Killed a pirate in a knife fight

If the investigation (which is certainly needed in this incident) shows that the US did not fire first, I can guarantee there will be no further negotiation with these pirates. They grab an American? They will be killed by Navy SEALs.

Does anyone here know a SEAL? I know a retired one, and he scares the living bejesus out of me (in a good, I'm fucking glad you're on my side way)
 
This prompted me to watch Fatbeard, the South Park episode.

NP: Alestorm - Keelhauled


I'm a cynical, heartless bastard, I know.
 
This is what can happen when a pirate knows that one of his "mates" got a lifetime prison punishment, for piracy.

He'll sure won't want to follow that guy, and rather kill an American instead.
 
Really? Really? You'll blame the Americans for this one? That's foolish. Not many people except fanatics want to die instead of live, regardless of the circumstances.

The real problem is the broken way of life in Somalia that has led people to commit crimes like this, but that does not absolve these people - murderers and scumbags much as classic pirates tended to be - of guilt. Besides, they were being negotiated with. Americans were doing the right thing, and these pirates murdered people in cold blood, as far as we know.
 
There is no debate about the pirates that they are wrong. It's illegal and should be punished.

However, I think that a pirate will be more desperate and will act more "out of control" / foolishly when he knows that an American vessel comes with American military on it.

Because of that life time prison sentence (I guess you've heard about it? I think it was one or two weeks ago).

(I must admit that I don't know enough about the negotiation to judge this)
 
That's how it works, though. I mean, those guys kidnapped Americans. What were they supposed to do, pat the guy on the back and send him on his way?

And no, I didn't hear about it, and I doubt these Somalis did either, given the state of telecommunications in their country. Especially if the verdict was only recent.
 
I suppose Foro is heading for the idea of a third party being sent in to rescue the prisoners, like whoever else is active in these waters (Indians, Germans or maybe Dutch). But that would work only if the assumption that the pirates will act more out of control in the face of an American vessel is true. There is no proof for that, and this is too serious a matter to work with assumptions. And who would want to tell the American military that they should not protect their own people? That is, after all, what they are there for.
 
CTF 151 is an international venture: US, British, Dutch, Germans, Indians, Koreans, South Africans, Danish, Australians, Canadians...basically it's a who's who.
 
This should be a big joint military venture, beyond these people on the yacht, these pirates are affecting exports of nearly every country.  They have ransomed an oil tanker and aother supply type ships and have driven up the cost of everything that goes through that part of the world, I am sure some crews are getting more hazard pay/companies are having to pay for armed security on these boats.

We should also recogniza that Somalia is barely a country in the functional sense of the word, the government has little to no control over this and I am sure quite a bit of the government is on the take.  If we know where the pirate bases are, we should look at taking these guys out at the source.
 
bearfan said:
This should be a big joint military venture, beyond these people on the yacht, these pirates are affecting exports of nearly every country.  They have ransomed an oil tanker and aother supply type ships and have driven up the cost of everything that goes through that part of the world, I am sure some crews are getting more hazard pay/companies are having to pay for armed security on these boats.

We should also recogniza that Somalia is barely a country in the functional sense of the word, the government has little to no control over this and I am sure quite a bit of the government is on the take.  If we know where the pirate bases are, we should look at taking these guys out at the source.
Click to expand...

All that is happening. Nobody expects anything to stop the pirates to come from a palace in Mogadishu. All the world's governments are aware that Somalia is more of a geographic term than a political one. In fact, Somalia isn't barely a country in the functional sense, it isn't one at all.
There are vessels from all over the world cruising the seas around Somalia, and pirates are being put on trial everywhere. Hamburg is currently experiencing its first pirate trial in 500 years. The locations of the pirate bases are well-known.

The problem is that your suggestions aren't enough. The pirates aren't this bold because they like to be, but because they have no other choice to sustain their lives. The ongoing civil war is preventing them to build up their country. From what I understand, their waters are overfished and polluted, so they can't live off fishing, nor can they live off farming. All they can do is capitalise on the fact that they're living along one of the world's busiest trade routes.

Like everywhere, the answer is removing the breeding grounds if you want to get rid of the problem for good.
 
Perun said:
The problem is that your suggestions aren't enough. The pirates aren't this bold because they like to be, but because they have no other choice to sustain their lives. The ongoing civil war is preventing them to build up their country. From what I understand, their waters are overfished and polluted, so they can't live off fishing, nor can they live off farming. All they can do is capitalise on the fact that they're living along one of the world's busiest trade routes.

Like everywhere, the answer is removing the breeding grounds if you want to get rid of the problem for good.
Click to expand...

Sounds like the should build a 7-11 along the highway.    I do no doubt that is in part why they are doing what they do, but that country has been a mess since the Italians invaded in the 1920s (if not before).  I know we have sent troops there, we send food there (which gets lost in the corruption).  Outside of invade the place and get rid of these warlords, I am not seeing what an outside country can do here, everything we send props up the warlords since they steal it.  In the meantime, the West (and East for that matter since they use the route too), need to keep attacking the pirates.  This is where the contineent should be able to step up, but Africa seems incapable of doing such things.
 
Africa as a continent is where the US was in around 1830, don't forget that. The US wasn't very much capable of enforcing its own boundaries until the Civil War. Robust democracies take generations to build.

Still, aside from removing the warlords with military might, what can we do?
 
Everyone was in Africa as a continent at some point ... Africa is going to contunue to have these problems until as a continent it can handle its own affairs and police itself, clearly easier said than done when the majority of governments are tin hat dictators. 

To the original point, we need to protect ships that go near Somalia, that is obviously a major lane for international trade.  The end game needs to be the warlords gone and power that can take up the void.  The ways that can happen are a) an internal rising b) one warlord becomes powerful enough to control the vast majority of the country c)outside intervention to take the warlords out and prop up a government. I see no political will amongst the counties that could actually pull it off for C, we can pick the less of all evils and try to fund a combination of A and B.  Sending food and medicine over there is noble, but it does not get where it is needed even if we parachute it in.
 
The problem with defending ships like that is it would take a huge percentage of the world's navies. There's too much ocean and not enough warships currently. I have heard that the idea of convoy has been tossed around, similar to World War II - I think that might be an interesting solution, for sure.
 
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