CC Sabathia was 3-0 Against Pittsburgh this Year

I was driving yesterday, and discovered that piracy is on the upturn again. My buddy Doug Tonks, did an item on Tuesday, but when NPR does a story, you know it's the cutting edge of the news. In listening to the story, I was struck by a couple things. First, the pirates are apparently operating without fear of sanction from the Somali government, and are even kicking back the ransoms they demand for return of the ships to the Somali government. If this scenario is not government sanction, it is the next best thing, and so I put it forth that the Somali pirates are not pirates at all, but rather privateers. Second, the strategies for dealing with these pirates are contradictory in some respects.


The pirates are capturing freighters and are holding them for ransom. This process involves feeding and watering the crews of the vessels without abusing them. And once they receive the ransom, the pirates kick back some of the ransom to what passes for the Somali government and even to militants in opposition to the Somali government. Well, I feel certain that a portion of a large ransom is a whole lot of money to these guys, so they see no reason to discourage the pirates. This connivance with the pirates in my mind is either one step removed or the same thing as actually employing them. The pirates are de facto privateers then, committing acts of piracy on behalf of a sovereign nation.

Which leads to the second point, which is that people cannot seem to find effective means of dealing with the pirates. The first problem is to find someone to put them on trial. I gather from the story that Kenya has reluctantly agreed to try some of these pirates, but in the main they simply wind up letting the pirates go. Without fear of actual prosecution there is not much the "authorities" can do to stop the piracy. Another issues is identifying the pirates who appear to be normal fishermen when confronted by, say, as US Navy battleship. They only appear where the authorities are not. The ships themselves can take steps such as installing water cannons or keeping their ladders rolled up, and their are even technological options, but realistically these are not enough.

The security expert on the NPR show apparently instills three member teams on boats, which are unarmed but ready to deal with pirates. Unarmed? Apparently ships have to be careful with engaging in violence. If someone on a fishing vessel brandishes a weapon without firing it, and a ship fires on that person, the ship might become the pirate. This does seem to be a threat based on a reading the United Nations Conventions on the Law of the Sea at Part VII Article 101. However, based on the current abilities to enforce these laws, I have to wonder what the fear is. Apparently nobody will try them. I am told the cost of arming the ships might be prohibitive, but realistically, four .50 cal machine guns at strategic places could saw a fishing troller in half.

So here's my oddball theory: they do not want to arm the ships, because then the crew will take over and go a-roving. Because if you arm the ships, you have to train people to use the arms. If you don't, then you have given said to the pirates "Please, take my ship, and here are four complimentary machine guns for you to use against the next freight you take." And the ships that are being targeted are not necessarily from the most civilized nations. The pirates don't take American ships, because the US would be more than happy to invade Somalia. It would give the military a chance to write their own sequel to Black Hawk Down. To a lesser extent the same is true of countries like the UK and France. So the pirates target less militarily capable countries. But these countries do not necessarily treat their sailors well. Give them some weapons and and training and set them off to see, and they steal your boat and become pirates.

This just a guess.

Of course, recent events indicate that the countries of the world are losing patience with the pirates. An Indian warship recently sank a pirate vessel and the US has asked the UN how violent it can be in defensing the shipping lanes. MY guess is the pirates made a mistake in taking an oil tanker. Because if there's one thing the United States likes more than weapons, it's oil.