Are all concerned wanting a way out?  The meeting today with PM Netanyahu, U.S.negotiator Steve Witkoff, Defense Minister, Israeli Chiefs of Staff and Mossad lasted three hours.  Iran removing their uranium and halting their strategic military ambitions were on the table. But Iran has already requested a change of venue for the anticipated Friday meeting in Istanbul.  It seems they are stalling a bit.

Even as they met,  the IRGC had received transmission of  information from their UCAV or Shahed 129 drone.  The claim is that is was not shot down but remained airborne for ten hours of surveillance and then safely returned to home base at Chabahar-Konorak Airport.  And oh - did they mention that another one is on its way? 

There is a video of an attack on our aircraft carrier with the words of the prior Grand Ayatollah Khomeini: "Don't try to intimidate us by saying you'll send troops! We will bury your soldiers here!"

There are still skirmishes in the Strait of Hormuz.  A U.S. oil tanker was approached by six (armed) Iranian boats and ordered to halt.

The signals are mixed across the globe.  On the one hand, Tehran and Muscat presumably extend a hand of diplomacy.  But Ali Abedi,  the Consul General of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Basra warns that the ocelots of Iran - Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon - are fully capable of responding to any threat against Iran's sovereignty.

Ali Baqeri, politically powerful and part of the inner circle of the Grand Ayatollah states that Tehran has no intention of transferring enriched nuclear materials to any other nation.  And this will never be the beginning point for negotiations.  This is not surprising, because if your first name is "Ali" you are engulfed in a legend which dates back to the seventh century.






Twelve hours ago one of the Iran media military sites merely posted coordinates, and no message.  I pulled it up on Google maps and... that does look like a satellite image of runways.  It is the coordinates for the Al Dhafra Air Base. Now this, is getting interesting.  hmmm

Is there a way out or a way back?  My feeling is that President Trump's negotiation demands are too broad, even if it is just focused on four primary issues.  Chop the list in half. Let me state the obvious and you can place a label on me.  I don't care, really.   Delete the non-strategic demand regarding treatment of protesters.  Treatment of protesters is not a strategic issue nor one which affects our own national security.  Give Iran something they can work with and something we can live with for this moment in time.

Is another drone aloft?  I don't know.  It an air base now at risk?  Who knows.  But a bit of a pull back from the abyss seems logical to me.

  

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