David and Goliath

Those fiendish Iranians have caused tensions with the US to resurface, spattered with facile journalistic paronomasia, by bullying American ships as they went about their legitimate and peaceful business in the Strait of Hormuz.

The Strait of Hormuz is a shipping channel in international waters (i.e. Anglo-US/Iraqi waters). The three American ships were a destroyer (the heaviest type of surface combatant ships in general use), a frigate (an even more disadvantaged vessel, sometimes weighed down yet further with guided missiles) and a cruiser (slightly more vulnerable than an aircraft carrier).

Five small Iranian boats appeared, leaving the defenders of freedom blatantly outnumbered. A Pentagon spokesbeing - a species known for its skill with facts - said that the Iranians had radioed "something along the lines of: 'We're coming at you and you'll explode in a couple of minutes'." They also dropped boxes in the water to force the weaker ships to take evasive action.

The boats "made some aggressive manoeuvres against [the American] vessels and indicated some hostile intent," in spite of their country having been labelled part of an axis of evil and threatened with World War Three. The Pentagon spokesbeing said that the Iranians moved away "literally at the very moment that US forces were preparing to open fire", in spite of the odds being, as so often, heavily stacked in favour of the enemy.

A State Department spokesbeing said that the US has no plans to lodge a formal protest, possibly out of concern that the international community's hollow laughter might make George W Bush's visit to the Middle East appear more ridiculous than it absolutely has to.