shit, let's bomb 'em anyway

Via IOZ comes the revelation that the Hormuz incident may have stemmed from a prank:

A threatening radio message at the end of a video showing Iranian patrol boats swarming near U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf may have come from a prankster rather than from the Iranian vessels, the Navy Times newspaper has reported.

If this is true, two possibilities present themselves, neither very flattering to the military juggernaut we know and love:

(1) a nameless radio hacker fooled the best and smartest armed forces in the world into thinking he represented the government of Iran; or

(2) we weren't quite sure who was talking or what was going on but we stood ready to unleash massive, unprovoked destruction anyway, a la Joe Horn.

I'm sure we'll have another chance to start a new war in the Middle East soon enough. As it turns out, any excuse to pull the trigger (or none at all) will do just fine.