[castlebrew]

Wrong. Britain waged a broad, naval campaign against pirates, actively tracking them down (offensive in nature, not defensive). Which happened to benefit all shipping in the affected areas.

When the bandits/pirates are land-based, and using land-based assets against shipping, then attacking those land-based assets is the right and proper course of action.

[Alberta's Child]

Your post is missing a huge, important aspect of the Barbary pirate problem for the U.S. back in the early decades of this country’s existence. Britain was actually encouraging piracy against American shipping in the Mediterranean Sea after the American Revolution ended. In fact, predation by British ships against American vessels was one of the issues that led to the War of 1812.

That’s why the piracy problem in the Mediterranean wasn’t really resolved until after that war — and (more importantly) the Napoleonic Wars between Britain and France — ended.