Maybe the news media are just paying closer attention, but it sure seems like the world’s sealanes – the lifeblood of commerce – aren’t what they used to be:
A Hong Kong cargo ship loaded with wheat bound for Iran has been hijacked by pirates in the Gulf of Aden, the official Xinhua agency said on Tuesday citing China’s maritime search and rescue centre.
There were 25 crew members on board, none of them from Hong Kong or the Chinese mainland. The ship was carrying 36,000 tonnes of wheat to Iran’s Bandar Abbas port, the report said.
A Danish shipping group says one of its vessels has been released after being hijacked for nearly 30 hours in Nigeria’s southern oil region.
Thor Shipping executive Thomas Mikkelsen says the crew aboard the Thor Galaxy was not harmed.
AND:
The Saudi Royal Family condemned Somali pirates as terrorists today after losing $100 million worth of oil in an audacious heist that saw bandits seize a supertanker in the Arabian Sea.
The Sirius Star, which was carrying two million barrels of oil, a quarter of the Kingdom’s daily output, was captured with its multi-national crew, including two Britons, 450 miles off the coast of Kenya on Sunday.
The hijack was the biggest ever act of piracy in the perilous shipping lanes off the east coast of Africa.
I guess we now know what it takes to get the Saudis to label a group as “terrorists.”
Kenya, Somalia, Nigeria, Aden: All this seemingly random lawlessness. I struggle to grasp the thread that ties it all together.
Perhaps when there are brazen acts of piracy off New York, Bremerhaven, Rotterdam, Cherbourg, Barrancaras, Angra dos Reis, Cartagena, Hong Kong, Chiba, Pusan, Singapore and Bangkok the picture will become clearer.
Just read the Wikipedia page “Barbary Pirate”. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_pirates).
A concise history and it shows how long countries will put up with this sort of cr#%3$ before finally saying “enough”. History repeats, only the Barbary pirates were a lot stronger than what we are dealing with today in different parts of the world.
George V.
I struggle to grasp the thread that ties it all together.
Easy Money…
A good deterrent, back in the day…
How hard is to give teeth to those ships?
Ask for volunteers. Any USMC, SF guy looking for overseas pay, free ammo and target practice.
I’m pretty sure the insurance companies will cover all the expenses.
The thread that ties it all together is that the seas around Africa are the wild west right now.
None of the countries with piracy problems have any sort of naval or coast guard presence to speak of. If you’re willing to go for it, chances are you can steal whatever you want.
Should put a SOF group aboard a couple ships and cruise up and down the coast of Somalia. Expend some ammo on the small boats. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Chokepoint + Anarchy = Piracy.
I wonder how JSTARs would do at breaking out the little pirate boats from the ground clutter of an ocean return?
Been watching this for a year or so at Eagle1 and ID.
I notice that most (certainly not all) of the problem is off the coast of Yemen, Gulf of Oman, Straits of Malacca.
I dunno….anyone else see a trend here?
We used to talk about defending the SLOC. I guess the new Navy has more important things to address.
Like Uniforms.
An APS-115 or -137 could pick up these small fry. It would only require a low-tech cluster bomb or even a Maverick from a tired old P-3 could stop them.
Perhaps the Navy is too busy helping the Army do its job?
I’m with grouchy – the answer is rather obvious.
AWC N ~ So rather than perform the job they are paid to do, you’d rather have the Navy acting as security for private shipping companies? And here I thought that’s what the Air Force did…
Correct me if I am wrong-but USN stopped providing a warship for the Straits of Malacca patrol a while ago. It used to be a rotational duty for the Crudes ships in C7F. Something to do with not enough ships and Fifth Fleet needing them more. ( The bennie was a port visit in Singapore, Malaysia or Phuket).
Do any of these ships contain Keira Knightley? ARRRR!
With cargoes to $100,000,000 in harm’s way, and with insurance companies being at risk for giant payouts, not to mention the cost in lost lives and/or disruption in business and lives caused by hostages being threatened and ransomed, the cost of security cannot beat all tough to justify or support. The security teams could ride ships in danger areas and swap off to other ships, with weapons suite, upon successful transit. Good sounds like great work. It would be nice, however, to know that someone’s Navy could be called on to give backup.
If the marketing people at Blackwater and other such companies are not all over this with constant calls in to the insurers and the shipping companies, someone needs to go back to biz school. And as far as the radar goes: My sailboat radar could pick out floating trash and birds whether on the surface or flying. If the big navy radar sets can’t igve similar results for boats big enough to hold over 10 people I’d be shocked.
Lastly, how hard is it to harden the ship’s crew quarters and piloting areas against unwanted entry? I was shocked at one article that said that pirates could pull up, fire some shots at the bridge and when they did that the captains had been ordered to stop and allow a boarding. Easy pickings. Dumb policies. And nobody around with guts to stop it and, worse, they PAY big bucks each time?? The results are not surprising.
I heard that Blackwater was trying to capitalize on this market.
Probably important to remember the nationality of most of the merchant crews. Approximately 80 percent of the world’s merchant fleets are manned by mixed nationality crews (Marcom Project, 1998).
Merchant ships are kind of like the 7-11 stop-and-rob. Management doesn’t want to be on the hook for a crewman’s life, what’s being stolen doesn’t belong to management or the crew, what incentive is there to resist? In addition, quite a few merchantmen ply the waters with the payroll in the safe, to be handed out at journey’s end. Cover all this with a ship the size of mid-range carrier, 20 folks for a crew, and a tradition of excellence that would have to go to the local DMV for an inspiration and you’re not going to find a lot of folks willing to do much but declare “We’ve been boarded” and pass the buck on to the insurance companies and management. Not their ship, not their cargo, not their problem.
On the other hand, seems a couple of guards with the right weapons could be of some use to the insurance companies. Protect that cargo, as it were.
Pinkerton Guards used to do this sort of work. I’d be rather suprised if they weren’t interested in the job.
– Max
I would like to pull every USN warship out of the region. We can embark an Expeditionary Security Detachment on any US flagged vessel and guarantee its safe passage for one millionth of the cost of operating warships in the area. Screw Saudi Arabia and Denmark and India and the rest. Let them defend their own ships. And you Flag of Convenience shipping lines: good luck with that. Discounting warships we probably have fewer than 20 US flagged ships per month transiting the Red Sea and an EST can embark from a Mobile Sea Base at anchor in the Red Sea and disembark in Oman or the UAE or another MSB at anchor. I no longer feel any call to defend the rest of the world’s shipping. ESD fire will drive off the pirates which obviates any need to rescue them from sinking boats, to give them medical care and to arraign and prosecute them. We’ll just shoot gently into that good night and motor on down the PIM leaving all consequences in our wake. We won’t have to separate sheep from wolves with exotic ISR, we’ll just let them do that themselves and let Ma Deuce please the sheep and disconcert the wolves. Live, die, drown; devil take the hindmost.
Read on another blog the possibility, in particular for the Saudi tanker, of an easy method by which to launder money into the hands of AQ/other favorite “charities.”
Interesting thought. Might go well for the Iranians, too. “GIVE US RANSOM!” met with a “OK, where do we send the check?” response.
Top cover for sending money straight to bad actors in the eyes of the “World Community.”
Possibly, there are international legal restrictions on commercial shipping having any weapons on board. If true, that would eliminate implementing the solution of carrying armed guards on board.
Such a regulation makes no sense to me, but it would explain why their only defense seems to be ‘evasive maneuvers’ and occasionally trying to use the fire hoses to repel unwanted boarding parties.
One article I read said the oil tanker was ‘three times as big as an aircraft carrier’. Is that correct, or even possible? I thought the aircraft carriers were the biggest ships on water.
Best regards, Peter Warner.
In international waters, ships are governed by the laws of their flag state. However, upon entering the territorial waters of a port state, they are subject to the laws of that state, including in regards to the possession and use of firearms. Not to mention, the taking of arms into a foreign state would be an export, even if temporarily, and requires a license or exception by the controlling export agency and the controlling import authority.
Couple that with the fact that any action against a threat but a civilian mariner would subject them to prosecution either in the country where the action occurred or some government agreement between the vessels flag state and the country of whom the threat was a citizen.
But take heart, the Indian Navy seems to have been willing to resolve part of the problem today when they attempted to stop and board a suspected mother ship. So while western navies might be ham-strung by whiners at home, those port states with economic interests in the area seem to be willing to apply some resolution to the problem.
Q-ships anyone?
Kudos to the Indians.
As for doubt if it’s our (USN) job to fight pirates and protect civilian ships, read this:
“The mission of the U.S. Navy is set forth in Title 10 of the U.S. Code. It states that the U.S. Navy must be prepared to conduct prompt and sustained combat operations in support of the national interest. This means the Navy must assure continued maritime superiority for the United States. The U.S. Navy must be able to totally defeat any threats to the continued free use of the high seas by the United States. The Navy assures continued maritime superiority through the destruction of hostile aircraft, surface ships, and submarines that threaten seaborne forces of the United States and our allies. ”
It’s a long winded way of saying the Navy is there to project power and keep the sea lanes open. That’s what they taught us in boot camp several decades ago…
Thank you, JKB.
Your clear explanation helps me understand the situation much better.
Best regards, PeterWwarner.
Git a rope. (or many ropes)
Ain’t that the traditional summary anti-pirate medicine?