How do we stop piracy?

Kill the pirates.

Harsh but effective.

Worked well the last time it was in vogue.

Anything less will grant the pirates and those who support them legitimacy. Negotiating with them also lends more legitimacy. Soon, piracy will become accepted as just another venue for the frustrated masses to vent their rage. Which is a lie, really, since becoming a pirate has nothing to do with venting rage, or frustration…it has everything to do with taking what is not theirs from others and forcing others to bend to their own greedy wishes.

If these pirates spent one-tenth of the time, money and energy actually building their own nation-states, contributing positively to the advancement of their own people, as they do stealing, terrorizing, killing innocents, they and their peoples would be one hell of a lot better off in the long run. But, they are lazy, and greedy, and could care not a twit less for their people…not one tiny bit. Don’t fall for the liberal screeds that they only have piracy to fall back on since they are so poor and underprivileged. That is a lie.

Piracy under Admiralty Law and a host of other international treaties and agreements is the one thing that most of the world has already come to agreement on. It is an evil infestation. It has to be eradicated. Used to be one of those things most nations, any nation, never gave a second thought about. Pirates were killed. No trials, per se, no lengthy discussions as to their motivations, or their needs…captured and killed, or sunk at sea and killed, or killed as their safe harbors became naval gunenry targets.

Harsh? Sure.

But, while we dither, more and more of those “frustrated masses” find the business model wonderfully appealing. So, it grows.

We are not talking about a few ragtag bands of merry men set sail on a brig with sails in full bosom under clear skies on the salty frothy waves…we are talking about organized gangs and armies of thugs, well armed, with everything from small Zodiac boats to expensive high-end cigarette boats and coastal military patrol craft, and a lot in between. Heaven help us when one or two of these pirate outfits find a small destroyers or corvette laying around for the asking…money talks…pirates have a pretty good income stream if they are doing it right.

Kill them. Blockade their harbors. Sink them as they attempt to come out to sea.

The present “rules” pretty much state that we have to wait until a merchant ship is attacked until we can respond. Respond. Response. A retrograde way of thinking. Wait until attacked, never a good tactic, let alone a strategy.

We need more than a show of force in the region off Somalia. When need a demonstrated full will of the over 20 nations already involved in the region…a lot of deck gunnery practice for the naval crews can go a long way to de-incentivize the pirates’ business model, and rapidly.

They’ve already made threats, these Somali Jack Sparrow wannabe’s. Let’s take these threats at face value…and nail them before they get underway.

Then we can turn our attention to the Malacca Straits, the Eastern approaches to Singapore, the Adaman Islands, the Nicobar Islands, the coastal regions of Burma, anywhere we know there are pirates ready to kill others, or confound the right of free trade and sailing on the high seas.

Nation building? That comes later, by those affected nations themselves. If they are with the rest of the world in eradicating piracy within their waters, on their shores, then they can make a case for aid and trade and support from the rest of the world. If they permit piracy to go unchecked…they get zip.

Yes, a lot of poor lowly fishermen and their families may face starvation, and yes there are innocents involved. But at what point do we throw up our hands and allow piracy to dictate how we are to conduct our lives, exercise our freedoms, engage in necessary and vital ocean-borne trade across the world?

Find them. Fix them. Kill them.

coldwarrior on April 13, 2009 at 1:51 PM

Infidoll on April 13, 2009 at 2:09 PM

We are already spending several million dollars a day monitoring piracy in the western Indian Ocean…most of it “wasted” with routine patrols, little contact with pirates, and a lot of days at sea.

Is piracy our biggest problem right now? No, not the biggest.

But, maybe we can all stop whatever we are doing worldwide, for a few weeks or more, and prioritize the most important from the less important and on down the list…and then allocate funding along the same priorities. How would that shake out?

Global Warming gets all the money because that is the most pressing need to address? Or stem cell research…that is vital to a lot of folks. Or building more nuke power plants? Or increasing the size of our armed forces? Or cutting backon the size of our armed forces? Or build new houses for every family on Earth?

Our interactions with the world, within our own nation, are in a spherical realm, not linear. But, it seems solutions are most often based on lineral logic…and we lose before even getting out of the gate.

How about going after problems as a point of simplicity…the most simple problems solved first…then we can tend to the larger issues?

Piracy is actually a very simple problem. It is easily identifiable. It can easily be eradicated. Compared to global warming, of course…which is not a simple problem because it is all based on faulty assumptions, poorly researched science and a narrow focus of its advocacy….yet, there are many in our government, in our White House, who believe that we will all die within a decade or two, maybe a few generations, unless we stop all CO2 outputs, and carbon emissions, and all other such stuff.

The point I am trying to make is that why are we so reluctant to address a finite problem with a finite solution, one that has proven in the past to work, and work well?

Nation building is at the far end of the piracy eradication effort…as it should be. Not our job to build nations…it is the job of those nations themselves…and if they can convince other nations to contribute to their efforts, good for them. But, if they allow piracy from their shores…why give them a penny for anything?

coldwarrior on April 13, 2009 at 2:21 PM