I disagree with Mark Steyn!

http://www.suntimes.com/news/steyn/331879,CST-EDT-STEYN08.article

"Even if there is more going on than meets the eye, what meets the eye is so profoundly damaging to the credibility of great nations that no amount of lethal special ops could compensate for it. Power is only as great as the perception of power. The Iranians understand that they can't beat America or Britain in tank battles or air strikes so they choose other battlefields on which to hit them. That's why the behavior of the captives gives great cause for concern: There's no point training guys to be tough fighting men of the Royal Marines when you're in a bloody little scrap in Sierra Leone (as they were a couple of years ago) if you allow them to crumple on TV in front of the entire world." [my italics]

I have to diverge from the Steyn theory of power at this point. There are a number of components that go to make up power. One of the most salient of them is 'the perception of power'. 'The perception of power' can get you some cheap wins- if your enemy thinks you are powerful he may never initiate an attack. On the other hand, there is a very limited shelf-life for 'the perception of power' that is backed up by little or nothing. I always go back to the supreme masters of both the theatrical and practical arts of power, the Romans. When Seguntum, a town in Spain very close to the border between the Roman province of Hispania and the Carthaginian Spanish province, was attacked and conquered by Hannibal, the Roman senate immediately declared war on Carthage. They understood the symbolic significance of an attack on Seguntum, which was widely known to be under Romes particular protection. After a devastating and fearful 16 year war, Rome won. Why sacrifice so much for Seguntum, the mainstream media of today would ask? Because Roman power depended on everyone believing that when they promised to protect their allies, every resource and effort would be spent in doing just that. Rome built up such a magnificent reputation for keeping its word that its reputation lives on even into our time. The Romans understood that to be powerful, you needed the military force and the materiel, combined with the political will to use it even in extremis.

What we have not seen yet is whether Britain is still truly powerful. It doesn't look powerful at the moment, but even Rome had its hostages murdered every now and then. What matters is who wins the real battles- the one that the losing party doesn't get up off the mat from. Britain still has some potent weapons. Whether it will have an opportunity to beat Iran in the field remains to be seen. There is still the small matter of Iran's illegal nuclear weapons program. We may well look on the events of the last two weeks quite differently in a years time if next month Britain and America demolish the Iranian nuclear program and Mr Ahmadinejads office.