An arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrms race, perhaps?
snerk
I’m saying the Barbary Pirates weren’t ever stopped completely until the French invasion of Algiers in 1830. Prior to that the United States went to war with the Barbary States twice, doing fairly well both times. But in the grand scheme of things these were just skirmishes, and after the first Barbary war the U.S. was still making tribute payments (this stopped in 1815 after the second Barbary war.) However the Barbary Pirates were still going strong after that.
Periodic punitive raids against the Barbary States were very common and happened many times throughout their history–but they had no lasting effect. The French King decided to invade Algiers in order to stir up domestic popularity for himself, he figured a conquest would make the public happy and make himself look good. So in 1830 France conquered Algiers and in the process killed a huge portion of its population–this massacre and the continual French presence lead to the end of the Barbary Pirates. It also lead to France having an overseas territory for over 100 years that continually waged insurrections and such against French rule.
As an interesting historical side note the king who decided to invade Algiers was deposed that same year and replaced by a more liberal king, the “citizen-king” Louis-Philippe. He and his supporters had not been advocates of the invasion of Algiers, but it was already a fait accompli by the time they took over. While they hadn’t desired Algiers, withdrawing would have left a power vacuum (since France had destroyed all vestiges of the state) and would have lead to the Ottoman Turks filling said vacuum, from a geopolitical perspective this was deemed to not be in France’s interests.
Where are these “simple 3rd World fishermen” getting the financial acumen to arrange the ransom payments?
Vast sums.
In many historical eras, nations would sponsor pirates as a deniable form of warfare.
Methinks we are being royally had!
You don’t know me from Steve, but I was a manager in the shipping division of a shipowner and operator for some time, my husband is a captain of a cargo ship from the same company as the one hijacked, he’s also trading in Africa.
Which of the assertions do you need a cite for? It was addressed many times in another that other thread about this same subject. But I am sure I will have no problems finding a site for any of the items in the list you disagree with.
I suppose you will not take my word that the ships I have been inside because of my work, and the ones I have traveled in with my husband display prominent signs reminding the crews which things they are not allowed under any circumstances to bring into the ship. Firearms is always the first item in the list.
It doesn’t matter. Even stun guns are not allowed in most ships.
They get bags of cash dropped from a helicopter onto the deck of their ships. That’s how the ransoms have been paid.
Maybe that says “financial acumen” to you, to me it says “we’re not dealing with criminal masterminds here.”
That’s the point. Where do you draw the line? If the US wouldn’t want an armed crew pulling into port, certainly other ports are not going to allow the same. Who is going to say whether a crew armed with guns is going to use them against pirates or against the local port authority?
Why is it so hard to recognize that it’s not feasible to arm the crew? You haven’t addressed Mighty_Girl’s simple question at all.
Mighty_Girl, honest question here: how do you propose we (that’s we, the nations of the Earth, not we, the posters of SDMB) deal with piracy off the Somali coast?
I don’t enjoy death and misery although I might for a few select people. I believe it was our most recent ex-president who said we weren’t in the nation building business and what you proposed seemed to me another suggestion to impose our style of government and our laws on yet another lawless country. In my opinion, that would be a huge mistake: we haven’t been successful at doing so yet. If I misunderstood you, I apologize.
For the rest of what I posted, I did say I was feeling mean yesterday. Re-reading my post today makes me wonder if I was not only mean but maybe possessed. Consider everything I said retracted. Please, none of it makes sense. Damn early senility anyway.
As I understand it, there are two primary issues that prevent arming crews:
- The extremely limited number of companies that insure maritime shipping don’t want armed crews for financial reasons.
- Legalities involving some countries prohibiting it in their territorial waters.
Therefore, arming crews is not impossible. It is matter of negotiating contracts and/or treaties. The people who could negotiate such things do not wish to do so right now because they percieve it as being not cost effective. No other reason.
There are about 100 ships a day traveling through the area. They need to travel in a convoy. Wait until they get a bunch and then it would be easier to protect them. They have been too spread out to keep safe. I doubt that our radar can pick up pirates in rubber rafts. Perhaps not even find a single small craft.
I have a lot of hate for some of the incompetent things our ex president has done. I consider him a lying war criminal who should be extradited to face a war crimes trial in international courts. Your use of his words after Iraq made me think you were being sarcastic maybe so I was more confused then anything. No worries. We all get in a bad mood sometimes.
Iraq was a different situation. Some countries might be more receptive to government. I don’t know much about Somalia so I was wondering if this might be the case.
That said the main point of my post was just fishing for intel. Pirates aren’t a nation-state. There’s no head pirate government with which you can fight and dominate. Since this isn’t a nation vs nation issue it’s a nation acting as a policing force against organized crime (piracy).
Would the police call in an air strike on a mafia business front in Los Angeles? Prolly not. Military tactics don’t work so well against crime. Too much collateral damage against innocents. What we need to do is find a way to bring the pirates to justice through the courts. Somalia having a government of some sort would solve a lot of problems, but failing that…
Finding evidence should be easy. Follow the money. groups of people with 8 million dollars+ prolly aren’t that common in Somalia and would stick out like a sore thumb if you follow the money.
Since Somalia lacks a functional government another option then establishing a Somalian government would be to catch and try the pirates in an international court empowered by international agreements and recognition. Would the ICC be up to the task? Or is stuff like this out of it’s scope?