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[vantor]

It says that coalition ships are now escorting the cargo vessel. WHY WERE THEY NOT DOING THIS ALREADY?!

Or, better yet, form convoys and make sure that every convoy has at least one warship protector. It'll slow things down a bit, but at least there will be very little chance of piracy.

[vantor]

Ok, so maybe that's been suggested before. But it still seems like the best option for protecting these ships. And it would allow for larger ships/helicopters to be used in a way that justifies their involvement. Making sure that the captains of these crews are part of some sort of communications network, and have lookouts when they are in the areas around the Somali coast would also help.

[Wickbam]

Honestly, how hard can it be to get rid of these pirates? I bet you the US could destroy them in a week, the US is just too busy trying to be politically correct. 

Or maybe the US military is stretched pretty thin around the world.  Does everyone have collective amnesia?  We intervened there in 1992 with 20,000 troops.  Clearly even massive military force won't solve the piracy issue.

[vantor]

Honestly, how hard can it be to get rid of these pirates? I bet you the US could destroy them in a week, the US is just too busy trying to be politically correct. 

Or maybe the US military is stretched pretty thin around the world.  Does everyone have collective amnesia?  We intervened there in 1992 with 20,000 troops.  Clearly even massive military force won't solve the piracy issue.

We weren't going after pirates then, we were trying to avert a famine.

[Wickbam]

And we ended up getting sucked into fighting tribal militias.  I can't imagine a full fledged attack on Somali pirates wouldn't drag us into their internal politics either.

[Rattatat]

What about the option of rubber bullets? They can cause a lot of damage and would be able to subdue the pirates but wouldn't kill them if we had to rescue hostages

[Merlin8r]

 I think you might have a hard time convincing the military to fight bad guys with rubber bullets, when said bad guys are firing FMJ lead rounds back at them.

[Otis Driftwood]

I didn't mean for the presence of a lot of small, fast warships to immediately mean deadly force. More as a deterrent.  I don't know if you've ever seen a warship of any type bristling with weapons and technology, but it's a damn intimidating sight. Either sitting in port or on the high seas, they stand out in a crowd of civilian ships like you wouldn't believe.  So I think a significant military presence in the area would be a fantastic deterrent, and that just might be enough. Oh, I'm sure a few fire fights wouldn't hurt a bit to curb this thing, but wiping them all out on sight was not at all what I had in mind.

If the "desperate fisherman" story has any credence, and most of these pirates are basically in it for the money, and not really to kill people, then a strong show of military - and maybe deadly- force is really the only option. The only thing that will make them change their mind is a "take no shit" kind of presence. They aren't going to board a ship if a contingent of marines, seals, or SAS is two miles away, and can respond in just a few minutes. And if anything, many nations working at this might just make the Somali warlords in charge of this thing take notice and realize that the world isn't really willing to put up with them starving, slaughtering and subjugating other people....finally.

Maybe if it's a multinational force sending a message from the sea to the land, we won't have Rangers dragged naked through the streets again, and our best soldiers humiliated due to a bad call from the White House, and an order to the US Army Scout/Sniper teams to hold fire. They've already given the order to SEALs to fire.

Maybe the families of the people held hostage would appreciate that message, no matter what country they're from.

And Texas is about 268,000 square miles. I know from experience that it's about 850 miles alone from El Paso to Texarkana.

Apologies if I seem overly serious about this topic for it not being in HB. Somalia is a sore spot for me.

[Alderaan]

Gale: Texas has roughly three times the area of the entire UK.

[Staff]

How many Rhode Islands is that?

[Alderaan]

Oh, I'd say roughly FUCK YOU.

[Cavedog]

Honestly, how hard can it be to get rid of these pirates? I bet you the US could destroy them in a week, the US is just too busy trying to be politically correct. 

Or maybe the US military is stretched pretty thin around the world.  Does everyone have collective amnesia?  We intervened there in 1992 with 20,000 troops.  Clearly even massive military force won't solve the piracy issue.

We weren't going after pirates then, we were trying to avert a famine.

That doesn't matter.  Extermination is a bad option for persistent problems.  Someone will keep filling the void as long as there's money to be made, and trying to just go in and kill them all  would generate so much ill will that you'd be able to taste it in the air.  And whats worse, you'd have to spend a ridiculous amount of money to do it.  And on top of that, you wouldn't have helped the situation in Somalia at all domestically, which just means they'll be back again, being even nastier than before.  Evil Sloth is right; until there's a functioning state in Somalia, there will be piracy.  No matter how hard we try to hit them.  All that can really be done is to ramp up protective measures, and I think Otis is right that the best way to do it is through a multinational force, not just an American force.

That'll give some of the more obscure countries to win some hatred too, so we're not hogging it all.

[LordGONDOR]

Honestly, how hard can it be to get rid of these pirates? I bet you the US could destroy them in a week, the US is just too busy trying to be politically correct. 

Or maybe the US military is stretched pretty thin around the world.  Does everyone have collective amnesia?  We intervened there in 1992 with 20,000 troops.  Clearly even massive military force won't solve the piracy issue.

I'm not saying we invade the country, I'm just saying we destroy all their ships and their bases. Remember, they are poor as fuck, they just can't keep building ships.

[Otis Driftwood]

Don't worry, she's got it all under control.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday unveiled a diplomatic initiative to thwart attacks on ships off Somalia's coast and combat what she called the "scourge of piracy."

You have got to be fucking kidding me. A "diplomatic initiative" with people who are #1) using other people as muscle to further their own monetary interests (the warlords), and #2) give a rat shit about "diplomacy" at all?  Please.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called for measures to help combat pirate attacks off Somalia.

Not by much she hasn't and not very effectively. Can I fire her ass from the public eye permanently when and if this fails miserably?

Clinton said the State Department will "explore ways to track and freeze pirate assets," similar to measures used against drug traffickers and terrorists.

What? They're attacking ships in rowboats, skiffs, and fishing boats for chrissakes. What fucking assets do either the pirates or the Somali warlords have that could be worth seizing?

Noting that the pirates have been buying more sophisticated vessels with the ransom money they have been collecting, Clinton said it could be possible to stop boat-building companies from doing business with pirates.

Yeah, fuckin' right.

This is the first "military" crisis the Obama administration has had to face, and they're so fucking intent on shedding the perceived "worldwide cowboy"  thing that the left stamped on Bush, that I fear they are going to pussy foot around this rather minor issue, and therefore totally fuck it up, and once again, the US will be a proverbial paper tiger.

Seizing assets? Diplomatic solution? Threatening contractors?

Those are all very viable, effective solutions. In other cases. Thugs and criminals understand one thing.

Superior force.

[Staff]

Those are all very viable, effective solutions. In other cases. Thugs and criminals understand one thing.

Superior force.

God damn it, man, stop teasing me! I just can't do it at this time...

[Glenn]

Seizing assets? Diplomatic solution? Threatening contractors?

Those are all very viable, effective solutions. In other cases. Thugs and criminals understand one thing.

Superior force.

I'm imagining you typing that with one hand on your keyboard and the other on your .44 Magnum, with your legs spread wide to accommodate your gigantic steel balls. Clearly, what this problem requires is an inflexible and unpragmatic approach.

[Rattatat]

I think the first military crisis the Obama administration has faced would be either Iraq or Afghanistan....What's going on in Somalia isn't at crisis level yet, though it can and probably will get there.

[The Evil Sloth]

Applying that superior force on the high seas is a nightmare. Whose law applies? Where are the goods being transited to/from? How are you going to arm a ship which is delivering goods to a country which will not allow those arms into their ports? How are you going to reconcile civilian/merchant ships engaging in what is effectively naval combat with the fundamental and long-standing legal obligation of civillian ships to rescue one another. What, you're going to have the Norweigan captain of the MV 'Oilrunner' open fire on some rickety wooden Somali fishing boat, then require him to rescue the people whose boat he just sank? What are you going to do with legitimate distress signals from non-pirate Somali ships? Ignore them?

The high seas are inherently dangerous. Everybody who works with/on them knows that. That's why the UNCLOS and attendant SOLAS (UN Convention on Law of the Sea, Safety of Life at Sea) is one of the very few pieces of international law that everyone agrees on and respects. Because without it, people die far more frequently than is necessary.

Pirates aren't playing by the rules because they are criminals. The effective way to respond to criminals is not to say "Well to hell with the rules then!'', because otherwise we wouldn't even bother with laws. The reason merchant ships aren't armed, and that there are no roving maritime mercenaries is because it would be an enormous, unworkable clusterfuck and it would cost lives.

Naval responses are far more effective, but you've still got difficulties in terms of time and resources. The sea is a huge place, and naval ships - as a rule - aren't very fast. One solution would be to deploy more highspeed vessels (like the prototype LCS vessels) But those are still being commissioned, and the congressional cost cap on those ships is about 400 million dollars a pop. So even if they are the best solution for the problem, it's going to take time and billions of dollars to implement them, and then any ships that you put into that theatre take the opportunity cost of delploying them elsewhere - say the Persian Gulf.

Given that a) the 'civilians/contractors arm and defend themselves' plan is fraught with problems and b) the military intervention solution is enormously expensive and stretches an already overburdened system, and c) historically, 'project more force' has never been an effective solution to piracy, diplomacy and nation-building are the only remaining viable options.

Yes, there should be more naval vessels deployed in the region. But that will only treat the symptom, not the cause. Clinton's solution is the only workable, long-term answer to these problems. I understand that 'diplomacy' and 'pressure on contractors' seem like soft answers to piracy, but let's take a step back and think hard about this. Would you prefer a hard, militaristic solution that will be expensive and probably won't work, or a soft, diplomatic solution that is cheaper, and realistically our best chance at solving the problem?

There's a certain poetic justice in letting loose the warships and blowing the pirates to hell. I understand that. But I'll take an effective solution over a poetic one any day.

[Otis Driftwood]

Okay, so how do you stem pirate attacks now? Which is when they are happening. Kudos on the long term "solution", but they are actually holding hostages right now. Fox News reported today about 300 of them.

If snipers aren't the answer, and we've already seen that they can be, then what is?

You and I recommended the same things as far as naval response goes.   Small, fast moving vessels, spread out and working in force. And the fact that pirates are criminals. The resources, should the be spread out among mann nations would be a small burden on all the nations involved. Since so many nations have a vested interest in protecting their cargo, I think it'd be a lot easier than convincing 26 nations of anything.

What do we disagree on again?

Nation building only works after the bombs and bullets have stopped flying, and when a country is made to belive it has no choice but to negotiate. History tells us that again and again.

A multinational force wouldn't have to invade the entire country at all. But just prove - at sea- to the warlords in charge - that the countries of the world aren't going to put up with criminal behavior.

[vantor]

I think the first military crisis the Obama administration has faced would be either Iraq or Afghanistan....What's going on in Somalia isn't at crisis level yet, though it can and probably will get there.

Yeah, at best this is the third or fourth new military crisis that Obama has had to deal with. Not to mention existing ones.