Not civilian freighters. The Maersk Alabama is a civilian (Danish) container ship and the DoD said it wasn’t on a defense-related contract; in fact, I haven’t seen anything on what it was carrying, except one report that it was “possibly food aid.”
The crews and ships are unarmed, and there’s no troops onboard. They’re reduced to frantic Mayday calls, evasive action, and manning the rails with firehoses to fight off thug pirates with assault rifles, heavy machine guns, and RPGs.
}:-)4
Why are they unarmed?