[nuconvert]

Can any country use the title SEAL for their special forces?

[Haiku Guy]

SEOUL (AFP) – South Korean navy commandos Friday stormed a ship hijacked by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean, rescuing all the 21 crew and killing eight pirates, military officials said.

The SEAL special forces boarded the South Korean ship before dawn, freeing all the hostages and killing the pirates in cabin-to-cabin battles, they said. Five other pirates were captured.

The only thing that can make this story better is if it continued with: "The captured pirates were summarily executed, bringing the total number of dead pirates to 13."

[oh8eleven]

SEAL is not an exclusive term.
Ever heard of Korean Marines?

[Lysandru]

ROK On!

[BuffaloJack]

Way to go, South Korea.
Not to criticize, but it would have been better if all of the pirates were dead.

[Tempest]

Has any ever watched the South Korean series IRIS? awesome show. I was reminded of that show when reading this article.

[Joe 6-pack]

"Can any country use the title SEAL for their special forces?"

"SEAL" is simply an acronym for "Sea, Air, Land" special forces. In as much as the ROKs generally try to mirror US forces in organization, equipment and training, I don't think their use of the term is inappropriate. There are ROK Ranger, too, BTW, although where our Army only has one Ranger School, each ROK infantry division runs its own.

[DaxtonBrown]

From what I have heard, the nastiest bunch to cross are Korean military. The Somalis should have asked to be turned over to the Russians.

[yarddog]

Sounds like they did an excellent job.

[Tempest]

Well I’m glad that it wasn’t the Israeli special forces. Otherwise the media would come out on the side of the poor victimized pirates.

[org.whodat]

LOL. Praise their work not the childish use of a name.

[ArrogantBustard]

Thank you, ROK SEALs, for exemplifying to the world the proper treatment of pirates.

[NeverForgetBataan]

The Koreans don’t have to be “encouraged” to get out of the helicopter. They go willingly.

[arthurus]

Why did they bother to capture the five? I hope they at least parade them on TV and send videos to Somalia. Better would be a raid followup destruction of the pirate ports.

[ArrogantBustard]

President Lee Myung-Bak, who authorised the operation, said the military carried out the raid perfectly under difficult circumstances.

"We will not tolerate any activities that threaten the safety and lives of our people," he said.

Must be nice to have a President who is a patriot ...

[The Great RJ]

They should have fed the 5 pirates they captured to the sharks and sending the video to Al Jareera.

[Fester Chugabrew]

Does South Korea have a whining, pantywaiste media that will question the severity of it all?

[DesertRhino]

As long as they can board a ship at sea, kill every single pirate, save every single hostage,,, they can call themselves any name they like. Go ROK

[KJC1]

Way to go, South Korea!

The world needs more pirate beat-downs, and less pirates.