Iran, Iran So Far A-way

Things get busy fast in the Middle East when something is afoot.

There's been some posturing and saber rattling over trade routes in the Straits of Hormuz in the last few weeks - Iran saying that they would disrupt shipping routes (and bomb Israel and US forces in Iraq, by the way) if they are attacked at all, the US saying that it will own the Persian Gulf if Iran tries anything funny, etc.

Now Iran is test-firing missiles and saying they did so in direct response to all that. Makes me wonder if Iran's follow-up act - shelling Kurdish settlements in northern Iraq - is a triangulation meant to endear Iran's cause to Turkey.