Aussies beat the Poms again

Not only do we continually beat the English at cricket  and rugby league, and more often than not at rugby union, but our Navy does better than theirs at fighting off Iranian revolutionary guards.

Remember the British sailors who were captured without a fight a few months ago.  Well it has been reported that Australian sailors repelled Iranian gunboats who surrounded them during a boarding of a ship in the Persian Gulf in December 2004.

Five Iranian Revolutionary Guard gunboats surrounded an Australian boarding party in the Gulf during a routine stop-and-search of the cargo boat MV Sham.  The Australian commander ordered his sailors back onto the cargo vessel and into defensive weapons positions in a four-hour confrontation from which the Iranians eventually backed away. No shots were fired. The Australians used what was described as “highly colourful language” to deter the Iranian patrol.

So, sledging is apparently a potent weapon in a tense military confrontation, just as it is on the sporting field for Australian teams.