national relationships don't work that way. I was going to write, "Just wait, you'll see the Iranians referring to the U.K. violating their sovereignty" in my last comment but you don't have to wait. It was already on the news, this morning. There was no forgiveness.
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