Ask and ye shall receive. lol
Reliable sources inform me that this Canadian Warship was purchased from the French Navy and the only modification they were required to make was to remove the permanently attached White Flag.
Posted on 04/05/2008 7:39:50 AM PDT by HAL9000
The Le Ponant pleasure yacht was seized Friday in international waters opposite Somalia without passengers on route from the Seychelles to Aden Port and the Mediterranean after its first pleasure trip of the summer season in the Indian Ocean. The 32-man crew was taken hostage.Our shipping correspondent reports that the French Le Commandant Rouen warship was diverted from NATO’s Afghanistan operation to join the Yemeni coast guard in the hunt for and rescue of the captured craft. The Le Ponant caters to 64 high-profile luxury tourists, one of three owned by Le Compagnie Des Iles du Ponant, a subsidiary of the huge Lebanese-French CMA CGM.
DEBKAfile’s sources note that the Gulf of Aden and Somali shores are rife with pirates. Last year, 24 civilian craft were commandeered by pirates. In one case, the American Navy’s USS Porter opened fire on a pirate ship threatening a Japanese tanker; in another, pirates released a Danish merchant vessel with hostages against a large ransom after holding them for two months.
It’s probably the Commandant Bouan, as misheard over the telephone. Would make sense given the role.
Probably the same one the Barbary Pirates of the late 1700’s and early 1800’s did.
You know, the ones Jefferson sent Decatur to Tripoli Harbor to open up a can of Whoopa$$ on?
Ask and ye shall receive. lol
Reliable sources inform me that this Canadian Warship was purchased from the French Navy and the only modification they were required to make was to remove the permanently attached White Flag.
No one will go hungry.
It would have been nice if they sent something that would at least SCARE the pirates.
French Rear Adm. Jean L. Kerignard is in command of CTF-150
Now that’s funny.
Good job.
No, I’m not. I’m just not gonna ever pass up an opportunity to rip the French.
But are the French up to it?
Have they ever been? Remember that during our own revolution the Frogs did what they do best. When Admiral Howe’s British fleet showed up, Admiral DeGrasse FLED with his numerically superior fleet.
There is a great misperception about the French military.
The French military is not incompetent. In fact, they are excellent. Their political LEADERSHIP has been horrible for decades and the French population in general has been ambivalent with regard to just about anything dealing with defense and national security.
But the French military is far from the incompetent, cowardly force that so many in America seem to think it is.
I’d take that piece for use in a fight....Ma Deuce always good!
Like what? They could find a later-model ship, but who cares? The pirates don't have anything that can even remotely take on this ship. A cheap, gun-based littoral-oriented ship is perfect for this role. If looks rather than need drove decisions, they'd have sent a Lafayette-class vessel:
Somalia lacks a functioning government, is an islamic cesspool, and would be a prime candidate to be the toxic waste dump for the universe. Much mischief comes out of Somalia, it produces nothing of consequence, it disrupts its neighbors, and it would look better if it glowed in the dark.
It is possible that the name is the only fact that they got wrong, but given their track record, that is unlikely. I fact-checked one item in a few minutes on the net, and caught an error. They didn't fact check at all, and no telling what we'd find if we went through the rest of the story.
The French military leadership failed their armed forces in 1940. When the Germans invaded, the French had a bigger army, more tanks, *better* tanks (albeit much slower), and more guns. The only areas where the Germans had a real qualitative superiority were in their air force (the French AF was bigger but largely obsolete) and in their tactics. The French generals deployed their army poorly, went into a total panic when the Germans broke through the “impossible” Ardennes and reached the Meuse, and totally botched any slim hope of a counterattack. Their soldiers, in many cases, fought well against hopeless odds.
The French actually have a lot of experience in counterterrorism. Well, OK, if you define Greenpeace as “terrorists”. But, still, they train very hard, and I expect if they can catch these pirates, they’ll put some serious hurt on them.
}:-)4
Tell you what. Let us put you out at sea on a small boat against this French warship, let it fire a couple of rounds in your direction, a direct hit from which would not send you to Davy Jones Locker, because the bits would be so small that the fish would eat you before they could sink that far, and let us see how your bravado stands up.
A machinegun-armed Predator flying up and down the Somali coastline, strafing anything that looks like a pirate vessel, would put a stop to this real fast
Some of you make fun of Debkafile, but methinks if an honest study were done, comparing the truth and accuracy of DEBKAfile to the NEW YORK TIMES, that it would be found that DEBKAfile is much more truthful and accurate than the Old Grey Whore, the Washington Compost, or any of a number of Liberal rags for that matter.
Fantastique! We shall fold like bath towels!
DeGrasse was a great seaman and fighter. E.G., His actions prevented the British from shipping in more troops and supplies at the battle of Yorktown, enabling Washington and Rochambeau to force a British surrender..
As the Revolution wore on, your typical continental soldier carried a French musket, powder and shot, wore a French-supplied uniform and boots, slept in a French-supplied blanket, even ate French rations. Artillery: French. Our Army units, modeled on the French.
Rochambeau, the French Army Chief in our Revolution, to which France also sent over 10,000 troops, was also a master strategist ... which old George was sometimes not. Lissen, the Frogs had a couple of bad centuries, and we bailed them out in WWI and II, but they are the US'oldest, if not constant, ally. There is even a well-founded theory that the money they spent on us, and the taxes they raised to get it, ruined the French Monarchy and led to THEIR Revolution!
And, they are plenty brave, just sometimes unlucky. Very good Navy. Very good Air Force. Very good Army. Of course, getting them to use force on our behalf is sometimes difficult ... as with any other ally.
> So I take it you’re rooting against America’s French allies and for the Islamist terorists who kidnapped 30 French citizens? Charming!
Congratulations! The first sensible post on this dam’nable thread! It only took twenty. Shivers! People complain when the French don’t participate in the WOT, and people make fun of them when they do. Crikey!
I wonder if any of these armchair heroes know that the French Foreign Legion is a world-class elite force, arguably as good as or better than anything that the United States can put in the field? Probably they don’t. It is just possible that the Legion will be on that warship — they often do things like that. And if not the Legion it will be a fairly competent group of French cutthroats that board the Luxury yacht.
I feel sorry for the Somali pirates, actually: they are highly likely to be dead in fairly short order.
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