The soft target sails into pirate-laden waters
where it is promptly seized.

Then the pirates find out that the cargo is
Gitmo detainees.

Wonder who will pay their ranson?

The waters are a large area. The Russians are starting to do escort duties of freighters which is a traditional naval duty.

Just stationing repelling forces on ships won’t work. First of all you would need a big detail on EVERY ship of attractive size, three shifts of guard duty. Then all it takes is ONE 1950s-technology RPG-7 into the wheelhouse and the ship is theirs, regardless of on-board forces. Needless to say, just a credible threat of such an attack is enough to force capitulation.

As in SO MUCH of life’s activities these days, it isn’t logic or reason that determines the behavior of the ship’s crew. It’s the INSUROR who calls the shots. The directive today is “Don’t Resist”.

Take a look at the UK and see the logical end that irrational tolerance will bring you. There are limits. Freedom without responsibility becomes license, and a society that adopts that philosophy will wither away and die.

Getting back to piracy: those seafaring nations having flagged vessels need to step up to the plate and deal with this situation around the Gulf of Aden and Somalia, as well as around places in Nigeria, Chittagong, Straits of Malacca, etc. Of course, flags of convenience ships like those flying the Panamanian and Liberian flags have their a$$es in a crack. Cheap registrations are like cheap parachutes.

Whoever, on the high seas, commits the crime of piracy as defined by the law of nations, and is afterwards brought into or found in the United States, shall be imprisoned for life.

See:
http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2007/06/why-do-we-refuse-to-call-terrorism-for.html

For one way to look at Gitmo, pirates and generally speaking, non-States who attack nations.

tom

If they don’t have them money, no problem. The ACLU will do the work pro bono and various ambulance chaser shysters will do it for a percentage of the take. Sean Penn and Oliver Stone will rush to make a movie, starring Johnny Dep. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton will chant “No piracy, no peace!” Susan Surandon will be see wearing a “Free Blackbeard!” T-shirt. Disney will rename their ride “Pirates of the Somali Coast.” The Supreme Court will rule that they were not read their rights before the Harpoon missile smashed into their ship and the pirates will end up owning the Potomac Yacht Club.

Back in the 90’s two crooks wearing bullet proof vests and carrying AK-47’s robbed a bank in North Hollywood. They shot up the neighborhood with impunity for an extended period, until the police put down their puny handguns, got AR-15’s from a local gun store and killed them.

And the family of those bank robbers sued the police.