Iran-amok

The Iranians are getting brazen. The theocracy first captures 8 British sailors in disputed waters and impounds their vessels. Thereafter the Iranians faced down the Brits, effectively holding British sailors as prisoners with no repercussions. The lesson, as Mark Steyn noted, is that the Iranians got away with it:

That's what matters: getting away with it. Do you think [UK Foreign Minister Jack] Straw, fretting over the "complications" of Anglo-Iranian relations, will make the mullahs pay any price for what they did? And, if he doesn't, what conclusions do you think the Islamic Republic will draw from its artful test of Western - or, at any rate, European - resolve? Right now, the British, French and Germans are making a show of getting tough on Iran's nuclear ambitions. Is that "tough" as in "Go ahead, imam, make my day"? Or is it "tough" as in [an] official's "one-way conversation"? Just a bit of diplo-bluster. If you were the mullahs, you might well conclude that the Europeans don't mean it, that they've decided they can live with a nuclear Iran, and you might as well go full speed ahead.

And thus, the result of playing nice with the mullahs is this: Iranian intelligence agents going to Iraq to set car-bombs -- presumably targeting the Iraqi interim government and its allies. Why? Because, as this Fox News article reports:

Syrian President Bashar Assad, at the end of a two-day trip to Iran on Monday, said developments in Iraq are "the most important issue" for Syria and other neighbors of Iraq, including Iran.

Iran's powerful former President Hashemi Rafsanjani (search) said . . . The "conspiracies" being hatched by "Washington and Tel Aviv" against Iraq call for increased "strategic cooperation" between Iran and Syria . . .

Iran needs (1) to be called out by Pres. Bush, (2) its nuke reactor bombed by the Israelis.

But leave treating Iran to the experts: read this Ilan Berman article in the Middle East Quarterly on how to tame Iran.