How Did the United States Defeat the Barbary Pirates?

Though a definite link has yet to be established (or publicized), it becomes more apparent with each passing day that the acts of terror on September 11 were undertaken by individuals belonging to or associated with the Al-Qaida organization. While the group has ties to the Taliban, the current ruling faction in Afghanistan, neither can really be considered a government, making war with either an unconventional one. Yet the United States is hardly unused to combating unconventional foes. While the Vietnam War and the "War on Drugs" may bear some parallels, perhaps the most germane historical example is the often forgotten war with the Barbary pirates in the early 19th century. This conflict, pitting the United States against a stateless enemy, was memorable for the use of careful diplomacy, coalitions, special military tactics, and, unfortunately, confused goals.

The pirates of North Africa, operating variously with or without the approval of the nominal rulers of Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, had long been a thorn in the side of the European powers. Even Britain, the rarely disputed ruler of the seas, paid tribute to these pirates. Due to Britain's payments, colonial American merchants were rarely accosted, but after the peace of 1783 ships flying the Stars and Stripes were seen as easy prey. Fortunately for our young, cash-strapped nation, unable either to pay tribute or protect shipping, Portugal declared war on Algiers in 1785, sending a fleet to patrol the Strait of Gibraltar and prevent the Corsairs from passing into the Atlantic. In 1793, the war ended and in the last three months of that year eleven American ships were seized. Unable to raise funds to pay the ransom for the crews, the American negotiator was compelled to borrow from a Jewish moneylender living in Algiers to pay the nearly million-dollar ransom.

During President Washington's administration, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson disagreed sharply over policy toward the Corsairs. Adams strongly favored paying off the pirates, arguing that a long and protracted war would financially ruin the young nation. Jefferson vehemently disagreed, appealing not only to an American sense of honor, but also to the notion that a single, decisive war might be more cost-effective than annual bribes for perpetuity. Not surprisingly, their subsequent administration policies reflected these beliefs. Adams was anxious to prevent conflict, and ensured payment of all demanded tribute. In addition, Adams even agreed to build and deliver two warships for the Algerian Corsairs. Since the Corsairs were considered more a force of nature than a foreign nation, the fact that this was contrary to the popular, "millions for defense, not one cent for tribute," attitude toward French demands for bribes, was rarely noted. Yet, frustrated during tribute negotiations with Tunis, negotiator William Eaton wrote home that, "there is but one language which can be held to these people, and this is terror."

In May of 1801, the Corsairs of Tripoli became restless and declared war on the United States, figuring they could increase their annual tribute. Their disorganized fleet passed into the Atlantic but was chased back by a recently dispatched American squadron. The Americans cruised the Mediterranean, evacuating American merchantmen and winning several engagements with the Corsairs. Later that year Sweden declared war on the Tripolitans and lent considerable support to the American blockade of Tripoli. The combined fleet of Swedish and American, and infrequently Danish, ships was unwilling to bombard the city until early 1802 when President Jefferson ordered that the war be pursued with greater vigor. Despite occasional bombardment, as the blockade continued, it became impossible for the large American ships to prevent some of the smaller, faster Corsair gunboats from slipping through. The Americans wanted to draw the pirates into a large decisive battle, but their attempts proved fruitless. When Sweden made peace that year, the blockade collapsed.

Following the abandonment of the blockade, a series of unfortunate incidents made the American position increasingly difficult. An American captain killed the personal secretary of the British governor of Malta in a duel, straining relations with that important source of respite and supply. In early 1803, an accidental explosion aboard an American ship killed nineteen men. In May of that year, a large squadron of American warships was assembled and proceeded to Tripoli to destroy the Corsairs' fleet entirely. Large guns protected the anchored fleet, but marines landed close to the walls of the city to set fire to many of the docked ships as they were pelted with stones from the town’s inhabitants. However, a heroic group of Tripolitans endured bombardment from the squadron and small-arms fire from the marines and extinguished the fires.

In October of that year, a large U.S. man-of-war, Philadelphia, gave chase to a Corsair ship trying to break the blockade, but was lured into an uncharted reef. The ship was paralyzed and overtaken and put into the service of the pirates. The following February, eight marines sailed a small merchant vessel alongside the anchored Philadelphia, killed twenty Corsairs, and destroyed the warship without any loss of life of their own side. Upon hearing of the attack Admiral Horatio Nelson called it, "the most bold and daring act of the age." Yet the blockade remained largely ineffective.

Early in 1804, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies declared war on Tripoli, lending a number of small, maneuverable gunboats that were thought to be helpful in subduing the pirates. On August 3, the American-led force began an all-out attack, sailing into the harbor and bombarding the city at direct range. The Americans aboard the smaller gunboats decided to counter the pirates' standard technique and approached the enemy ships fast, boarding them and engaging in hand to hand combat. After destroying much of the town's fortifications, several gunboats, and a large mosque, the squadron withdrew.

Bombardment of the town achieving little besides massive civilian casualties, a change in strategy was in order. A small force of marines was sent to Alexandria, Egypt, to locate the original hereditary ruler of Tripoli, with the intent of restoring him to the throne. Upon finding him, they raised a mercenary army of Arabs and Greeks and began a several hundred-mile march towards Tripoli from the land. After a difficult march across the Libyan Desert and a bloody victory in the outlying town of Derne, the marines were informed by messenger that the war was over. The treaty that was signed guaranteed the return of American prisoners but changed little. The difficulties with the Barbary States, including a series of confrontations with Algiers in 1814-17, would continue until France brought the era to an end by invading and colonizing most of North-West Africa. Notably, Algiers in 1954 proved to be the forerunner to the type of war being waged against the United States today.

email going around 7/16/04

THE WORLD SITUATION - A LETTER TO MY SONS

This was written by a retired attorney, to his sons, May 19, 2004.

Dear Tom, Kevin, Kirby and Ted,

As your father, I believe I owe it to you to share some thoughts on the present world situation. We have over the years discussed a lot of important things, like going to college, jobs and so forth. But this really takes precedence over any of those discussions.

I hope this might give you a longer term perspective that fewer and fewer of my generation are left to speak to. To be sure you understand that this is not politically flavored, I will tell you that since Franklin D. Roosevelt, who led us through pre- and WWII (1933 - 1945) up to and including our present President, I have without exception, supported our presidents on all matters of international conflict.

This would include just naming a few in addition to President Roosevelt - WWII: President Truman - Korean War 1950; President Kennedy - Bay of Pigs 1961); President Kennedy - Vietnam (1961); [1] eight presidents (5 Republican & 4 Democrat) during the cold war (1945 - 1991); President Clinton's strikes on Bosnia (1995) and on Iraq (1998). So be sure you read this as completely non-political or otherwise you will miss the point.

Our country is now facing the most serious threat to its existence, as we know it, that we have faced in your lifetime and mine (which includes WWII). The deadly seriousness is greatly compounded by the fact that there are very few of us who think we can possibly lose this war and even fewer who realize what losing really means.

First, let's examine a few basics:

1. When did the threat to us start? Many will say September 11th, 2001. The answer as far as the United States is concerned is 1979, 22 years prior to
September 2001, with the following attacks on us:
Iran Embassy Hostages, 1979;
Beirut, Lebanon Embassy 1983;
Beirut, Lebanon Marine Barracks 1983;
Lockerbie,Scotland Pan-Am flight to New York 1988;
First New York World Trade Center attack 1993;
Dhahran, Saudi Arabia Khobar Towers Military complex 1996;
Nairobi, Kenya US Embassy 1998;
Dares Salaam, Tanzania US Embassy 1998;
Aden, Yemen USS Cole 2000;
New York World Trade Center 2001;
Pentagon 2001. (Note that during the period from 1981 to 2001 there
were 7,581 terrorist attacks worldwide).

2. Why were we attacked? Envy of our position, our success, and our freedoms. The attacks happened during the administrations of Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton and Bush 2. We cannot fault either the Republicans or Democrats as there was no provocation by any of the presidents or their immediate predecessors, Presidents Ford or Carter.

3. Who were the attackers? In each case, the attacks on the US were carried out by Muslims.

4. What is the Muslim population of the World? 25%

5. Isn't the Muslim Religion peaceful? Hopefully, but that is really not material. There is no doubt that the predominately Christian population of Germany was peaceful, but under the dictatorial leadership of Hitler (who was also "Christian"), that made no difference. You either went along with the administration or you were eliminated. There were 5 to 6 million Christians killed by the Nazis for political reasons (including 7,000 Polish priests). (http://www.nazis.testimony.co.uk/7-a.htm). Thus, almost the same number of Christians were killed by the Nazis, as the 6 million holocaust Jews who were killed by them, and we seldom hear of anything other than the Jewish atrocities. Although Hitler kept the world focused on the Jews, he had no hesitancy about killing anyone who got in his way of exterminating the Jews or of taking over the world - German, Christian or any others.

Same with the Muslim terrorists. They focus the world on the US, but kill all in their way, their own people or the Spanish, French or anyone else. The point here is that just like the peaceful Germans were of no protection to anyone from the Nazis, no matter how many peaceful Muslims there may be, they are no protection for us from the terrorist Muslim leaders and what they are fanatically bent on doing - by their own pronouncements - killing all of us infidels. I don't blame the peaceful Muslims. What would you do if the choice was shut up or die?

6. So who are we at war with? There is no way we can honestly respond that it is anyone other than the Muslim terrorists. Trying to be politically correct and avoid verbalizing this conclusion can well be fatal. There is no way to win if you don't clearly recognie and articulate who you are fighting.

So with that background, now to the two major questions:

1. Can we lose this war?
2. What does losing really mean?

If we are to win, we must clearly answer these two pivotal questions. We can definitely lose this war, and as anomalous as it may sound, the major reason we can lose is that so many of us simply do not fathom the answer to the second question - What does losing mean?

It would appear that a great many of us think that losing the war means hanging our heads, bringing the troops home and going on about our business, like post Vietnam. This is as far from the truth as one can get.

What losing really means is:

We would no longer be the premier country in the world. The attacks will not subside, but rather will steadily increase. Remember, they want us dead, not just quiet. If they had just wanted us quiet, they would not have produced an increasing series of attacks against us over the past 18 years.

The plan was clearly for terrorists to attack us until we were neutered and submissive to them. We would of course have no future support from other nations for fear of reprisals and for the reason that they would see we are impotent and cannot help them. They will pick off the other non-Muslim nations, one at a time. It will be increasingly easier for them. They already hold Spain hostage. It doesn't matter whether it was right or wrong for Spain to withdraw its troops from Iraq. Spain did it because the Muslim terrorists bombed their train and told them to withdraw the troops. Anything else they want Spain to do, will be done. Spain is finished. The next probably will be France. Our one hope on France is that they might see the light and realize that if we don't win, they are finished too, in that they can't resist the Muslim terrorists without us. However, it may already be too late for France. France is already 20% Muslim and fading fast. [See article on the French condition by Tom Segel.]

If we lose the war, our production, income, exports and way of life will all vanish as we know it. After losing, who would trade or deal with us if they were threatened by the Muslims? If we can't stop the Muslims, how could anyone else? The Muslims fully know what is riding on this war and therefore are completely committed to winning at any cost. We better know it too and be likewise committed to winning at any cost.

Why do I go on at such lengths about the results of losing? Simple. Until we recognize the costs of losing, we cannot unite and really put 100% of our thoughts and efforts into winning. And it is going to take that 100% effort to win.

So, how can we lose the war? Again, the answer is simple. We can lose the war by imploding. That is, defeating ourselves by refusing to recognize the enemy and their purpose and really digging in and lending full support to the war effort. If we are united, there is no way that we can lose. If we continue to be divided, there is no way that we can win.

Let me give you a few examples of how we simply don't comprehend the life and death seriousness of this situation. President Bush selects Norman Mineta as Secretary of Transportation. Although all of the terrorist attacks were committed by Muslim men between 17 and 40 years of age, Secretary Mineta refuses to allow profiling. Does that sound like we are taking this thing seriously?

This is war. For the duration we are going to have to give up some of the civil rights we have become accustomed to. We had better be prepared to lose some of our civil rights temporarily or we will most certainly lose all of them permanently. And don't worry that it is a slippery slope. We gave up plenty of civil rights during WWII and immediately restored them after the victory and in fact added many more since then.

Do I blame President Bush or President Clinton before him? No, I blame us for blithely assuming we can maintain all of our Political Correctness and all of our civil rights during this conflict and have a clean, lawful, honorable war. None of those words apply to war. Get them out of your head.

Some have gone so far in their criticism of the war and/or the Administration that it almost seems they would literally like to see us lose. I hasten to add that this isn't because they are disloyal. It is because they just don't recognize what losing means. Nevertheless, that conduct gives the impression to the enemy that we are divided and weakening, it concerns our friends, and it does great damage to our cause.

Of more recent vintage, the uproar fueled by the politicians and media regarding the treatment of some prisoners of war perhaps exemplifies best what I am saying. We have recently had an issue involving the treatment of a few Muslim prisoners of war by a small group of our military police. These are the type prisoners who just a few months ago were throwing their own people off buildings, cutting off their hands, cutting out their tongues and otherwise murdering their own people just for disagreeing with Saddam Hussein. And a few years ago they chemically killed 400,000 of their own people for the same reason.

They are also the type enemy fighters who recently were burning Americans and dragging their charred corpses through the streets of Iraq. And still more recently the same type enemy that was and is providing videos to all news sources internationally, of the beheading of an American prisoner they held.

Compare this with some of our press and politicians who for several days have thought and talked about nothing else but the humiliating of some Muslim prisoners - not burning them, not dragging their charred corpses through the streets, not beheading them, but "humiliating" them.

Can this be for real? The politicians and pundits have even talked of impeachment of the Secretary of Defense. If this doesn't show the complete lack of comprehension and understanding of the seriousness of the enemy we are fighting, the life and death struggle we are in and the disastrous results of losing this war, nothing can. To bring our country to a virtual political standstill over this prisoner issue makes us look like Nero playing his fiddle as Rome burned - totally oblivious to what is going on in the real world. Neither we, nor any other country, can survive this internal strife.

Again I say, this does not mean that some of our politicians or media people are disloyal. It simply means that they are absolutely oblivious to the magnitude of the situation we are in and into which the Muslim terrorists have been pushing us for many years.

Remember, the Muslim terrorists stated goal is to kill all infidels. That translates into all non-Muslims - not just in the United States, but throughout the world. We are the last bastion of defense. We have been criticized for many years as being 'arrogant'. That charge is valid in at least one respect. We are arrogant in that we believe that we are so good, powerful and smart, that we can win the hearts and minds of all those who attack us, and that with both hands tied behind our back, we can defeat anything bad in the world. We can't. If we don't recognize this, our nation as we know it will not survive, and no other free country in the world will survive if we are defeated.

And finally, name any Muslim countries throughout the world that allow freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, equal rights for anyone - let alone everyone, equal status or any status for women, or that have been productive in one single way that contributes to the good of the world.

This has been a long way of saying that we must be united on this war or we will be equated in the history books to the self-inflicted fall of the Roman Empire. If, that is, the Muslim leaders will allow history books to be written or read.

If we don't win this war right now, keep a close eye on how the Muslims take over France in the next 5 years or less. They will continue to increase the Muslim population of France and continue to encroach little by little on the established French traditions. The French will be fighting among themselves over what should or should not be done, which will continue to weaken them and keep them from any united resolve. Doesn't that sound eerily familiar?

Democracies don't have their freedoms taken away from them by some external military force. Instead, they give their freedoms away, politically correct piece by politically correct piece. And they are giving those freedoms away to those who have shown, worldwide, that they abhor freedom and will not apply it to you or even to themselves, once they are in power. They have universally shown that when they have taken over, they then start brutally killing each other over who will be the few who control the masses. Will we ever stop hearing from the politically correct, about
the "peaceful Muslims"?

I close on a hopeful note, by repeating what I said above. If we are united, there is no way that we can lose. I believe that after the election, the factions in our country will begin to focus on the critical situation we are in and will unite to save our country. It is your future we are talking about. Do whatever you can to preserve it.

Love,
Dad
[of Tom, Kevin, Kirby and Ted]

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