Posted on 11/22/2008 9:42:24 PM PST by bruinbirdman
Electric fencing, sonic guns and even armed mercenaries are being offered as the first line of defence for ships at risk in pirate-infested waters.
The world of private security and mercenary soldiers has been put on alert this week by the seizure of the supertanker Sirius Star.
The tanker industry, however, is resisting any introduction of weaponry on vessels that are little more than floating petrol bombs.
Frontline, a leading owner of oil tankers, has called for a multinational force to be sent to the Gulf of Aden to protect the access route to the Suez Canal. Fleet owners want co-ordinated action by governments using military hardware.
Intertanko, the oil tanker industry association, is against any arming of the ships. “These guys are carrying machineguns and rocket-propelled grenades. Any retaliation from a ship would lead to more powerful weapons,” said Bill Box, of the association.
However, private security firms that are starting to lose business in Iraq are anxious to promote their services. Six million barrels of oil move through the Gulf of Aden every day, a trade that is worth $300million (£200million) a day at current oil prices.
Nick Davis, an executive with Anti-Piracy Maritime Security Solutions, a British consultancy, said that onboard security was vital. “Now anywhere between Singapore and Cape Town is unsafe without onboard security. The ships need to ensure that their security is sufficiently up to date.”
Blackwater, another security firm, is providing escort services for vessels, while some firms are pushing technology including sonic guns, which fire a beam of sound loud enough to cause deafness.
Many container ships or bulk carriers are already equipped with electric perimeter fences capable of giving a boarding party a non-fatal shock. However, Intertanko says that such devices are a fire hazard.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
There are many forms of protection that does not involve firearms. One is a microwave gun that heats the adversary up or sonic weapons that will create a instant migraine. But I doubt that these will work on blood thirsty pirates.
As the US Navy has less and less influence in international waters, expect this piracy thing to be the norm.
And I would’nt trust a Somalli to defend a peice of crap on dry land. but I think that whole region is the same, so what do I know.
I thought so - Blackwater is expanding. I wonder if they’re hiring?
Blow a whole bunch of the pirates out of the water. When enough of them die, they will go on to something else.
A fair question that. Were I a Blackwater exec I'd be penning a small addendum to the Business Plan.
Then I'd be on a plane...
L
One thing works. Destroy their sanctuaries. Or shut up and pay them off, and expect to keep paying them off forever.
I’ve been saying for several years that the PMCs could do this and rake in the cash. I just wish I had been in a position to do something about it back then.
Maybe something similar could be done against these pirates. There could be pickup and drop off locations at each end of the transit routes through the piracy area. Ships entering the area would pickup crews and weaponry at one end and drop them off at the other. You wouldn't have to install really heavy ordnance. Lightweight 20mm and .50 cals (along with NVGs) would probably be enough. From the news reports I have read the Somali pilots are not heavily armed - basically just fast boats with AK-47s and RPGs.
Probably oversimplifying a bit but its worth considering. As for the pirates operating bases - can you say "ARCLIGHT?"
Didn't pirates set a French tanker on fire a couple of years ago?
We know where the pirates are: weaponry in the form of an oil tanker "Q-ship" would be very effective.
It would take an NGO to operate it, IMHO. (Like the SMS Seeadler mentioned earlier).
Only complete and total fools are compelled to repeat the lessons of history. Sadly, that includes about 52% of the American electorate if we count both real and imaginary votes.
Are they morons or just in the pay of the pirates. "Pirates, may I please have your attention? None of our ships are armed. If you try to take one, the crew will not resist and we will immediately pay 10% of the cargo's value. The next Intertanko ship to cruise through your waters will pass Somalia Tuesday afternoon."
"Daddy, what do you do at the office?"
"I'm an Intertanko executive. I grovel in front of pirates and then surrender. It's an important job."
"Gee, I can't wait until I'm big so I can grovel and surrender too!
Do they defend individual ships and ride aboard, or do they freelance? The pirates take a ship and demand ransom, and Blackwater takes the ship back, killing all the pirates aboard and sailing the ship back to the open ocean. If the company pays Blackwater half the usual pirate ransom for their freelance work, the next ship gets rescued too at the same rate, and otherwise Blackwater blacklists that company. I like it, and I imagine a few Blackwater professionals would like hunting down pirates better than riding security duty.
The alternative? Hopefully if Blackwater does ride security, they'll stay low-key. When the pirates show up, Blackwater could follow a "don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes" strategy, and we'll still get lots of dead pirates. The best part of that is that dead men tell no tales - and they might all be within range of Blackwater's weapons. The pirates might be slow to figure out what's going on, and they could lose a large percentage of their experienced leaders before they realize that the rules have changed.
My wife's cousin works for Blackwater and has since Kosovo. He's currently in Iraq. Every time I talk to him when he comes home for a break he mentions they are hiring "qualified" people. Apparently, the security biz is booming....
The piracy case in Somalia is a perfect example of victim disarmament at sea. Most merchant ships are forbidden by their countries’ laws from having weapons on board (a ban which is enforced by rigorous inspections), which leaves a 20.000tn ship worth hundreds of million of dollars vulnerable to a pirate dinghy with a crew of five armed with AKs and RPGs worth a few hundred bucks. So do we allow owners to spend a few thousand dollars on weapons and private security on board? God forbid! No, much better to send a carrier group, or just nuke the high seas.
At present the war navies of India, Russia, Britain, the US, Malasya and a NATO taskforce are in the Gulf of Aden playing cat-and-mouse with a few Somali pirates. An EU fleet is on its way.
Check out special operations War web site it might answer your question.
I'd recommend against 'freelancing'. Leave that to the Navies. I'd defend individual ships and ride aboard. A squad and their gear could be helicoptered to ships entering the target zone.
They could surreptitiously install a couple of .50 cals in temporary mounts, put a couple of sniper teams on top of the bridge, and then just wait.
A small per diem would be charged, say $10,000 per man per day, until there was a confirmed kill of a pirate crew. Then the price would go up to a million or so.
A six or seven man team should do it I would think.
The shipping companies would write it of as a CODB. It's either cheap insurance at say 150 to 200K per trip. The sight of pirates being chopped to pieces and their ships sunk would be a fairly strong deterrent.
If there's anyone left with any cojones in the Administration a coordinated Seal or Delta strike on the HQ's of these pirate gangs (I can't believe we don't already know who and where they are.) leaving piles of dead and smoking ruins of their new mansions would also send a powerful message.
Then the Somalis can go back to starving each other to death.
Problem solved in about 6-8 months and Blackwater gets a healthy infusion to their bottom line.
L
I hadn't thought about it that way, but your idea could work nicely. As the ship leaves the southern edge of the danger zone, the Blackwater team takes a helo to a northbound ship and rides it for a few days, then catches another helo ride to the next southbound ship, back and forth for a 2-3 month sea tour. I'd join up with Blackwater for that duty - a cot and a chance of killing pirates - life doesn't get any better than that. Plus, when the ship left port, the pirates' spotters wouldn't see anything to worry about, and when they got to the next port the lace-panty diplomats wouldn't panic that they had weapons. Everybody wins.
That's the outline of my plan.
I'd join up with Blackwater for that duty - a cot and a chance of killing pirates - life doesn't get any better than that.
My thoughts exactly. It'd most likely take the bad guys a couple of cycles to figure out why their buddies weren't coming home. By then I'd be in Jamaica spending my hard earned cash.
L
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