The Captain, from stories already reported, was not on the bridge. He was actually in his quarters, and suffered head injuries during the collision.
I agree with you about all your other assumptions. As I pointed out in an earlier post, the Combat Information Center would've also been watching all surface activity, and would've been in communication with the bridge about the proximity of this vessel.
To me, a "ramming" of the destroyer seems unlikely--it seems as though the destroyer may have misjudged a maneuver in order to cross in front of the container ship, but failed to pass soon enough. If such a move occurred, it demonstrated poor judgment by whomever was driving the destroyer at the time.
I wonder how it works in these situations. I know that with aircraft, the two warning systems on the 2 planes either talk to each other or have some sort of set rules to instruct each plane to change course away from each other rather than give them conflicting instructions that only compound the situation.
Obviously if 2 ships are on a collision course, one needs to slow down while the other perhaps should speed up... or both should change course away from the predicted collisions spot.
Do the ships talks to each other either by voice or by computer to say "You go that way and I'll go this way"?