9th April:

International diplomacy is a tricky old business. These two very words conjure up visions of official notes beng passed in clandestine fashion between embassies in the dead of night, of coded langauge and hidden agendas, of politicians with one eye keenly on their domestic approval ratings, of sabre-rattling and public posturing, of last-minute brinkmanship and under-the-table compromise. Unless you are Bush, of course, in which case you just invade the filthy fuckers.

Recent events in the gulf suggest that any old Abdul can wear a tea-towel on his head and wave an AK-47 in your face, but it takes real audacity and bluff to create a good old-fashioned international incident. The Iranian government clearly has a developed sense of the theatrical. If your common-garden variety of Jihadists came across 15 British sailors in 'disputed' waters they would, one wagers, put bullets in them all and then run away claiming a great moral victory for Allah against the tyrranical occupying forces of decadent pork-scoffing whitey Westerner. Not so the canny political machine that is Iran, though. Oh no. Better to arrest them, put them on the telly and use them as political pawns to illustrate Iranian strength and defiance against Western agression. Yes, well done Iran. What a prize. 15 sailors barely out of short-trousers and Clearasil and a rubber dinghy. Cue the inevitable huffing and puffing of British officialdom and associated cartoon tabloid outrage.

Thankfully, the ending is a happy one and we can only assume that both parties got in some way or another what they wanted. More unsettling is the agreement to allow the captured sailors to sell their stories to the press for profit. A strange move and one, we can only guess, which was sanctioned by the government to ensure that Iran is indelibly painted as the baddy in all of this. Cue the inevitable cringeworthy and leading "Just how awful was your treatment?" and "Did you think you would ever seen your family again?" interview questions.

In some ways, this whole incident and the actions of President I'm-A-Dinner-Jacket hark back to a time when Foreign Office diplomats really earned their corn. Modern International terrorism tends to shoot first and negotiate later, so it's pleasing to see that evolution still has a place for these mercurial political creatures.

It's a comfort to those of us who pay our taxes in the UK to know that when we're tucked up in bed there will still be an anxious light on in a Whitehall office because a British back-packer has taken his socks off whilst facing a portrait of the King on a public holiday in Phu-Yuk, thereby sparking rioting between rival tribal factions.

Get me the Ambassador. Oh, and while you're at it, pass the Ferrero Rocher.