Patrick Wintour – The Guardian June 13, 2019
Two oil tankers have been attacked in the Gulf of Oman, leaving one ablaze and the other adrift, a month after a similar incident in which four tankers in the region were struck.
The US navy’s fifth fleet said it was assisting the tankers, which issued distress calls near the strategic strait of Hormuz. The crew from both tankers were evacuated.
Reports of the explosions originally came from the same Hezbollah-linked news agencies in Lebanon that correctly reported attacks on tankers docked off the coast of the United Arab Emirates in May. The US blamed those attacks on Iran – an accusation Tehran has denied.
The suspected attacks occurred along one of the world’s busiest oil routes, and the price of oil surged as the initial reports emerged on Thursday.
Front Altair was carrying 75,000 tonnes of naphtha, a petrochemical feedstock, when it suffered a suspected torpedo hit, according to Taiwan’s state oil refiner CPC, which chartered the vessel. Other unverified reports suggested a mine attack.
The vessel was on fire but afloat, said its operator Frontline, denying a report by the Iranian news agency IRNA that it had sunk.
The Kokuka Courageous was damaged in a suspected attack that breached the hull above the waterline while en route from Saudi Arabia to Singapore, Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement said. “The ship is safely afloat,” it added
Iranian state TV reported 44 crew had been evacuated from the tankers to an Iranian port.
United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, which is part of the Royal Navy, said it was investigating. “We are deeply concerned by reports of explosions and fires on vessels in the strait of Hormuz. We are in contact with local authorities and partners in the region,” said a UK government spokeswoman.
Tensions in the Gulf have been close to boiling point for weeks as the US puts “maximum economic pressure” on Iran in an attempt to force Tehran to reopen talks about the 2015 nuclear deal, which the US pulled out of last year.
The timing of Thursday’s attack was especially sensitive because it came as the Japanese prime minister, Shinzō Abe, held talks with the Iranian leadership in Tehran in an effort to find a basis for discussions between the US and Iran. The Japanese stressed they were not bringing specific messages from the US president, Donald Trump, and said nothing that they had heard in the first day of talks suggested a breakthrough was imminent.
Japan’s trade ministry said the two oil tankers involved in Thursday’s incidents carried “Japan-related” cargo.
The Iranian foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, described Thursday’s developments as “suspicious” and implied that the fault lay with a person or group trying to damage his country.
“Suspicious doesn’t begin to describe what likely transpired this morning,” he tweeted, adding that the incidents took place while Abe was meeting Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, “for extensive and friendly talks”.
who else would do this but miossad, i smell the stench of the dirty jew here
Ellis, “we shall do war by way of deception”. The zionist way for more then a hudred years.
Here Is The Real News: Americans Are Stupid And Insanely Greedy
So let’s get a good eye on the optics on the scene surrounding this attempt to encourage war. What has been occurring in the area:
– Saudi Arabia illegally started attacking and invading Yemen, Yemen is resisting Saudi Forces, and is in fact making Saudi forces look like a bunch of second rate morons (which if you have ever met a Saudi, that’s pretty much what they are, morons, but evil morons, believe me you really have to dumb down your conversation skills with these people they are so simple minded. I speak from professional experience on this!). Saudi Arabia can’t win in Yemen, in fact they are starting to take a licking, by people that have little more than machine guns on camels!
– Recently Saudi Arabia’s airport that is located more than a few hundred kilometers from the fighting in Yemen was recently and successfully attacked. Can you imagine what happened in Riyadh? I bet you 10:1 that everyone off those coward rich evil Saudis were winding up their planes, getting ready to run for it, just in case it was a full scaled invasion. As cowardly these Saudis are, its no wonder camels have more guts than a Saudi.
– US forces in the gulf recently failed to make it look like the Iranians tried to sink a container ship, by planting a minor bomb under the hull of said container ship. Now think about this, why would Iran sink a ship in the straights of Hormuz when it is their ONLY sea born gateway to the world? It makes no military, economic or common sense. Of course, it was the US, you think it was the Saudis? They have trouble getting on and off a camel, little less going to swim and plant a bomb. Saudis are inept at everything! No this was a US operation, this is how the US works, as history has shown many times, like fake ship attacks before entering World War 1, setting up countries like Japan before World War 2, oh how about the whole circus around Vietnam, the list goes on and on, with US military false flags all to lure the world into backing an attack on an innocent country. This latest attack on these ships HAS AMERICAN FINGERPRINTS ALL OVER IT.
So what do we have? We have Saudi Arabia losing a war in Yemen. America losing power in Iraq as the Iraqi government is moving always more and more closer to Iran. Pro American psychopaths in Idlib losing territory recently to Assad’s Syrian forces. Turkey waking up to reality and understanding that US F-35s are really flying coffins, and that the Russian S-400 can shoot anything down from tens of meters off the ground to lower Earth orbit, and soon the S-500 systems will shoot anything from meters of the ground to higher Earth orbit. In other words, US military tech. is a joke. Then there is China. Ah China with its Belt-and-Road initiative. Super highways and Mag-lev trains running from China to Europe via Iran. Do you really think Iran wants to risk that?
It is clear that the US is behind all this. That’s why these ships that are attacked are ALL NON US bound ships. Convenient that, isn’t it. A clear case of showing how the US is so stupid, that they think the world doesn’t see what is really going on. The US is in trouble in the Middle East, its forces are being surrounded more and more by hostile forces. Well actually, the real problem is that they egged on Saudi Arabia to do its dirty work, but as incompetent and stupid the Saudis are, they blew it. And blew it big time, with the laughable entry into Yemen. And so the US now is looking desperately to get some of this power it had lost back in the Middle East.
To The House Of Saud….WELL DONE! As little as I am doing here to trying to make the world a better place by exposing hypocrisy and evil by people like you, you guys are my biggest allies! With sick deranged mental cases like MBS around (yes people I know Saudi’s AND WE ARE NOT FRIENDS! And yes the rumors are TRUE, MBS is a homicidal maniac), I thank you for all your contributions to ridding the world of your family from Arabia. Hopefully soon, the Arabian people will have true freedom and we will be able to really fix the Middle East to be a true place of wonder and peace! Keep up the good work MBS, it will not be long now that your country will be renamed from Saudi Arabia, to just Arabia with not a single Saudi in sight. Get ready Britain and America! Some time in the, I hope, near future, you are going to have Saudis living with you permanently!
Did you read that Britain and America? Saudis and all their money will be coming to your shores! Yes dear readers, all is not well a foot in Saudi Arabia (I will be talking about this in the future more), for you see there is a lot of angry Arabs in Saudi Arabia. How do I know? Ha ha ha! You don’t need to have inside knowledge on what is happening. For you see, this whole schemozzle that this occurring in Yemen was really an attempt for the House of Saud to show the Arabian people they are strong and that anymore discourse in the country (and there has been lots lately, hence all the beheadings, including of children!) will be dealt with in the same way as they are dealing with the Yemenis. Well you can see how that turned out. Its been a bloody disaster! And yes there is more talk of uprisings and revolution talk in Saudi Arabia. That’s right folks, the House of Saud is in SERIOUS danger of falling. My arabic is very poor but there is enough going on the Internet to know that the Saudis (I refer to the family not people of Arabia, they are Arabians) are in serious trouble at home. My oh my, revolution in Arabia? Heavens to Betsy! What about all that oil that goes to Britain and America? Start understanding now you British and Americans how high the stakes are in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf? If Saudi Arabia falls to Free Arabian Forces (that’s just my moniker for them), you people in the USA and Britain are going to start paying the CORRECT price for gasoline for the first time in your lives. Yes ladies and gentlemen, there is much going on here than you realize. But people are talking, at least in Arabic they are.
You don’t have to be Chinese to know we live interesting times. But I can assure you, even the Chinese KNOW that these events are happening. Why do I say that? Well why do you think that the Chinese are working on the Belt And Road Initiative, especially with Iran, if there was no chance of it ever happening! That’s right, folks. That’s why the Americans are now panicking and are shooting themselves in the foot with this stupid bombing of tankers. The Americans are desperate. The Turks know this, that’s why they aren’t interested in dealing with American pop guns anymore. The Syrians know this. The Chinese know this. The Iraqis know this. The Palestinians know this (that’s why there is an up tick in violence, especially Hezbollah is starting to wave the red flag in front of the Israeli bull). The Israelis know this, and that is why they are spoiling for a fight trying to lure the US into it. The Afghans know this, that’s why they are slowing down talks with the Americans.
You get the picture everyone. Anglos are getting desperate and starting to do desperate things. While Arabians, Chinese, Russians, Syrians, Turks and Afghans are quietly watching Anglos lose their heads.
Stay tuned everyone…..the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia, is heading for a well over due reckoning. Make room Britain, I know for a fact most Saudis would like to live in England (I said England, so relax Scotland, Wales and Northern Island, Saudis can’t stand your “backward” societies, I write “backward” for that is what Saudis see you as, I have had that said to me many times, frankly, I like Scotland, great fishing!) rather than the USA with all its squalor and common folk.
Well lets see what happens next. Its still the US’s next move. Iran just needs to just keep cool like they always do. Just let the US paranoia and desperation do all the work, and in the end Britain will pay the price. And Europe and Asia will have the start of a New Age…The Eurasia Age! I thought I’d get that in, and be the first to coin it! (Just checked…its been used but only in a Paleo sense.) Ok so you read it here first!
Its going to be an interesting 1920s. I hope to live long enough to see what’s coming. Its been a long time in coming. Too long!
Nothing deceptive about this effort. Well, there will be – the Seppos will blame Iran who of course will deny it – why would they ‘stage’ an attack on japan cargo while they’re hosting Abe? Not a chance.
Reportedly one suspected Torpedoed and one holed “above the waterline” WTF?
And the evacuated crews say?