Posted on 04/13/2009 3:27:57 PM PDT by tobyhill
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Monday that three Somali pirates who were killed by the Navy's Seals to end a hostage crisis were "untrained" teenagers.
Addressing an audience at the Marine Corps War College in Quantico, Virginia, Gates said that the slain pirates, aged at between 17 to 19, were heavily armed but inexperienced.
They were shot dead on Sunday at the end of a five-day standoff with the U.S. military after they attacked a U.S.-flagged cargo ship about 400 kilometers away from Somali and held an American captain as hostage.
"As long as you've got this incredible number of poor people and the risks are relatively small, there's really no way in my view to control it unless you get something on land that begins to change the equation for these kids," Gates told students and faculty members.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.xinhuanet.com ...
Thats a slap in the face of all those who took part in this.
My God, what have we done.
“Well, it got so that every piss-ant prairie punk who thought he could shoot a gun would ride into town to try out the Waco Kid. I must have killed more men than Cecil B. DeMille. It got pretty gritty. I started to hear the word “draw” in my sleep.
“Then one day, I was just walking down the street when I heard a voice behind me say, “Reach for it, mister!” I spun around... and there I was, face-to-face with a six-year old kid. Well, I just threw my guns down and walked away.
“Little bastard shot me in the ass.”
— An important lesson about “kids with guns”, from the movie Blazing Saddles.
Schooled in the KORAN!
(Which tells these Muslim kids to KILL and to PLUNDER the infidels)
Isn't the obvious answer to make the risks relatively large, as in shooting them dead?
Gates basically made that case as if it does matter. He almost excuses their behavior being they were teenagers and poor.
On the Job Training?!
In the sense that there probably is no ‘school for piracy’, then Gates is probably right. It is still an idiotic statement, however. A fast boat, an AK, and a will to commit mayhem is all that is required. It’s also time to consider what would have happened, Sec. Gates, if 1 of our highly trained snipers had missed. You would probably have been thrown under Obama’s bus.
These pirates need midnight basketball....
>Thats a slap in the face of all those who took part in this.
>My God, what have we done.
The guy’s statement, or my suggestion of impeaching him?
Yes, I miss Rumsfeld.
Dead muslims in the straights off Somalia..
Dead muslims in the straights off Sommalia...
And they're stinking to high heaven.
*******************
I rarely agree with anyone all the time and don't expect to. I loved Rumsfeld because of the very reasons you mentioned. He is a true patriot and a brilliant man.
“As long as you’ve got this incredible number of poor people....”
Oh get the F out if here, you mean every poor kid will become a pirate? And that attacking these pirates wouldn’t deter kids from joining up??? Oy
If the pirates were young white chrisians just screwing around they would be considered blood thirsty humans in need of instant execution.
If not, Big O, Reid and Pelosi will probably sponsor a foreign aid bill named "No Pirate Left Behind."
That jerk wads statement.
Impeaching him would have been too good. Tar and feather maybe.
Is
Givs Somalies a chance”
The vast majority of Somalis don’t kill anyone. Why does the action of a minority require intervention with the population as a whole?
If lawyers, sea lawyers at that, weren’t involved these ships could just gun these guys down. People adapt. They’ll find something else to do.
Pacifism and multi million dollar rewards is fueling this.
Anyways, Gates and the security bureaucracy isn’t letting any opportunity go to waste to expand the bureaucracy, spend more and tax more.
Heck, I bet people would PAY to ride these ships. Bring some DVD’s, beer, meat, grill, meet like minded friends, get a tan...
You mean, something like THIS?
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