Grace 1

[Steve Singleton]

2019: Thereby the reciprocal gesture from Iran in Syria's time of trouble?....Mmm

[Ivan Cloherty]

France, Italy and Denmark have agreed to join the UK in patrolling the Arabian Gulf and Hormuz to keep the seas open for navigation. A German defence minister has stated that Germany will not become involved because it is a U S led coalition Force and has no desire to get involved in what may become a U S led conflict, so much for unity!

[Ivan Cloherty]

Never did sail on big tankers...but I knew of these wheelings and dealings whilst such ships were at sea.... No wonder I was never attracted to such vessels!
My principal reason for going to sea was to see the world...not be a pawn in some rich gits gambling on making more money.

.

I have never been a shipowner, but spent 60 years of my working life in the marine industry both at sea and ashore and a mixture of both.

I notice your comments about rich gits, but alas it is a fact of life that if the rich gits didn't speculate and make money, there would have been no money to buy more ships either as additions or replacements for us mere mortals to sail on and see the world, and nothing has changed, new ships are not magicked out of thin air, regardless of flag or trade. There are currently (according to IMO) 59000+ vessels sailing the worlds oceans manned by over 1.5 million seafarers of all nationalities, alas barely 16,000 of these seafarers being British. I thank the rich gits for giving me the opportunity to see the world in a manner I loved and also getting paid for the privilege, albeit I would have liked more money, but then again I knew what I was doing and I knew my rate of pay before I signed on the dotted line, so any dis-satisfaction, in the most, I can only blame myself for.

I never regretted any of it, even the bad, without the bad you could never have appreciated the good

[Keith Tindell]

I am so thankful that as a young lad i had the seven years of sea life that i had, not long by many on this site, but i am positive it stood me in good stead for the remainder of my life. How many youngsters would give their right arm to get the sort of life we had. Only happy memories from this old git !!!, yes i know there were bad times, but we stuck it out, knowing we could handle it, kt

[vic mcclymont]

# 29. Same in the seventies when carrying S.A. fruit.
For insurance purposes fruit was to be delivered to fictional park in London.
We usually left the Cape heading for Europe, wasn't unusual to get one or two radio messages directing us to different ports.
Yes KT, I did four years, and I believe it stood me in good stead.
Vic

[Jim R Christie]

France, Italy and Denmark have agreed to join the UK in patrolling the Arabian Gulf and Hormuz to keep the seas open for navigation. A German defence minister has stated that Germany will not become involved because it is a U S led coalition Force and has no desire to get involved in what may become a U S led conflict, so much for unity!

The German position sounds pretty sensible to me as they can see exactly what's coming - the pretext for another US-led foreign jolly, or should I say folly.
Have we learnt nothing from Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen.....

[Ivan Cloherty]

The German position sounds pretty sensible to me .

So much for NATO Nations supporting each other then. I think there are more German flagged/owned ships sailing the seven seas than UK ships, who I assume would be quite happy to have a little security from UK naval vessels should the need arise. Alas in a world of conflicting super powers and rogue nations one cannot bury ones head in the sand, terrorism in all its forms does not respect neutrality

[Jim R Christie]

So much for NATO Nations supporting each other then. I think there are more German flagged/owned ships sailing the seven seas than UK ships, who I assume would be quite happy to have a little security from UK naval vessels should the need arise. Alas in a world of conflicting super powers and rogue nations one cannot bury ones head in the sand, terrorism in all its forms does not respect neutrality

NATO has absolutely nothing to do with it and no relevance here.
Anyone with a modicum of sense and intelligence could have foresaw the consequent actions from an Iran whom the US seems to want to go out of it's way to antagonise so as to provoke a response.
German ships do not need protection from Iran and on those occasions in the past when their ships have required protection from an agressor the subsesquent response of that nation has been to take direct, practical and well organised action to protect their ships and people, invariably putting to shame many of their neighbours - UK included. Their response to the threat of Somalian piracy over the past decade versus our own poor efforts is a stark case in point.
This isn't about freedom of navigation for all in Hormuz, it's about idiotic US foreign policy decisions coming home to roost, ably abetted by a UK of ever diminishing influence fatally coupled with a total lack of self awareness regarding our own current diplomatic and military impotence.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

I sailed on a lot of tankers, and, as for changing orders, on one tanker we had 8 changes from Kuwait to the English Channel, that was when we had to go around the Cape after the canal was closed, and the US raised the price of its oil a shilling a ton, cost Britain dearly.
I don't know if Banias is still an oil port, I went there back in the 50s, maybe all the fighting that went on in Iraqi destroyed the pipeline.
Des

[happy daze john in oz]

The USA has a habit of going into conflict when there are other issues they wish to hide from.
Being in a recession has in the past always brought USA to the fore in any global conflict at the time, soaks up the unemployed.

We now have a Trade War situation with china causing some problems for the consumer in USA.

An issue such as this may well take the Trade War off the headlines.