Its been a while
It has been hard to blog ... kids, school, work ... golf. But Winter is here and that means its time to bitch about something or someone. Maybe more.
So what about Somali pirates? What on Earth is happening to our society that we allow them to continue to maraud the seas of East Africa? What is wrong with us that we permit this age-old barbarism (from Barbary Coast pirates) to continue?
The answer is simple and not very politically correct: we are all afraid that the next news cast will show some U.S. Navy (or other naval country) machine gunning some poor BLACK fishing folk into hamburger. If that "fisherman" does not have weapons on him when his remains are searched (most likely dumped overboard), then CNN will parade the villains -- U.S. Navy personnel -- around for crimes against humanity. Our STUPID STUPID STUPID media will have a field day showing why once again our military "failed us." Instead, these self-same watch-dogs of all that is fair and just in the world will happily report on the failures to stop these animals from hijacking poor, innocent sailors peaceably sailing the 7 Seas. Jerks. But that IS the reason.
Let's get s few things straight: if you are black, in a (typically) new, white, speedboat, with large, new, outboard engines more than three miles off of the coast of Africa ... you are up to no good. A fisherman CANNOT make enough to afford that boat, full stop. And you cannot corral a freighter moving at 18 knots in what passes for a real African fishing boat. So you make it clear to all along the African coast: if you appear in a vessel that makes more than 12 knots more than 3 miles off of the coast, you will be considered a pirate and/or a drug smuggler -- and you will be blown out of the water without warning.
The second aspect to this is even more simple, but it does take some rather expensive equipment to do it. We track the pirates to where they live and then demolish the place. We announce it in advance: "if you are an honest fisherman, then move -- because if you live in/with/near pirates, your house and boat stands a better than average risk of being blown to smithereens. Consider: a U.S. Navy submarine can track a school of shrimp. So it is not really much of a trick to plant a few attack boats off of the Somali coast, track the comings and goings of the pirates and then vector Seals or Predator aircraft to the appropriate spot. And kill them. If there are "innocent" aboard, then at least they are "innocent" Somalis -- who have been warned.
If the pirates operate from "mother ships," subs can track them too. Remember -- nothing over 12 knots. So when a mother ship sends out its attack skiffs ... bingo we have a target. Predators are on site due to tracking of mother ships from their ports, and the sub sends out a torpedo to take care of the mother ship. This does not require a huge number of naval vessels to accomplish, only the right ones.
Think of the terror being thrown back to the pirates: you never know when you might be targeted by an unseen enemy and terminated. Sort of takes the allure out of shaking your AK-47 from the bridge of the Sirius Star, doesn't it?
The humanitarian crisis is not some poor, black fishermen from an African backwater being "forced" into piracy. It is innocent sailors being held hostage in simply awful conditions by khat-chewing maniacs who value human life not at all.
But no country has the balls, least of all our own.
So what about Somali pirates? What on Earth is happening to our society that we allow them to continue to maraud the seas of East Africa? What is wrong with us that we permit this age-old barbarism (from Barbary Coast pirates) to continue?
The answer is simple and not very politically correct: we are all afraid that the next news cast will show some U.S. Navy (or other naval country) machine gunning some poor BLACK fishing folk into hamburger. If that "fisherman" does not have weapons on him when his remains are searched (most likely dumped overboard), then CNN will parade the villains -- U.S. Navy personnel -- around for crimes against humanity. Our STUPID STUPID STUPID media will have a field day showing why once again our military "failed us." Instead, these self-same watch-dogs of all that is fair and just in the world will happily report on the failures to stop these animals from hijacking poor, innocent sailors peaceably sailing the 7 Seas. Jerks. But that IS the reason.
Let's get s few things straight: if you are black, in a (typically) new, white, speedboat, with large, new, outboard engines more than three miles off of the coast of Africa ... you are up to no good. A fisherman CANNOT make enough to afford that boat, full stop. And you cannot corral a freighter moving at 18 knots in what passes for a real African fishing boat. So you make it clear to all along the African coast: if you appear in a vessel that makes more than 12 knots more than 3 miles off of the coast, you will be considered a pirate and/or a drug smuggler -- and you will be blown out of the water without warning.
The second aspect to this is even more simple, but it does take some rather expensive equipment to do it. We track the pirates to where they live and then demolish the place. We announce it in advance: "if you are an honest fisherman, then move -- because if you live in/with/near pirates, your house and boat stands a better than average risk of being blown to smithereens. Consider: a U.S. Navy submarine can track a school of shrimp. So it is not really much of a trick to plant a few attack boats off of the Somali coast, track the comings and goings of the pirates and then vector Seals or Predator aircraft to the appropriate spot. And kill them. If there are "innocent" aboard, then at least they are "innocent" Somalis -- who have been warned.
If the pirates operate from "mother ships," subs can track them too. Remember -- nothing over 12 knots. So when a mother ship sends out its attack skiffs ... bingo we have a target. Predators are on site due to tracking of mother ships from their ports, and the sub sends out a torpedo to take care of the mother ship. This does not require a huge number of naval vessels to accomplish, only the right ones.
Think of the terror being thrown back to the pirates: you never know when you might be targeted by an unseen enemy and terminated. Sort of takes the allure out of shaking your AK-47 from the bridge of the Sirius Star, doesn't it?
The humanitarian crisis is not some poor, black fishermen from an African backwater being "forced" into piracy. It is innocent sailors being held hostage in simply awful conditions by khat-chewing maniacs who value human life not at all.
But no country has the balls, least of all our own.
posted by Zaphod at Tuesday, December 02, 2008
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