India is coming of age in the world. We did it in 1802 or thereabouts.
Send the pirates “whaling”, problem solved.
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Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, UK, Denmark, Malaysia, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the US all have vessels involved in detering acts of piracy in the region. Pakistan was also seeking to send vessels to the region. Not an easy task to monitor and actually catch the pirates in action. Think of all the fishing vessels and other small craft confusing the picture.
The Germans also thwarted an attack using a helo on Saturday.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gB7YMEDuCwwY9ncDOtPAkEI4-H2wD9521CLG0
If they are, I applaud them. I am, however, getting a little suspicious of the stories of how the Indian Navy manages to take these pirates on so successfully while the world's major seapowers seem to be saying it's beyond them.
I hope my suspiscions are wrong, and they might be. Still...
Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy sits and does nothing.
Yesterday’s update from ORBAT.
The Indian missile destroyer came to the aid of an Ethiopian merchantman under attack by pirates. Indian naval commandos dropped by helicopter responded to the SOS. The pirates are evenly divided between Yemenis and Somalis; as far as we are concerned, this is not a good sign that the Yemenis have also decided to join the game. The Mysore replaced the frigate Tabar on anti-piracy patrol. Several pirates escaped, indicating this lot of bandits was prepared for a fight. The prisoners will be delivered to the “appropriate authorities”. We say the proper authority is King Neptune.
As far as we know, the Thai businessperson who claimed the pirate mother ship Tabar had sunk was his innocent fishing trawler is out of the news.
Question: why are other navies not being as aggressive as the Indians in pursuing the pirates? The Indian Navy has had one warship on station for the past two months but has already whacked a bunch of pirates.
Meanwhile, US Secretary Defense says the individuals who are pirate leaders must be identified before they can be targeted. So here we are, back again to the high-tech videogames to which the American military has become addicted. Guys, guys, what about getting your feet wet and doing some fighting in person? This taking out individuals is not going to work. It has to be a secondary tactic.