“In 2010 and 2011, groups of armed Somali men were hijacking merchant vessels off Somalia’s coast at an almost daily pace,” washingtonpost.com reports. “Thousands of hostages of myriad nationalities were taken, and billions of dollars were lost in ransom, damage and delayed shipments.” And then . . .
The crisis was so severe that a naval task force with more than two dozen vessels from European Union countries, the United States, China, Russia, India and Japan banded together to restore order to one of the world’s busiest shipping routes. They largely succeeded.
In 2015, there were 17 pirate attacks near Somalia, down from 151 in 2011. Many of those attacks were on smaller fishing boats from nearby countries, mostly by disgruntled Somali fishermen, but not on commercial ships.
Hmmm. I wonder why the WaPo neglects to mention the real reason Somali pirate attacks went from hundreds to none: the ships cruising those pirate-infested waters tooled-up against pirates. And shot pirates.
It was this “precaution” that ended the reign of high seas terror unleashed by Somali pirates. An “alternative fact” that doesn’t jibe with The Post’s anti-gun rights animus.
In keeping with their slant, the Post seems sympathetic to the “plight” of the Somali pirates who carried out the most recent hijack — the first in five years — on the oil tanker Aris 13 (above).
Concerns about piracy’s reemergence in the region have been growing in concurrence with greater exploitation of Somalia’s waters by foreigners engaged in illegal fishing. Deprived of a livelihood, some Somali fishermen have turned back to hijacking to get by.
Salad Nur, described as a “local elder” by the Associated Press, said that the men involved in Tuesday’s hijacking had been searching for a commercial vessel for days on the open water. “Foreign fishermen destroyed their livelihoods and deprived them of proper fishing,” Nur said.
As the Christian parable reminds us, teach a man to fish, then watch him turn to piracy when someone steals his fish. Wait. That’s not it.
Anyway, I don’t think this will end well for the pirates. Remind me to feel sorry for them when the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet reads them the riot act.
And expect the same private ballistic solution to an outbreak of piracy off the coast of Nigeria. And the same result. ‘Cause more guns equals less crime. Who knew?
Actually, the pirates just returned from a long stay in Chicago where they shot up competing, uh, fishermen who interfered with their trade in square grouper.
in somali with poor lighting near the water market.
Ralph,
I thought you were going to say that the Somali pirates returned from training in the world’s largest open air shooting range — which is Chicago of course.
He dindunuffin.
Because the reasonable response to overfishing is piracy, kidnapping and murder, naturally.
Yep, The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations rears its ugly head again.
Next time a left-leaning associate pulls the ol’ “What do you expect from people who [x]?” card, make sure to point out how condescending, paternalistic and, frankly, racist it is to assert that people of certain genetic representation only know to resort to violence in the face of hardship. I do it all the time, and I haven’t gotten tired of that deer-in-the-headlights look yet.
The second you called him a “racist” you lost the argument. That might as well be a new Godwin’s law online.
Dude, what in the hell are you talking about? Did you read what either of us actually wrote? I was agreeing with him and supplementing the point he made, both of us doing so in mockery of the WaPo’s moronic editorializing.
There’s an excuse for everything nowadays.
Was their fishing really hampered, or did piracy start to look like a “thing” again? You don’t see them ridding the waters around their country of sharks.
“As the Christian parable reminds us, teach a man to fish, then watch him turn to piracy when someone steals his fish. Wait. That’s not it.”
“If you GIVE a man a fish, he eats today. If you TEACH him to fish, he eats every day. If you teach a man to fish WITH DYNAMITE, you MAY have to give him a chicken, or else he may claim that to feed his bride and brood he NEEDS to go do some piracy”.
They must look at it like ‘whaling’, in the same way the Japanese look at whaling like “science” and the taking of Rhino horns like “medicine” in the same way PP tries to feed you their GDP like soylent green.
I suggest Jeffersonian Diplomacy, and don’t just profile on N.E. Africa, there’s a piss ant POS saber-rattling nation that likes to take over embassies. . .
You know what’d I’d do if had a few billion laying around? I’d buy or have built an old school ship of the line, like the HMS victory. Then in all the gun ports and top deck, instead of black powder cannon, I’d place .50s, mark 19s, maybe a few mini guns. Leave a few black powder cannons for the cool factor. Anyway I’d hire a crew of nut cases like me and sail right into those pirate infested waters and send them all to Davy Jones, in true pirate style.
Sounds fun until the pirates figure out that a few RPGs would give you a really bad day … Or they could just literally run circles around you. Sail power does have a few issues…
Perhaps an ironclad? Instead of iron and steam, modern ceramic armor and a good set of diesel electric engines?
Yeah but that’s kinda getting away from the olde pirate battles and closer to those ships that came right before drednaughts. I figure bristling with all those guns, plus the ability to rotate 180 degrees on the top guns would help with the mobility factor. But ultimately yes, as the above poster noted, we gotta figure out a way to make the wood a little more durable to something like an RPG. Maybe we need a mad scientist to invent a polyurethane coating that’s RPG resistant.
Steel plate hull, then wrap it in a wooden texture.
Hey as long as it looks like a pirate ship, who cares how bullet/RPG resistant it is?
Why don’t you just walk around the bad neighborhoods of Chicago at night? Then you could get the killin’ you so crave.
C’mon, that’s fight club awesome, sign me up, I don’t worry about skinny’s with RPGs I worry about the rest of the world looking at the boat like they were ‘shopping’. Especially with air assets
But yes, great idea, keep it fair ref, keep it fair. FLY THE BONES (back). ?
Sounds to me like Somalia needs a proper Navy or coast guard to deal with such problems.
Or at least issue letters of marque to provide their daring citizens some legal cover fire.
But either requires a semblance of a functioning state, so…
I am surprised that the security guards did not seem to have any acrylic/steel/armor to stand behind. I am also surprised that the security guards did not seem to have anything more than AR-15s.
If I were going to ride on a large freighter as security, I would want bullet-proof plating to stand behind and significantly larger calibers available. And more than two guys.
I am surprised that regional navies don’t steal the freighters. A freighter loaded with crude oil has to be worth 10s of millions of dollars.
They are tossing those $500 AR’s in the water before the ship reaches port. The present system seems to be working just fine.
My take is: a couple of MSRs and some nads’ is all it takes to send two skiffs of pirates running to find softer targets. Pirates are no different than your average street thug – not looking for a fight, just helpless victims.
I wonder if isn’t time to revive the practice of granting letters of marque and reprisal and get some privateers patrolling those seas. The authority is still right there in Article I. Just tap a few ex-Navy who are willing to go and take some prizes, and the problem could be resolved for relatively little money.
“… the problem could be resolved for relatively little money.”
That is precisely why no nation will go that route. Better to require an expensive state controlled apparatus … that can be redirected at anyone who dares question the Almighty State.
What problem??
Somehow I doubt that taking pirate skiffs as “prizes” is going to yield much in the way of a profit margin. Most of their boats are basically 19th century auxiliary craft fitter with outboard motors.
Sing it with me!
Come, friends, who plough the sea,
Lock and load your rifles;
Time for some reprisals;
Let’s end this piracy,
With some armed securityyyy!
Ancient Rome considered pirates to be enemies of humanity, literally “hostis humani generis”. As such pirates were afforded no legal protections and could be killed at will by any nation.
No modern nation will ever get serious about destroying piracy because to do that you must destroy pirates. Therefore the seaborne thieves will continue to do whatever the hell they want, whenever they want with no significant repercussion.
They don’t need to be dealt with humanely. No, what is needed is nothing more than long, repeated bursts from US Navy Goalkeepers and Phalanxes.
Love to see that Pirates of Penzance reference, with the updated lyrics.
Nicely done Zeke!
The somalis ought to tool up and go viking on the fishing ports in the other countries that are stealing their fish.
Anyone ask Tom Hanks what he thinks? Perfect ending for a scurvy knave…
I chased pirates for 2 deployements. 05 and 07. We were hampered becuas US navy ships were under the control of a multinational task force under the command of a BAHRAINI. Yeah… our rules of engagement were fucking awful. We couldnt do shit. The private guards did WAY more than we did. And FYI they only have AR 15s cause thats all they are allowed to have. And most ports wont let you have them on the boat in port so they toss them over the side before they get in.
One of the reasons we need to update our treaties. Every merchant ship should have an arms locker sufficient to outfit the crew with the right gear to repel boarders.
Though I do think this is a reason to bring back Marine detachments on Navy ships. Capture the pirate, interrogate him to find his home port, then send a Marine landing party ashore to burn it to the ground.
If they’re locals whose fishing has been ruined by illegal intruders, we should be on the side of the locals, because they’re fighting off de facto invaders of their country.
If they’re out to grab a ship and hold it for ransom, they deserve whatever death creative defenders can devise.
BTW, I like the idea of an old ship of the line, built with modern armor under the wood, though. But I’d make it a copy if the U.S.S. Constitution — maybe call mine the USS Bill of Rights. 😉
It would be sunk by kapo bloomberg, hillary, barry and his man ape wife, etc.
Nah… Give me an old WWII style destroyer with a small (platoon sized) Marine compliment. We’ll settle the pirate problem in about a month. The Somali coast might suffer a little breakage though.
As the gunny would say, looks like somebody picked the wrong ship to hijack. Khat makes you brave…and stoopid.
I imagine local pirates are happy with development. No desire to work around regulations/costs of security -> little possibility of armed response -> soft targets -> PROFIT! Yeah, rusty AK is all you need.
“WaPo neglects to mention the real reason Somali pirate attacks went from hundreds to none”
That is not “the” reason piracy went down. It is “a” reason. I am all for violence against pirates but there were several factors that contributed to the drop in piracy – private defense and naval patrols just being two of them. A big factor is ships just avoided the Gulf of Aden (when possible); the extra fuel costs are cheaper than hiring a security detail. Another factor is that ships that could reach decent speeds did so before reaching dangerous waters and maintained speed until out of the “danger zone”. It is about doing alot of things right many of which do not entail violence.
With that stated I would have loved for anyone to plant a well armed q-ship, or two (or ten), off of the coast of Somalia . . . and video record the drama for our enjoyment 🙂
You’d want your q-ship designed to be able to change its appearance significantly, so pirates wouldn’t be able to tell if it was “the one” or not.
The company supplying the private security did not have them throw perfectly good rifles and light machine guns overboard
The had an ” arsenal ship” that stayed at sea and never entered the (anti gun) ports of call
The guards and their weapons were transferred by small boat from the tanker to the arsenal ship just before entering the Suez Canal
They then transferred to the next clients ship with the same weapons
At one time there were 4 Arsenal ships operating in the Gulf of Aden at the same time
One, the Sinbad, was detained by the United Arab Emirates when it took on fuel at Fujairah, UAE
It was soon released and back on station
Ship sails under a Mongolian flag
Has full permission of Mongolian government to carry and store arms
Rents storage space to other security companies at a fee of
$25 u.s. dollars per day per weapon
Also supplies full auto weapons, including light machine guns, body armor, ammo and night vision if you do not have your own equipment
( weapon rental fee not published)
Source: maritime gazette issue of 10/16/12