Posted on 04/15/2009 7:13:03 AM PDT by reaganaut1
An American cargo ship was attacked by pirates armed with grenade launchers and automatic weapons in the Gulf of Aden on Tuesday, but the attackers failed to take over the ship, which was able to continue with its delivery of food aid to the Kenyan port of Mombasa.
The ship, the Liberty Sun, was damaged in the attack but the crew members were not hurt, according to a statement from the ship’s owner, Liberty Maritime, of Lake Success, N.Y.
“We are under attack by pirates, we are being hit by rockets. Also bullets,” a crew member aboard the Liberty Sun, Thomas Urbik, said in an e-mail message to his mother, The Associated Press reported. “We are barricaded in the engine room and so far no one is hurt.”
Mr. Urbik said a rocket had “penetrated the bulkhead but the hole is small. Small fire, too, but put out.”
The ship sent out a distress call around 6:30 p.m. It was able to repel the attack by conducting “evasive maneuvers” — which can include speeding up the ship or zigzagging in the water to destabilize the small pirate skiffs, said Lt. Nathan Christensen, a public affairs officer with the United States Fifth Fleet in Bahrain. The Navy destroyer involved in the rescue of an American captain last week responded to the distress call, but by the time it arrived, about five hours later, the pirates had fled.
...
Piracy in the region is surging. American naval authorities have recorded 23 hijackings this year. In 2008 — already a record year — there were 40 hijackings. Still, statistically, the chance of being pirated in the region remains low — less than 1 percent of the tens of thousands of ships transiting the area are attacked, Lieutenant Christensen said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Harriers in the air will deter 99% of these attacks.
Gatling guns scare the hell out of people just sitting there................
Why is the act of piracy discussed in terms of "chance"? That has a disturbingly dismissive ring to it.
Piracy is and should be classified either an act of war or violent crime. Neither of those are "chance" events. Either merits a swift and lethal response. Instead, in keeping with the worldwide epidemic of the mental disease of liberalism, the victims of piracy are mostly denied the God-given right to defend their lives at sea.
More and more frequently, they don't stand a chance.
“5 hours is not a good response time.”
Large ships can’t go but so fast. The ocean is vast. I’d bet 5 hours was the best they could do.
Sure they do, but they need power, aren’t easily moved from one spot to another ... Sometimes too much is as bad as nothing at all.
How about a few shoulder fired missiles? That would scare the carp out of the little boats.
IMHO — I think the idea is to have arms that can be stowed when in port. Since some ports required weapons to be secured when entering port.
Hey a sniper team would do ... Give them a Barret 50 and let them at the terrorists. That’s what the coasties do, disable the engines problem solved.
Right when you are 5 hours away that is the best you can do. We obviuosly need a lot more assets in the region. Perhaps some vessels with helicopter capability.
I say put a “loaded freighter” out there - only it would be loaded with guns and ammo. Float it back and forth on the same route that these real ships travel. If the pira, err I mean terrorists attack, the will be in for a huge surprise and demise.
On a serious note, I would have UAVs searching the area.
Helicopters, UAVs, more ships, decoy ships...all good ideas, but ignoring the simple solution...
Arm the merchant ships. Period.
And btw, the Navy should not be capturing pirates. If they see an un-flagged boat, with armed men on it, in international waters...kill them...you know, because when they shoot rockets at our ships, its kinda sorta like WAR.
My son was on the USS Kearsarge, the same class ship (Wasp) as the Boxer and I don't remember seeing or hearing about any drones. They indicated that the USS Bainbridge did use drones but they were small and used for surveillance only, way to small to support any serious weapon.
I'm sure Wasp class ships could support larger drones that carry weapons.
Don’t you think that it might be time to bring back the “Letter of Marque’ and Reprisal”?
As far as I know, such a commission would empower a privately owned vessel to be armed as a “Privateer” and at least defend itself, if not capture a pirate “prize” or two now and then.
Entrepreneurial adventurers might well set up their own privateers and take a crack at ‘em, as apparently some did back in the days of sail.
I know that this syndicate (oft referred to as an “Administration”) is loathe to bid anything out to the private sector without significant bribery... err.. “Lobbying influence”, but I think that you’d see a big dent in the piracy problem if such an old policy were to be revived.
Where is the Mariner’s Union in all of this?
I’m amazed that they would stand for their Members being subjected to this sort of risk and abuse.
From what little I’ve observed, their Union is not in the habit of backing down to intimidation. Am I wrong about that?
I don’t understand why they don’t arm all the ships. Give the crew some machine guns or whatever is best and let them take care of these people themselves.
Bump to Post 33....{:-)
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