How should the US respond to Iran detaining 10 US Sailors?

300 miles of open water for a small craft unescorted tells me there was a major FUBAR. Add to that a rogue nation that won't necessarily honor international conventions that we're operating near makes this a Powerball FUBAR.

As we all know, there are facts that will never be revealed to us. The explanations provided are questionable at best, an out and out lie in the worst case. There are times that the Government must lie to the people for national security. I believe this was a situation where Iran could show they still have "teeth" in the face of the new treaty and wanted to see how other countries would respond. As far as our service member apologizing, it is not unheard of that Iran demanded that and threatened the others under his command and he did what he felt he had to keep his people safe and get them home, even at the possible loss of his future in the service.

I wont google it but I think they were caught near an Iranian Naval Speedboat yard. Also air power is faster than boats.

I don't know what happened exactly, only those that were there do. But, I think that the Sailor who has been shown on the news was speaking well and not being confrontational, opposite as to what many nations perceive Americans to be. He handled himself well. Iran did what the US would do if another country's military entered their waters, from everything I've seen and heard today both nations' representatives behave professionally and much better than we would have seen a few years back. I'm just glad no violence occurred, yes they got propaganda to skew, but we have our Sailors back.

I think the President might be on the right path by ignoring it and kicking sand on anything that does not fit his failed narrative? It is not like he is actually in charge of all our troops?

After the fact it looks like both sides were able to save face on this near-miss. Why and how the boats ever got in Iranian waters (if they actually did) we will probably never know the details, but they did exercise exceptional judgement under a very difficult situation, in not resisting. It was an 'unintentional accident' as far as the record goes.

Ask yourself what the U.S. would do if an Iranian military vessel strayed into our waters? Think we wouldn't detain those Iranian soldiers?

Sounds like the situation resolved itself (helps that the questionable nuclear "deal" has some near-term goal dates), but Step 1 in determining how to respond--given the situation as it was yesterday--is: DON'T GO OFF HALF-COCKED, AND TAKE A MOMENT TO FIGURE OUT WHAT'S HAPPENING. Do that, and you can figure out what Step 2 should be. Immediate, knee-jerk over-reactions tend to make situations worse.

This has happened many times before with the same results, D or R. What we would like to see happen will not. Perhaps this is the best given that we have them back.

From The New Yorker this morning.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/01/short-history-of-obamas-iran-hostage-crisis.html

Yesterday Iran detained two small ships of American sailors in the Persian Gulf in what appears to have been a routine dispute over alleged territorial violations. (In 2007, Iran detained 30 Royal Navy sailors and held them for two weeks.) Conservatives immediately moved onto war footing. “Iran is testing the boundaries of this administration’s resolve. And they know the boundaries are pretty wide,” pronounced Marco Rubio. Ted Cruz added, “The fact that Iran feels emboldened enough to capture two U.S. Navy ships and to take ten sailors into custody is really a demonstration of the unbelievable weakness of the Obama-Clinton foreign policy.” The jingoistic fervor swept up even such a relatively mild figure as Joe Scarborough. “Hey, Iran, you have exactly 300 days left to push a U.S. president around,” warned the normally affable cable-television host, “Enjoy it while you can. After that, there will be hell to pay.”

And now our very short national nightmare is over. Iran has released the sailors. One outstanding question remains: Does this episode tell us anything about the right-wing analysis of the administration’s foreign policy? If Iran was “testing” the administration, did the administration pass the test? Or perhaps was the right's explanation for Iran's actions analytically flawed?