Finally... > General Discussion

Piracy. No, not your Torrents, I mean REAL piracy.

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Bromor Neckbeard:
First, a few links, for those not aware of the current situation.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/04/10/somalia.u.s.ship/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/04/09/wilkerson.pirates/index.html#cnnSTCText
http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/29/pirates/index.html#cnnSTCText

This sort of crap was actually a huge contribution to America building a Navy in the first place.  The phrase "to the shores of Tripoli" in the Marines' Hymn is a reference to it.

I'm wondering why on Earth that a ragtag band of Somalis think that they can take American ships without hideous repercussions.  They KNOW that we're the freakin' Empire, if you look at us cross-eyed we'll invade you AND the country next to you just for good measure.  There's entire cities in Somalia whose entire existence is devoted to supporting their piracy industry.  Coincidentally, we just so happen to have in the area a squadron of warships with the ability to hit the license plate of a car with a shell from over the horizon.  I'm wondering why we haven't commenced shelling a couple of those pirate villages yet, or sank a couple of "mother ships".

Now, your thoughts?  What sort of action is called for here?  Do we level a couple of pirate towns, kill a few thousand women and children and a few hundred pirates, or should we just sink a couple of converted cargo ships and call it a day, or what?

IndonesiaWarMinister:
Aha~
At last, assymetrical oceanic warfare...
Let's see how effective your conventional weapons... against them!

(Reason: Not Guilty before being proven otherwise?) my take on on this.

Cthulhu:
We need to build crazy blade-covered robots and send them onto the ships to eviscerate the pirates.

Aqizzar:
Yar far fiddledy dee and all that.  Big serious post to follow.


--- Quote from: Bromor Neckbeard on April 10, 2009, 10:12:56 am ---Coincidentally, we just so happen to have in the area a squadron of warships with the ability to hit the license plate of a car with a shell from over the horizon.  I'm wondering why we haven't commenced shelling a couple of those pirate villages yet, or sank a couple of "mother ships".

--- End quote ---

One, these "mother ships" are all but non-existent, and double in the on season as fishing carriers.  That's what most of these pirates are, fishermen when the fishing is good, pirates when it's not, hence all the boats.

Two, we're not shelling any "pirate villages", because the United States, contrary to either conspiracy theorists or supremacists, is not in the business of lobbing military ordinance at any group of people that happen to be near someone who's suspected of what is really criminality and not an act of war.

Why do these pirates think they can get away with it?  Because they almost always do.  In this one instance, the ship's crew was able to get a message out, overpower the boarders, and stall until help arrived.  Usually these hijack/ransom jobs go exactly as planned for the pirates.  The one major difference here was that the ship was an actual American merchantman and not an independent vessel registered to Panama or Liberia like most of them are.  Somali pirates are unlikely to notice the distinction.

I don't know if your closer was a joke or not, but I hope to god you realize both the impracticality of just shooting anyone who might have pirates among them, and the fact that such a move would accomplish nothing.  Arming the actual vessels is a far more viable option, especially with non-lethal tools - there was a case a few years back where a passenger ship fended off an attack in the same area with those neato directed sound projectors.

Ultimately though, piracy will continue as long as it's a viable business strategy.  The answer lies in a combination of making the targets themselves harder to attack, and in (yeah laugh it up) improving the economy of the area so that violent criminality isn't so obvious an option.  In Somalia, yeah I know I know.

By the way, there's been rampant piracy around both the coast of Africa and especially the Straits of Malacca for more than forty years.  Funny what kind of ethnocentrism it takes to grab people's attention.  God forbid a ship registered in America, or a tankerful of oil, happens to be the victim of a systemic world problem instead of somebody else's stuff and lives.

IndonesiaWarMinister:
Well...
I live in the vicinity of Malacca Strait.
And yeah, the piracies are ... numerous.

Also, the pirates are those who are heretics. So, if you want to kill them, [perhaps] we'll support you guys. (Who am I to speak like this?)

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