Posted on 04/08/2009 4:04:52 AM PDT by rightwingextremist1776
NAIROBI, Kenya - Somali pirates have hijacked a cargo ship with 21 Americans onboard, officials said on Wednesday.
The 17,000-ton Maersk Alabama was taken Wednesday, according to the Kenya-based diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
A spokeswoman for the U.S. Fifth Fleet confirmed that a Danish-owned, U.S.-operated container ship carrying 21 Americans "came under attack" about 240 nautical miles southeast of Ayel, Somalia. She said the crew had radioed for help but the closest naval ship was about 300 nautical miles away at the time. The official was unable to confirm the name of the vessel.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Using firehoses, putting barbed wire on the rails, etc. has stopped quite a few attacks.
There are a lot of insurance problems covering a ship if the crew is armed, and a lot of countries’ regulations prohibit entering port with arms on board.
We can only hope he doesnt solve this like Jimmy Carter,tried to solve his hostage crisis. Sending in a helicopter and crew to be destroyed.
Even the crew. Ships are reduced to having to try and use loudspeakers and fire hoses to ward off pirates armed with automatic rifles, full-size machine guns, and RPGs.
As somebody upthread stated, once a ship hits port, they’re under the gun laws of that country (or state in our case, I’d imagine). In many places, even a locked room full of unloaded, secured weapons would get the master and crew arrested and imprisoned, and the ship impounded.
}:-)4
Nothing a little groveling and abject apologizing by our new commander-in-chief won’t make worse.
ping
“What about the Merchant Marines?”
What in the WORLD are you talking about? You assume that Merchant Marines are some sort of warfighting force?
Ahhh, I don’t think so.
What they can expect from a Dem administration: a BIG discussion and a BIG payoff.
Hard to do on a Blackberry.
President Jefferson knew how to handle this situation. This history is probably not taught in colleges today.
The “pirates” won’t be harmed. After all, they are in TWO of the best victim groups that there are! Untouchable!
I thought I was going to read that Sailors (US Navy) were taken hostage. Although I’m not sure even that would have elicited a response from Zero.
Obama: “Ummmm... I’d like to tell.... the uh.... Somalis aboard that boat... uhhh that uh... the United States is sorry that they had to take such action....uh... to get our attention.”
Yes, reparations will soon follow, perhaps an American payment to the warlord’s tribe of 100 million or so.
Paging the Navy Seals?? Tsk tsk.. dont you all remember what liberals see terrorism as? They see it as a law enforcement issue!!
I’m sure Obama’s people are calling the FBI now and working to get some search warrants right away!
For a more recent example than the still very relevant Barbary Wars ones (Presley O’Bannon was great, Stephen Decatur was the best!), remember the Mayagüez! The armed forces still have O’Bannons and Decaturs and could do better than Ford’s poor effort, but will Pasha O’Bambi let us use them?
The first quote indicates some 21 US citizens were on a boat captured by these scum.
The second quote attempts to "sell blood in the streets" by infering that 21 US MILITARY sailors had been captured.
The meanings of the two are miles apart. And it is very typical of our dear msm.
In today's "objective" journalism, when the market goes down a percent or two, it "crashes", "collapses", "takes a deep dive", "faulters", "deflates" and a host of other "objectve" adjectives/verbs.
If something good happens (like the market goes up), our "objective" msm uses words like "goes up", "rises", changes little" and other such terms.
Well, ya can't sell papers without blood in the street. And if there isn't any blood, then create it. Way to go, msm.
And to finalize the deal with theses scum, hunt them down and kill them. No effort spared, no quarter given.
I used to be a merchant sailor and have worked for Maersk years ago. One of Maersk’s competitors at the time was Sealand; they were bought by Maersk a while back. One SeaLand captain I worked for kept a small arsenal on board for pirate deterrence. Too bad these guys weren’t armed and hope their okay.
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