Indeed. Watch the stupid show and you will see that those Sea Shepherds deploying the entangling gear are making every (clumsy) effort to prevent the Japanese ships from avoiding them.
As has been said upthread, a ship with its propulsion and possibly its rudder fouled is in a distinctly dangerous situation even in calm seas. Clearing the mess requires some specific exposure to danger for selected crew members. Weather and sea conditions can prevent these efforts or make them even more hazardous. At the extreme end of the sliding scale, really bad weather endangers the fouled ship itself, and can prevent effective life saving efforts.
No, the SS are not deploying this gear merely to force the whalers to practice their avoidance steering.
No, the Sea Shepherds see this as a war, and they are using every means they can within the bounds of international opinion to skirt being viewed as pirates and terrorists. Their main objective is to cost the Whaling fleet money.
It’s clear to me you have never seen the show. The SS make every attempt to place the prop fouler in a way that they are unavoidable. Due to their incompetence I’ve only seen them be successful once, which the whalers were eventually able to clear. (I think they may of had to put divers in the water which is certainly not safe, my memories a bit fuzzy.)
I have never seen the whalers attempt to foul the SS props.
I’ve seen Japanese whalers attempt to kill the crew of the Ady Gil in the Antarctic so I’m going with that. Get back to me when the SS destroys the Shonan Maru and its crew has to be rescued from Antarctic waters.
Yes, they see it as a war, and they are using “every means”-- but the reason we are having this discussion is because those “bounds of international opinion” are not hard and fast, but still in a formative stage. Whether their actions are “within” or without is still to be decided.
It has been said upthread that the Japanese market for whale meat is less than profitable, and most meat ends up in secondary consumption. Further, it has been said that the primary motivation for whaling is actually nationalistic pride, not profit. I do not know if these statements are true, but if they are, then driving up harvest costs will likely have little effect on Japanese whaling.
I believe that the Sea Shepherds (or at least Paul) recognize this, and their actions are designed to influence world public opinion rather than merely influence a line item cost. Getting people to feel less accepting of “the Japanese” is even more powerful than raising ire at “the whalers”. But they have to play the game of ostensibly costing the Japanese money, because people do not respond well to causes that are seen as directly trying to manipulate public emotions.
The whole charade is far more complex than it seems at first glance.
Well I think they are dual objectives. Driving up the cost will eventually run into the hard limit of how much Japan is willing to spend on the national pride. Especially if no one gives a shit about eating whale meat.
The SS have actually rammed whaling ships in several occasions. The fact that they are mostly unsuccessful at everything they try doesn’t mean that they are not trying. Maybe the whaling fleet needs to build a glass ship so the SS can finally break something and they can be victims.
Well, that’s nice. Anyway, I’d rather the Japanese whalers read the COLREGS, and while they’re reading I"d like them to read the treaties they’ve signed.
Maybe they could also explain the Nisshin Maru: pdf here.
Sounds like these whalers are not only a danger to SS, but they’re an even bigger danger to themselves and the protected Antarctic environment. Nonetheless, assuming they don’t blow themselves up, they’re more than capable of surviving at least 10 days without a working prop or engine.
I’ll grant you two means– but I still think the “play to world opinion without letting the world see how obviously we’re pandering” gets way more use than the “run up the incidental costs”. And both serve one single end.
The fact that this ship survived 10 days disabled by no means guarantees that this ship or any other will *always *survive disabling. That would depend upon sea conditions and other factors at the time.
In the instance you cite, the danger to the environment would have been the release of fuel oil and perhaps other chimicals upon the ship sinking. There’s no evidence that these shipps or their activities pose any other significant environmental hazard. In fact, the argument could be made that the Sea Shephers are actually increasing the potential environmental hazard by attempting to disable ships, an activity which can only make the possibility of a sinking, thus a spill, more likely.
I went to a seminar on whaling and this collision this week. One of the speakers and one member of the audience were master mariners. Their conclusion watching the videos was the same as mine: the whaler was aimed on a near miss course and the skipper of the Ady Gil panicked and went forward.
Ady Gil was the stand on vessel because the whaler was to port, whaler should have kept clear, Ady Gil failed to maintain course and speed in a close quarters situation: primary fault whaler, secondary fault Ady Gil.
But that isn’t why I’m reviving this thread: check out this video.
So we have one collision which SS are again playing up as being the whalers fault but it’s hard to tell because you can’t tell who created the collision course. Certainly in this one the SS vessel has the whaler to starboard and is the give way vessel so should have turned away but doesn’t. The whaler then turns away but its stern clips the SS vessel as it goes.
But the reason I post the link is this: if you think Paul Watson has an ounce of credibility, if you think the bullshit they are spinning at you suckers is tasty, make sure you watch to the end.
Sea Shepherds have admitted to ramming ships to disable before, I don’t have a problem with that, IMO they’re enforcing the Southern Ocean Sanctuary which bans commercial whaling but which governments don’t have the willpower to enforce.
I do have a problem with the whalers ramming back, just like you’d have a problem with poachers shooting back at armed national park rangers.
Have donated to Sea Shepherds… will keep doing so.
It is very obvious the whaler turned into the SS ship initiating a collision course.
Now, you may say the whaler just wanted to pass by very close and not ram but sure looks like a collision course from the Ady Gil perspective. The whaler turned away but not knowing they would turn away the Ady Gil assumed they’d be run over.
The problem with this course of action is that the area where the whaling fleet and the SS operate is technically claimed by Australia. Most other countries do not recognize this claim, but any direct involvement by the Japanese government risks a confrontation with the Australians both on a diplomatic and possibly military level that Japan is looking to avoid. A Japanese naval ship is likely to be met by an Australian naval ship. The last thing Japan wants is more international attention being directed at the vaildity of their research vs. commercial whaling claims.
This is the reason the SS operate where they do as well. They have an area where Australia will give them some token protection for thier actions (or at least look the other way) that they do not have going after other whaling fleets.
The SS are not park rangers. Not even close.
If you want to make a comparison between someone speeding and an equivalent SS group hunting down speeders and forcing them off the road, then fine.
You do realize how laughable this position is, right? You are saying that you are okay with someone slapping someone else in the face as long as the other person doesn’t slap him back.
Make no mistake, both sides are doing their thing in a grey area of the law. What’s good for one is good for the other. If you think ramming is bad, then nobody does it. If you think ramming is legit, then both sides can do it. Either one is a tenable position. Saying that one side can ram while the other cannot is just ridiculous. And it goes for both sides.
As an Australian, it’s not so grey. The Whalers are poaching in Australian waters which would be illegal anyway regardless of the type of fish caught. Second they’re using a factory ship which is forbidden by the IWC south of 40 degrees.
see here:
“It is forbidden to use a factory ship or a whale catcher attached thereto for the purpose of taking or treating baleen whales in the waters south of 40o South Latitude from 70o West Longitude westward as far as 160o West Longitude.” http://www.helsinki.fi/~lauhakan/whale/iwc/reg1946/schedule.html
So the whole issue of research is laughable, it’s illegal commercial fishing in what Australia considers a sanctuary.
The Sea Shephereds have appointed themselves the rangers of that park as no-one else was doing it. Australian government largely doesn’t have a problem with that. So yes its ok for the park rangers to use force, it’s not ok for poachers to fight back.
D