Posted on 04/14/2009 6:07:32 AM PDT by Laissez-faire capitalist
Mombasa, Kenya (AP) Undeterred by U.S. and French hostage rescues that killed seven bandits, Somali pirates hijacked three more ships in the Gulf of Aden...
The latest trophy for the pirates was the M.V. Irene E.M., a Greek-managed bulk carrier...
The Irene was attacked and seized in the middle of the night Tuesday...
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
None of them French or U.S. flagged you'll notice.
“All of this will change when the insurance companies realize the risk of arms on board is less costly than losing ship after ship. Lloyd’s drew the same conclusion in the early 18th century. Ah, a lesson lost to time..”
This is only a problem for a small percentage of ships in the world that for logistical reasons need to go through this section of the Indian Ocean. Therefore, you only need to arm the ships traveling this route. The ships going through the Panama Canal probably do not need to be armed.
The USA is still the big Kuhuna when it comes to trade and being the market everyone hopes to compete in. What happens if WE passed a law (obviously after 2012) that if a nation prohibits ships from its ports if they carry small arms, then their own ships are not allowed here.
First, Liberia would allow and that would cover most of the worlds ships. Others would follow. And the die hards like England would get their just desserts by not being able to sail here.
I know, it’ll never happen,,NAFTA, free trade, WTO, would all squeal. The EU would fine the President a few billion for being unilateral, that spanish judge would call it a war crime and it would probably increase global warming too,,,, but i have a dream.
Except for American Flagged Ships, Undeterred Somali Pirates Hijack 3 More Ships
Don’t you know? Capitalist entrepreneural ideas like *that* are strictly forbidden. Obama will be watching you closely.
make that 4
They will stop when they are dead.
Per FoxNews, 4 ships (various national flags) have been hijacked today.
Let their own military rescue them also. I see Italy is chicken crap also. What’s wrong with those Italians can’t they fight?
Some perspective on why shipping companies may be willing to take their chances. From NRO:
There were over 90 Somali pirate attacks last year, resulting in about 40 successful hijackings, with few fatalities. But — this is the crucial point — about 21,000 merchant vessels transit the Horn of Africa region every year. With profit margins as razor-thin as they are in the merchant shipping industry, it would be expensive to add an effective force of armed guards to all of those crews — apparently too expensive to make it worthwhile given the risk (and given the alternative of avoiding the area altogether and taking the longer route about the Cape of Good Hope). Any ship transiting the Horn of Africa has less than a 1 in 200 chance of being hijacked, even with the upsurge of recent years.
Undeterred by U.S. and French hostage rescues that killed seven bandits, Somali pirates hijacked three more ships in the Gulf of Aden...
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Well, as long as they stay away from the U.S. ships, they can keep hijacking those other ships from those other countries — who have created this piracy problem in the first place by paying ransoms over the years, instead of doing something about it immediately, way back when.
So, leave it t those others to take care of the mess they created...
“How would you seperate the pirates from the non-pirates on land?”
If it moves it’s a pirate.
Anyone that allowes them to exist in their country is part of the problem, wipe oout anything that moves that has 2 legs and stands upright.
Seems to me it would be possible to use our navy to guarantee safe passage to any US flagged cargo carrier, everyone else is on their own. So if your ship is a Liberian registered tanker then let the Liberian navy protect you. Since it's only a few choke points in the world where piracy is a problem it should be possible with our existing navy.
I think you'd have a resurgence of the US merchant marine along with the jobs that would bring into our ports.
Of course the mob-controlled maritime unions would need to be cleaned up, but that would also be a benefit.
Right
Razor wire along the walls of the ship wouldn't be that expensive and would slow the pirates down. Not a total solution, but an effective deterrent I would think.
“Well, as long as they stay away from the U.S. ships, they can keep hijacking those other ships from those other countries — who have created this piracy problem in the first place by paying ransoms over the years, instead of doing something about it immediately, way back when.”
It’s mostly the shipping companies that have paid the ransoms, not the countries. And why do the companies pay? A simple business decision — it costs less to pay the ransom than to have their ships and cargo sitting still. It’s figured into the cost of doing business.
As long as the U.S. military stays out of “cleaning up their messes” — I don’t care if they keep paying ransoms.
Our military can “send the message” to the pirates to stay away from U.S. flagged ships. We’ve got the ability to “send them that message”... all right... :-)
Let those other countries and companies take care of their own messes that they create...
The hijacking of unarmed ships by armed pirates is a triumph of gun control.
I notice that so far no Israeli ships have been hijacked. Wonder why? Certainly there must be Israeli shipping traffic coming down the Red Sea from Eilat or through the Suez canal.
Do you suppose certainty of death has anything to do with it?
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