Yemen Sliding Towards Civil War

Civil war in Yemen appears more and more likely as a result of Ali Abdullah Saleh's refusal to agree to a deal leading to a transition government. Dozens of people have been killed in running gun battles on the streets between Saleh's loyalists and tribal groups seeking his ouster.

The crisis engulfing Yemen deepened on Wednesday with dozens of people killed as President Ali Abdullah Saleh reinforced his troops after heavy clashes with gunmen loyal to an influential tribal leader.

Overnight street battles left at least 41 people dead, some trapped in burning buildings. Fighting raged until dawn as presidential guard units shelled the headquarters of an army brigade responsible for protecting government institutions.

Arab embassies were said to be evacuating their staff and the few remaining western residents were being advised to leave urgently. The Foreign Office is urging all Britons to leave while flights are still available in a situation diplomats described as "worse than Libya."

Residents of Sana'a woke to a chorus of birdsong and machinegun fire as plumes of smoke rose into the sky, mortar blasts rattling windows and nerves. Heavy clashes resumed as Saleh's republican guard forces equipped with heavy artillery pushed the tribesmen out of government buildings. By nightfall they had wrested back control of several key positions.

The week's gun battles between rebel tribesmen and Saleh's troops have already claimed 200 lives and the confrontations are fanning fears of civil war.

Diplomats are fleeing the capital because of increasing violence. The violence is likely to spill over to the territorial waters making the transit around the Horn of Africa into the Red Sea more dangerous. Piracy is a significant concern.

It also provides an opportunity for al Qaeda to renew its efforts on the Arabian peninsula where it got its start.

Pirates Attack US Navy Ship; Predictable Results Ensue

Pirates versus a US Navy ship on patrol in the Indian Ocean looking for pirate vessels? The pirates never had a chance.

A group of suspected pirates was captured Thursday after attacking a U.S. Navy frigate in the Indian Ocean, according to a statement released by the U.S. Sixth Fleet.

The USS Nicholas reported taking fire from a suspected pirate skiff shortly after midnight local time west of the Seychelles, the statement said. The Nicholas quickly returned fire and began pursuing the skiff, which was eventually disabled. A boarding team from the Nicholas subsequently captured and detained three people, the statement said.

The team discovered ammunition and several cans of fuel aboard the skiff, which was later sunk by the Nicholas.

Two more suspected pirates were captured on a confiscated "mother ship," the statement said. The detainees will "remain in U.S. custody on board Nicholas until a determination is made regarding their disposition," it said.

The pirates remain a scourge in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Africa, particularly around Somalia and extending out to the Seychelles. Showing the pirates that the risks of further attacks on shipping are too great versus the ransoms that are routinely paid out by shipping concerns will finally get piracy under control off the coast of Somalia. That means killing pirates attacking shipping and sinking their ships. Until that happens, the pirates will continue attacking shipping.

Somali Pirates Continue Harassing Shipping

Not only have they continued their attacks, but they have again attacked the Maersk Alabama, a ship that was briefly siezed by pirates earlier this year and whose captain was held hostage for several days before US Navy SEALs rescued him and killed three of four of his captors.

The Maersk Alabama repulsed the attack by firing back at the pirates.

The United States Navy Central Command said four suspected pirates in a skiff came within 300 yards of the Maersk Alabama at 6.30 a.m. Wednesday about 600 miles off the northeast coast of Somalia as it headed for the Kenyan port of Mombasa.

But a security team on board the Maersk Alabama responded with small-arms fire, long-range acoustical devices painful to the human ear and evasive maneuvers to thwart the attack, the navy said in a statement.

“Due to Maersk Alabama following maritime industry’s best practices such as embarking security teams, the ship was able to prevent being successfully attacked by pirates,” said Vice Adm. Bill Gortney, the commander of the Central Command. “This is a great example of how merchant mariners can take pro-active action to prevent being attacked.”

No injuries or damage were reported, the Navy said.

That comes after a captain of a hijacked chemical tanker reportedly died of gunshot wounds inflicted when pirates seized his ship off the Seychelles Monday.

Piracy continues to be a huge problem, and ransoms are a big reason. Yesterday, the Spanish apparently paid $3.5 million to secure the release of a Spanish crew.

The pirates had threatened to kill the Spanish crew unless Spain agreed to release two pirates captured by its navy a day after the Alakrana was seized. A Spanish court on Monday indicted the two pirates for kidnapping and armed assault, charges that could allow Spain to deport them. News of the sailors' release emerged as the European Union said it would consider expanding its anti-piracy mission off the coast of Somalia as pirates venture further south to attack commercial vessels.

The EU's mission off the Horn of Africa will not diverge from its objectives, though officials may agree on changes, the EU foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, told reporters after a meeting of the bloc's defence ministers in Brussels.

''If the pirates move south, we'll have to see if some adaptation can be done,'' Mr Solana said. The EU force, consisting of eight warships and four surveillance planes supplied by eight countries, has been operating off Somalia since December to protect commercial trade.

Typically, pirates press for ransoms totalling millions of dollars in return for freeing crews.

By continuing to pay ransoms, it makes attacking shipping all the more attractive to the Somali pirates and the risks are mitigated by the huge paydays.

Moreover, there continues to be evidence that the pirates are in cahoots with the Islamists who are busy trying to control Somalia and who may have affiliations with al Qaeda. Indeed, there are reports that al Qaeda has been urging the Somalis to continue their high seas terror campaign.

While there are links between the Islamists and the pirates, some believe that the clan allegiances are more important, even as they recognize the threat posed by such links.

Militant Somali Islamist groups such as Hizbul Islam and Al Shabab – who control most of southern Somalia and most of the capital city of Mogadishu – may share a hard-core Islamist ideology with the Al Qaeda militants loyal to Osama bin Laden. But the larger portion of Somali society – and certainly those who make up Somalia's business sector and even its many armed militias – make their crucial decisions based on clan rather than on religion. In a society where nearly everyone is a Muslim, blood relationships are a firmer basis than ideology for deciding whom to trust, whom to hate, whom to do business with, and whom to fight.

"While it is true that Al Qaeda has penetrated into parts of Somalia, it is another thing altogether to prove a link between piracy and Al Qaeda," says Ms. Roque. "For the pirates, it is in their interests to have money and it is in their interests to have prisoners captured by the French to be released. This is an economic decision."

Then, there's the issue of prisoner swaps - capturing crews and passengers and hoping to exchange them for pirates captured by various navies operating in the waters off Somalia.

The world navies refuse to take steps to put the piracy to an end, and that includes zero tolerance for any piracy. It means a cessation of ransoms and instead demanding the unconditional release of the captured ships and their crews/passengers.

Somali Pirates Capture Indian Ship With 26 On Board

The Somali pirates remain a threat to shipping off the East Coast of Africa and into the Indian Ocean despite an ongoing mission by various navies to interdict the pirates and to protect the vital shipping lanes:

At least 24 Indian sailors were taken hostage by Somali pirates who hijacked a Panamanian-flagged bulk carrier near
Seychelles on Thursday, just a week after a vessel with two Indians among the crew was seized by the sea brigands.

The MV Al Khaliq was Indian-managed and had a sizeable number of Indian crew aboard, Noel Choong, the head of the International Maritime Bureau's Piracy Reporting Centre, told PTI in Kuala Lumpur.

A NATO spokesman in London said, "There were 26 crew on board -- 24 Indians and two Burmese. The 33,000 DWT bulk carrier was hijacked this morning in the Somali Basin.

UPDATE:
Meanwhile, Islamic terrorists fired on the Mogadishu airport at a time when the Somali President was preparing to board his aircraft, killing at least 20 people.

Somalia's capital sees near-daily bloodshed as a powerful insurgent group with links to al-Qaida tries to overthrow the fragile U.N.-backed government and push out some 5,000 African Union peacekeepers. Both sides of the conflict have been accused of indiscriminate shelling.

"We have seen at least 20 dead bodies lying in the streets, most of them civilians," said Ali Muse, the head of Mogadishu's ambulance service. He said about 60 people were wounded as mortars slammed into residential areas.

Thursday's shelling started soon after insurgents fired toward President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed's plane, said police spokesman Abdullahi Hassan Barise.

"The mortars hit the perimeter of the airport," he said. "The plane carrying the president took off safely."

The Mystery of the Arctic Sea Hijacking Deepens

A Maltese flagged ship, the Arctic Sea, was hijacked by pirates at sea off the coast of Sweden and went missing for months. That itself was extraordinary given that pirates weren't known to operate in the waters of the Atlantic off the coast of Europe. The ship was recovered by the Russian Navy after a wide search, and the crew was recovered as well.

However, that's where the plot thickens.

The Russians initially claimed that the cargo aboard was nothing but timber - nothing that would raise suspicions. Bloggers and Russian journalists had been pursuing the possibility that there were more nefarious cargoes on board.

Now, the Russians admit something else might have been aboard.

The Maltese-flagged vessel with a crew of 15 Russian sailors was officially heading to Algeria with a cargo of timber. But Moscow's top investigator, Alexander Bastrykin, cast doubt on that theory.

"We do not rule out the possibility that the Arctic Sea transported something other than wood," Bastrykin told the official government newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

"This is why we asked the crew to remain in Moscow, as we must figure out if any one of them was involved in those events," added Bastrykin, who heads the investigative committee of Russian prosecutors.

The reported detention of 11 Arctic Sea sailors by Russian authorities and claims that they are prohibited from communicating with their families have fuelled speculation of a cover-up.

Strangely, just hours after Bastrykin's interview was published, his press service issued a statement denying that the ship had been on any "secret mission" or that it had been carrying illegal materials.

"The investigation currently does not have any information that the ship could have carried any sort of illegal cargo," it said.

Its statement also rejected allegations of a cover-up and said the sailors were not being kept in isolation.

Meanwhile, the head of the Russian military said that Moscow still needed to clarify what exactly was on board the 4,000-tonne ship.

"We do not know what it is carrying, we only know there is wood and whatever else it is carrying must be clarified by the investigation," Nikolai Makarov, chief of Russia's general staff, said during a visit to Mongolia.

Pirates Getting Help From Overseas

This isn't much of a surprise really. The pirates and the shipping industry have been in close contact through intermediaries for years in order to secure ransoms and negotiate deals to release ships and crews in Somalia and elsewhere around the world.

Therefore, it's not much of a reach to learn that there are unscrupulous people who are tipping off the pirates as to the whereabouts of lucrative targets ripe for being attacked by the pirates.

It says that pirate groups have "well-placed informers" in London who are in regular contact with control centres in Somalia where decisions on which vessels to attack are made. These London-based "consultants" help the pirates select targets, providing information on the ships' cargoes and courses.

In at least one case the pirates have remained in contact with their London informants from the hijacked ship, according to one targeted shipping company.

The pirates' information network extends to Yemen, Dubai and the Suez canal.

The intelligence report is understood to have been issued to European navies.

"The information that merchant ships sailing through the area volunteer to various international organisations is ending up in the pirates' hands," Cadena SER reported the report as saying.

This enables the more organised pirate groups to study their targets in advance, even spending several days training teams for specific hijacks. Senior pirates then join the vessel once it has been sailed close to Somalia.

Cruise Ship Defends Itself From Somali Pirates; Five Other Ships Attacked

They didn't use nonlethal systems like the long range acoustic device, which sends piercingly loud sounds at the attackers. They sent hot lead; as the pirates opened fire on the cruise ship as it was steaming near the Seychelles, an Israeli security team on board returned fire. The Italian cruise line issued a statement saying that the Israelis were hired because they were the best security available.

The ship, the MSC Melody, did take some damage as bullets broke windows and damaged a lifeboat. One crew and one passenger were injured in the encounter. The pirates continued firing on the ship for some 20 minutes after trying to board. The pirates were repelled by both Israeli security and crew manning a fire hose to prevent the pirates from boarding.

This wasn't the only pirate attack over the weekend either:

Separately Sunday, four Yemeni tankers escorted by a Yemeni coast guard boat on their way to Aden were attacked by pirates. Three of the ships escaped and coast guards captured five pirates and wounded two others, said Mohammed Abdul-Rahman, a senior official at the Overseas Shipping and Stevedoring Company. Pirates could only seize one of the tankers, the Qana. The Yemeni Interior Ministry said coast guards were trying to free it.

And the Turkish cruiser Ariva 3, with two British and four Japanese crew aboard, survived a pirate attack near the Yemeni island of Jabal Zuqar, said Ali el-Awlaqi, head of the Yemeni El-Awlaqi Marine company said.

"Pirates opened fire at the cruise ship for 15 minutes then stopped for no reason," he said, adding that the cruiser was heading to Aden, Yemen, to fix a broken engine.

International military forces have battled pirates, with U.S. Navy snipers killing three holding an American captain hostage in one of the highest-profile incidents.

But Saturday's exchange of fire between the Melody and pirates was one of the first reported between pirates and a nonmilitary ship. Civilian shipping and passenger ships have generally avoided arming crewmen or hiring armed security for reasons of safety, liability and compliance with the rules of the different countries where they dock.

Pellegrino said the pistols on board the Melody were available to the commander and security agents. He said they were used as a deterrent, "in an emergency operation."

It was not the first attack on a cruise liner. In November, pirates opened fire on a U.S.-operated ship, the M/S Nautica, which was taking 650 passengers and 400 crew members on a monthlong luxury cruise from Rome to Singapore. The cruise liner was able to outrun the pirates. In early April a tourist yacht was hijacked by Somali pirates near the Seychelles just after having dropped off its cargo of tourists.

The number of pirate attacks has doubled this year, and the payment of ransoms isn't helping matters. It might secure the release of the crews, but it incentivizes the taking of more ships.

This must stop, and fighting the pirates on the seas isn't going to end the piracy. Only taking out the safe havens onshore will. No one appears willing or able to do so. Instead, everyone will talk about having to conduct more patrols, all while the pirates continue their deadly business.

Captured Somali Pirate Was Ringleader, Not Dupe

You don't say. Crew members of the Maersk Alabama have gone on the record saying that Wal-i-Musi (aka Abdiwali Abdiqadir Muse), the Somali pirate captured by the US Navy in connection with the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips, was not merely some guy along for the ride, but was the leader of the group.

That directly contradicts claims made by his supporters yesterday.

Crew of the Maersk Alabama say he was the leader.

[ATM "Zahid"] Reza said he was steering the Maersk Alabama when it was attacked April 8.

"When I first saw him, he carried himself as the leader. He was asking for directions, how to start (the) engine, and asking for all the crew," Reza recalled of Muse.

Muse spoke in broken English, and mostly spoke to the captain, Reza said.

"He was surprised he was on a U.S. ship. He kept asking, 'You all come from America?' Then he claps and cheers and smiles," Reza said.

Reza, who immigrated to the U.S. from Bangladesh in 1999, said Muse was friendly and smiling at first.

"He was the one who was nice to us because two of the other pirates tried to shoot us and he stopped them from shooting," Reza said.

But Muse eventually lost his patience as other pirates failed to arrive, Reza said. Reza and his shipmates lured Muse into a darkened engine room.

During a noisy struggle there, Reza stabbed Muse in the hand with a knife.

Well, now we know how Muse got injured in the first place and why he was on board the USS Bainbridge when the snipers finally freed Capt. Phillips and killed three of the pirates holding him.

This is going to make it even more difficult for Ron Kuby to defend this guy. Kuby's a good lawyer, but Muse is not going to walk. He was caught literally red-handed.

Kuby's trying to torture a reading of international law claiming that the US was somehow violating a truce of warfare in high seas.

Ron Kuby, a New York-based civil rights lawyer, said he has been in discussions about forming a legal team to represent the Somali.

"I think there's a grave question as to whether America was in violation of principles of truce in warfare on the high seas," said Kuby. "This man seemed to come on to the Bainbridge under a flag of truce to negotiate. He was then captured. There is a question whether he is lawfully in American custody and serious questions as to whether he can be prosecuted because of his age."

As noted yesterday, age is not a problem since it's been shown he was at least 18 years old. While Musi may have boarded under a flag of truce, his compatriots continued to threaten Capt. Phillips and the US Navy is obligated to protect the life of the American captain. The US Navy owes a pirate nothing but the business end of a gun or missile.

Somali Pirate's Jolly Adventure To New York

The United States captured a Somali pirate during the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips of the Maersk Alabama. The pirate, Abduhl Wal-i-Musi, was escorted back to the US to stand trial. He's now in New York standing trial on multiple charges stemming from his actions to attack the Maersk Alabama and taking the captain and crew hostage.

He was front-cuffed and chained to the agents. At first, he was stern-faced, before flashing a smile for the photographers.

His blue, rainproof jumpsuit hung baggy on his thin frame -- all in one piece, including the footies, like a child's pajamas.

He didn't answer questions.

Wal-i-Musi is expected to face a federal magistrate in Manhattan by this afternoon, according to official sources.

There, he will likely learn he faces kidnapping and other charges carrying a maximum of life in prison, the sources said.

He has a lawyer with the help of the Minneapolis-based Somali Justice Advocacy Center, its director, Omar Jamal, said today.

Jamal says Muse, whose parents say is 16, does not speak English and is confused at his circumstances.

Wal-i-Musi was the hapless pirate in the lot -- jumped, stabbed and tied up by his would-be captives in the early moments of the attack.

He's confused at his circumstances? I'd say that he got off lucky. He's lucky he wasn't killed along with the other three pirates holding Capt. Phillips because he sought medical attention for wounds on his hand courtesy of the USS Bainbridge. He's lucky that the US has a justice system far more compassionate than the Somali pirates, who repeatedly attack shipping with the intent to collect ransoms.

What exactly is Musi confused about? He was involved in piracy. Is the Somali Justice Advocacy Center claiming that Musi didn't know that he was engaging in piracy and violating international law? Ignorance of the law is no defense. It's basic common sense that you don't go and attack ships, threaten crews with machine guns and rocket propelled grenades and other weapons, and kidnap crews to hold them ransom. Yet, Musi was in with this particular crowd. It's what they do.

UPDATE:
Apparently Musi isn't 16, but 18. The parents spoke with the judge by phone and said as much. Musi will be treated as an adult. So much for the claim that he was a juvenile.

Weather Favors the Pirates

Weather patterns over the next few weeks will favor the pirates, who continue attacking shipping off the coast of Somalia. Light winds and favorable sea conditions might be good sailing conditions, but they aid the pirates who have smaller speedboats.

The pirates have been using armed, small speedboats to attack the large vessels. For obvious reasons, large waves would greatly hinder these tactics. The current, seasonable weather pattern favors generally clear skies and waves generally of 3 to 5 feet or less. There are no big storm systems in the northern Indian Ocean to general large waves and swells. Only spotty thunderstorms will occur along the immediate coast from Mogadishu northward in Somalia. More unsettled conditions and building seas will be found farther south toward Kenya. No rain and nearly cloudless skies are expected around Arabia and the Gulf of Aden.

A new moon is in store later this week. While the nearly unrestricted visibility by day may be a draw as far as who benefits, little or no moonlight for the next 10 to 14 days will not aid those keeping watch at night aboard merchant vessels. The pirate boats are not illuminated, while the large ships must be lit to avoid collision with other vessels in the vicinity.

Later in May and in June, seas will typically build in the region as the southerly flow picks up. The moist flow also allows thunderstorms to propagate northward to a certain point. Until then, the merchant marine sailors operating in the area will have to keep a watchful eye.

Meanwhile, The Atlantic does a disservice by claiming that the Ethiopian government, backed by the US, overthrew the one functioning government that Somalia has had in two decades. The Islamists were not the legitimate government, and the ICU and their compatriots are busy engaging in piracy, not acting like coast guardsmen.

They are attacking any and all shipping that comes even remotely close to Somalia - some of the attacks have been several hundred miles from the Somali coast. Then, there's this:

Thanks to the high-profile rescue and the courageous tale of the Alabama’s captain and crew, however, the world is paying attention now. Last week, Hillary Clinton unveiled several new anti-pirate initiatives, which include proposals for freezing pirate assets, arrangements to work with 30 nations on international maritime protection, and, most importantly, new plans to address the glaring chaos of Somalia—Finally.

Secretary Clinton also spoke of the need to take Somalia’s new Prime Minister, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed—one of the leading Islamists who fled the U.S.-backed invasion by Ethiopia nearly three years ago—very seriously. Paradoxically, the Islamists led by Sheikh Ahmed, are the only leaders who have effectively banned piracy ever—during their six months in power in 2006. Under the Islamist’s watch, piracy stopped almost completely. Now, heading back into power after nearly three years of bloody insurgency, the Islamists are ready to take on the pirates again. In the past few days, the Islamists leading Somalia’s transitional government have announced that piracy is a crime against Islam and punishable by death.

The ICU has been busy marauding all over Somalia and imposing Sharia and there have been several attacks since the ICU suddenly announced that piracy is a crime. The ICU is making much of a show of their claim that piracy is suddenly a crime against Islam, when these people have been pushing piracy for years on end.

The ICU has no interest in stopping the piracy - only getting the attention off their own actions.

There is going to be a meeting next month to deal with the piracy issue, led by the US and Secretary of State Clinton. Unless the meeting includes a consistent policy on how to deal with the pirates captured on the high seas and taking action against the militias and the black market that supports and feeds off the piracy, the situation will continue. The Bush Administration had coordinated the response, but that approach clearly has not contained or solved the situation.

At the same time, Kenya is contemplating hosting a piracy tribunal. That makes a slightly improved situation to the haphazard manner in which pirates are dealt with now. In fact, the current situation can best be described as utter chaos as some pirates are simply detained and released, while others are captured and may be held for trial in the US.

UPDATE:
Case in point. Yet another attack. Pirates opened fire on a cargo ship in the Gulf of Aden. Another group of pirates released a ship containing humanitarian aid after receiving a $100,000 ransom, which was euphemistically called a "reward."

Pirate Catch and Release

Revolving door justice takes to the high seas as members of the NATO anti-piracy fleet engage in protecting shipping by catching pirate ships after they've attacked shipping and then release them after disarming the pirates. NATO appears to have thwarted another pirate attack, and fired on a pirate skiff that had seven of these thugs on board before finally apprehending them after a seven-hour chase. Then, the Canadian contingent that captured them, released them:

Seven pirates attempted to attack the Norwegian-flagged MV Front Ardenne late Saturday but fled after crew took evasive maneuvers and alerted warships in the area, said Portuguese Lt. Cmdr. Alexandre Santos Fernandes, aboard a warship in the Gulf of Aden, and Cmdr. Chris Davies, of NATO's maritime headquarters in England.

"How the attack was thwarted is unclear, it appears to have been the actions of the tanker," Davies said. Fernandes said no shots were fired at the tanker.

Davies said the pirates sailed into the path of the Canadian warship Winnipeg, which was escorting a World Food Program delivery ship through the Gulf of Aden. The American ship USS Halyburton was also in the area and joined the chase.

"There was a lengthy pursuit, over seven hours," Davies said.

The pirates hurled weapons into the dark seas as the Canadian and U.S. warships closed in. The ships are part of NATO's anti-piracy mission.

"The skiff abandoned the scene and tried to escape to Somali territory," Fernandes said. "It was heading toward Bossaso we managed to track them ... warning shots have been made after several attempts to stop the vessel."

Both ships deployed helicopters, and naval officers hailed the pirates over loudspeakers and finally fired warning shots to stop them, Fernandes said, but not before the pirates had dumped most of their weapons overboard. NATO forces boarded the skiff, where they found a rocket-propelled grenade, and interrogated, disarmed and released the pirates.

The pirates cannot be prosecuted under Canadian law because they did not attack Canadian citizens or interests and the crime was not committed on Canadian territory.

"When a ship is part of NATO, the detention of person is a matter for the national authorities," Fernandes said. "It stops being a NATO issue and starts being a national issue."

This is absolutely ridiculous. The pirates know that they will not suffer any consequences from attempting to capture and hold for ransom crews and shipping cargo unless the world puts its collective foot down and stamps out the piracy on the high seas and the pirate safe havens onshore.

Catch and release is an astoundingly bad idea that reinforces the notion that the world is powerless to deal with the piracy threat.

The problems are going to get a whole lot worse before the world finally responds in the kind of force needed to end the piracy on the high seas.

Islamists Continue Somali Takeover; Piracy Continues

Somali parliamentarians announced that they will enact Islamic law over the country, claiming that this will somehow reduce the support for the Islamist insurgents fighting the UN backed government. It sounds to me like the "government" is capitulating to the Islamists.

In any event, the Islamists are taking over Somalia and everyone is pretty much ignoring the situation, along with the ongoing piracy in the region.

Various navies are patrolling off the coast of Somalia, but they're not going after the ports-of-call in Somalia where the pirates call home. They're simply trying to deter pirates from attacking along the main sea lanes and attempting to come to the defense of those ships that are attacked. It's a response posture rather than taking the offense, and it means that shipping will remain threatened by the pirates until such time that the world powers agree that something must be done onshore.

In any event, the pirates continue attacking shipping and Dutch commandos rescued 20 Yemeni fisherman who were taken hostage while detaining seven pirates briefly. That's right folks, instead of holding those pirates, they just detained them before allowing them to go back to what they were just doing.

Dutch commandos freed 20 Yemeni hostages on Saturday and briefly detained seven pirates who had forced their captives to sail a "mother ship" attacking vessels in the Gulf of Aden, NATO officials said.

Meanwhile, a Belgian government crisis centre spokesman said that a Belgian-registered ship with a 10-member international crew, including two Belgians, was feared hijacked by Somali pirates on Saturday.

Sea gangs have captured dozens of ships, taken hundreds of sailors prisoner and made off with millions of dollars in ransoms despite an unprecedented deployment by foreign navies off the east African coast.

There's a reason that the foreign navies aren't stopping the piracy. It's precisely because they're not going after the pirate safe havens onshore and they're simply playing catch and release with those pirates they happen to capture. They also allow those pirate ships to continue floating instead of destroying them. In sum, those actions allow the pirates to persist despite the efforts of those navies to stop the pirates. There simply is no deterrence factor unless force is used against the pirates to dramatically increase the risk to the pirates themselves. Instead, the pirates continue attacking shipping in the hopes of taking hostages that they can trade for ransoms that they know that shipping companies will eventually pay.

Rep. Payne Opposes Sending Troops To Somalia

Rep. Donald Payne, whose plane came under fire from militias as it was leaving Mogadishu, Somalia during the Maersk Alabama standoff, says that sending US troops into Somalia to deal with the pirate threat is a mistake at this time.

No, the real mistake is allowing a failed state to continue being a breeding ground for terrorists who engage in piracy on the high seas and which threatens the stability of nearby countries.

The reason that Ethiopia engaged in the military operations last year was because the Somali thugs decided to attack Ethiopians. Allowing the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) to continue operating with impunity is the wrong way to deal with the situation. Doing nothing, which is tantamount to what Payne proposes, is only going to drag out the problem for years to come.

No one else was willing to send in troops to deal with the ICU. The Ethiopians drove out the ICU for a time, but the Ethiopians didn't stay around to finish the job, so the ICU has come back, in a new iteration - calling itself the Alliance. They're still just as dedicated to imposing Sharia as before, and the pirate threat continues growing with each passing day.

The African Union isn't going to act. Neither is the United Nations. The US could move to act directly, but Payne clearly opposes such a measure at the present time (and that isn't going to change anytime soon since the conditions warranting his change of view aren't going to happen without military intervention). I take this as a sign that the US isn't going to send in troops to deal with the piracy threat anytime soon, nor are they going to engage in military operations to bring an end to the failed state of Somalia's corrosive and destructive effect on the region.

More Details Emerge On Yesterday's Pirate Attacks

Yesterday, I reported on the developing story of another pirate attack on US flagged shipping. More details have emerged on the pirate attack on the Liberty Sun, a US-flagged ship that had just delivered humanitarian aid to Sudan.

Somali pirates attacked and damaged an American ship carrying humanitarian aid Tuesday, but the ship and crew were safe under Navy escort, the military and shipping company said.

The pirates fired rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons at the Liberty Sun as it carried food for famine-wracked African nations, said the vessel's owner, Liberty Maritime Corp. The ship was en route from Houston to Mombasa, Kenya, with a roughly 20-member crew, officials said.

"We are under attack by pirates, we are being hit by rockets. Also bullets," crew member Thomas Urbik told his mother by e-mail. "We are barricaded in the engine room and so far no one is hurt. (A) rocket penetrated the bulkhead but the hole is small. Small fire, too, but put out."

After the ship reported being attacked around 11:30 a.m. EDT, the USS Bainbridge - the destroyer that assisted in the rescue of the hijacked Maersk Alabama last week - sailed to its aid, said Navy Capt. Jack Hanzlik, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Fla.

The Bainbridge arrived at 5:30 p.m. EDT to find that the pirates had left, and there were no injuries, Hanzlik said.

The ship was continuing on its way to Mombasa late Tuesday, he said.

This is the second incident involving US flagged shipping that was delivering humanitarian aid to Africa when it came under attack from pirates.

The pirates aren't going to stop their attacks anytime soon unless the world puts its collective foot down to stop it.

UPDATE:
Kenyan officials estimate that the Somali pirates made $150 million in their attacks on shipping in 2008. That's why the attacks will continue. Paying the ransoms shows the pirates that they have little to fear from reprisal, the US and French operations notwithstanding.

Will the second attack on shipping carrying humanitarian aid get the UN to act? I doubt it. These pirates, for all their talk about how they are not threatening the lives of those crews they capture, are putting lives in danger - the hundreds of thousands who are benefiting from humanitarian aid shipments brought in by those ships such as the Maersk Alabama and Liberty Sun. It's yet another reason to deal with the safe havens onshore to stop the pirates before they get out to sea where they are more difficult to track.

UPDATE:
Somali pirates are vowing to hunt down and capture and kill American sailors. They tried yesterday, but were thwarted by an American crew that fought back. The pirates are going to find out that the American crews aren't going to sit back and allow themselves to become hostages and pawns in a moneymaking venture for the pirate leaders who are safely ensconced back in ports in Somalia.

"We will seek out the Americans and if we capture them we will slaughter them," said a 25-year-old pirate based in the Somali port of Harardhere who gave only his first name, Ismail.

"We will target their ships because we know their flags. Last night, an American-flagged ship escaped us by a whisker. We have showered them with rocket-propelled grenades," boasted Ismail, who did not take part in the attack on the Liberty Sun.

The move comes after U.S. Navy sharpshooters killed three pirates Sunday to win the release of a hijacked American sea captain, Richard Phillips of the Maersk Alabama.

The French are starting to increase the pace of raids on pirates who are shadowing shipping, taking out a pirate ship overnight:

The French forces, meanwhile, launched an early morning attack on a pirate ship after spotting it Tuesday with a surveillance helicopter and observing the pirates overnight. The raid thwarted the bandits' planned attack on the Liberian cargo ship Safmarine Asia, the French Defense Ministry said.

The statement called the pirate vessel a "mother ship" — usually a seized foreign ship that pirates use to transport speedboats far out to sea and resupply them. The ship was intercepted 550 miles (900 kilometers) east of the Kenyan city of Mombasa.

The 11 detained pirates were being held on the Nivose, a French frigate among the international fleet trying to protect shipping in the Gulf of Aden. France already is holding several pirates for prosecution.

The one mistake with the French strategy is holding these pirates for prosecution. They're needlessly creating a legal problem where none should exist.

Developing: Pirates Attempt Another Attack On US Shipping

This time, they weren't able to board the US flagged Liberty Sun. The ship is now being escorted by a coalition navy ship.

Here's an ongoing map of attacks and suspicious incidents.

Brazen Pirates Strike Again

The Somali pirates continue hijacking ships, despite the American operation to free Capt. Phillips that resulted in three shots and three dead pirates. Today, they captured three more boats off the coast of Somalia, including a Greek-managed bulk carrier and two Egyptian fishing boats.

The latest trophy for the pirates was the M.V. Irene E.M., a Greek-managed bulk carrier sailing from the Middle East to South Asia, said Noel Choong, who heads the International Maritime Bureau's piracy reporting center in Kuala Lumpur.

The Irene was attacked and seized in the middle of the night Tuesday — a rare tactic for the pirates.

U.S. Navy Lt. Nathan Christensen, spokesman for the Bahrain-based 5th Fleet, said the Irene was flagged in the Caribbean island nation of St. Vincent and the Grenadines and carried 23 Filipino crew. Choong reported a crew of 21, and there was no immediate way to reconcile the figures.

Apparently the pirates haven't gotten the message that their days are numbered. They continue plundering shipping that comes near the coast.

The message the rest of the world is sending is that they're not going to free all of the hostages held by the pirates, but only those whose navies are in a position to take action (the US and French for example, although the Indian Navy has also engaged and destroyed pirate shipping).

A map indicates where the pirates have struck during 2008, and 2009 looks like it's going to be a banner year despite changes in the shipping lanes away from the Somali coast. It's also not much of a surprise where the pirates call home.

Arming the crews may not be the panacea that everyone thinks since it only addresses a symptom, not the cause. Eliminating the pirates' port of calls will. Eliminate the pirates means of getting into the shipping lanes will (destroying the pirate boats). Sending out notices to all shipping in the region that any craft entering the shipping lanes that is unmarked and unregistered will be searched, seized, or destroyed depending on the actions of the pirates.

UPDATE:
Jules Crittenden has much more on the handling of the volatile situation off Somalia and the need for follow through.

UPDATE:
Make that four ships seized in 24 hours. A fourth ship was seized by pirates today, this one under the flag of Togo. Why would anyone expect the piracy to end after the US and French operations? The pirates know that unless the US or French go after all the pirates, they'll continue operating and attacking shipping under non-US or French flagged vessels.

Also, spare me the drama over how the pirates who captured Capt. Phillips were all teenagers. Outside of the West, many parts of the world routinely turn children into soldiers. Pirates are no different.

They answer to tribal leaders and militia leaders who are older and know that they can sacrifice the teens while not having to absorb any of the risk themselves. It's yet another reason to go after the pirate safe havens - to take out the tribal leaders and militia leaders spurring others to engage in the piracy to support their own situation.

UPDATE:
Hot Air also notes the capture of the four ships and 60 crew members and that it will take more than words to bring the situation to an end.

Flopping Aces notes that actions speak louder than words.

Blackfive concurs on the need to take action against the safe havens onshore.

Pirates Vow Revenge Following US Rescue

The pirates are nothing if not inconsistent. The French launched a raid over the weekend to rescue five French hostages, and yet now the pirates are claiming that they're going to seek revenge for the death of three pirates and the capture of a fourth following Captain Richard Phillips escape, which allowed US Navy SEALs to take out those pirates.

The operation was a victory for the world's most powerful military but angry pirates vowed Monday to retaliate.

Those threats raised fears for the safety of some 230 foreign sailors still held hostage in more than a dozen ships anchored off the coast of lawless Somalia.

"From now on, if we capture foreign ships and their respective countries try to attack us, we will kill them (the hostages)," Jamac Habeb, a 30-year-old pirate, told the Associated Press from one of Somalia's piracy hubs, Eyl. "(U.S. forces have) become our No. 1 enemy."

News of Capt. Richard Phillips' rescue caused his crew in Kenya to break into wild cheers and brought tears to the eyes of those in Phillips' hometown of Underhill, Vermont, half a world away from the Indian Ocean drama.

President Barack Obama called Phillips' courage "a model for all Americans" and said he was pleased with the rescue, but added the United States still needed help from other countries to deal with piracy and to hold pirates accountable.

The pirates had a good business setup. They had the insurance companies for the shipping lines paying up on a fairly regular basis. Everyone made out like bandits. The pirates got regular pay and the shipping companies handled this as another cost of doing business in a lawless region off the coast of Somalia.

Of course, it was a different story for the crews of those ships captured by the pirates. More than 200 are still being held by the pirates in various communities up and down the Somali coast. Some have been held for months, and regardless of claims of how well they're being treated, these crews are being held against their will and haven't seen family or friends for months.

These high seas terrorists were not expecting to have various navies firing back at their thugs. They figured that they could get the usual ransoms and the companies or nations would eventually give in.

The pirates didn't expect the US crew of the Maersk Alabama to fight back. They didn't expect Captain Phillips to attempt escape from the drifting lifeboat twice; the second time being the charm on Easter Sunday as the US Navy was prepared the second time and facilitated his escape by shooting his captors as he swam to freedom while the lifeboat was under tow in increasingly choppy waters (video of Capt. Phillips here).

The pirates had been operating in a vacuum. The lawlessness of Somalia enabled them to operate with impunity. The various navies stood by and did little except ward off the pirates; they didn't go after the pirates homeports and the black market economy that supports the pirates in Somalia. Merchant shipping altered their shipping lanes, but did little to address the safety of their crews from these brigands. The pirates were exposed to no risk from their high seas terror campaign.

Now, they're going to be thinking twice about taking on shipping. They are starting to recognize that going after shipping has consequences. Permanent consequences.

Taking hostages can and may result in their death.

The French showed that the pirates cannot take hostages and expect to survive. The US did the same.

Now, the pirates are making threats that they wont treat the crews of ships they hijack the same as before.

The US Navy can't stop and smell the roses with securing Capt. Phillips release. They must do more. The other navies must do more. They must put down the pirates and their infrastructure. It means going and rescuing the other crews in Somalia.

To be absolutely clear here, these pirates started this conflict by attacking world shipping and taking hostages. Now, that the US and French navies responded by freeing several of those hostages, these thugs are vowing revenge? Sorry, but these terrorists are going to have to learn a harsh lesson of the consequences of their actions. They had a choice to not attack shipping and take hostages. They chose to attack make enemies of the various navies of the world.

The pirates are responsible for the consequences of their own actions; this isn't about revenge for the death of their fellow thugs. It's about excusing their own actions.

UPDATE:
It looks like the US military is contemplating attacking the pirate bases on land in Somalia, although the operation being considered isn't a wide ranging operation.

The U.S. military is considering attacks on pirate bases on land and aid for the Somali people to help stem ship hijackings off Africa’s east coast, defense officials said.

The military also is drawing up proposals to aid the fledgling Somalia government to train security forces and develop its own coast guard, said the officials, who requested anonymity. The plans will be presented to the Obama administration as it considers a coordinated U.S. government and international response to piracy, the officials said.

The effort follows the freeing yesterday of Richard Phillips, a U.S. cargo ship captain held hostage since April 8 by Somali pirates. Security analysts said making shipping lanes safe would require disrupting the pirates’ support network on land.

“There really isn’t a silver-bullet solution other than going into Somalia and rooting out the bases” of the pirates, said James Carafano, senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based group.

I think the attack on Rep. Payne's plane in Somalia may further hasten a US response to the piracy and lawlessness there.

UPDATE:
Apparently the pirates want to seek revenge for the deaths of their fellow thugs against the French following the French raid to free French citizens from the pirates' clutches. Earlier reports indicated that the pirates were going to have their revenge against the US.

There's also a new timeline of what happened in the moments before the Navy SEALs rescued Capt. Phillips. Apparently one of the pirates aimed their AK-47 at Capt. Phillips and the sharpshooters responded by taking out the pirates in a blink of an eye.

UPDATE:
Hmmmm... Obama's order merely reiterated a standing order to take out the pirates if they threatened Capt. Phillips? In other words, the guys on the ground were doing what they had to do, and Obama simply restated the same order?

Well, I'm not surprised by that, nor am I going to attack Obama for making the decision. He could have chosen to simply demand that the US negotiate the release.

Still, the real kudos must go to the SEAL team snipers who took out the pirates and rescued Capt. Phillips. They're the ones at the tip of the spear who never took their eye off the target.

The Danger of the Post-Hegemonic Vacuum

What happens when a political system loses the power broker? A vacuum occurs, and nature abhors a vacuum. In the case of the Somali pirates, the pirates saw the failed state and the lawlessness and filled the gap. Now, the pirates are ranging out hundreds of miles at sea in search of bigger targets and more lucrative paydays while the world shrugs and the US contemplates a law enforcement response to what has always been treated as a military operation.

The failure of the UN and other international organizations, let alone the various navies of the world to police the waters off the Somali coast has enabled the pirates to gain a stronghold from which to operate with near impunity.

The Obama Administration's weak showing on the foreign policy stage - whether it's a tight-lipped response to the capture of the Maersk Alabama and her captain, Richard Phillips, or the Iranians announcing the completion of the nuclear fuel cycle or the North Korean missile launch or the Russians pushing the Administration to make concessions even before entering into negotiations is fueling even further tests for the administration.

Each sign of weakness is being exploited and followed up with yet another test that the Administration appears ill-prepared to deal with.

The Piracy Conundrum Continues: UPDATE: Capt. Phillips Freed

Pirates continue holding Capt. Richard Phillips on board that drifting lifeboat, and while that is a dangerous enough situation, the complicating factor is that there are more than 200 other crew members who are being held by pirates up and down the Somali coast from the numerous other hijackers in the past few months.

US Navy ships and helicopters are shadowing the lifeboat.

There is some concern that a rescue operation against the pirates holding Phillips might endanger the others. It could conceivably increase the ransoms demanded for the others.

Then again, no such action was discerned following the French efforts to release five hostages in a military operation that resulted in four being rescued and a fifth person killed along with two of the pirates. The French engaged in military ops to secure the release of their citizens shows that military ops can work and the repercussions may not be as bad as feared.

Of course, there's a solution for that too, and that involves going and rescuing all of the people being held hostage by the pirates on shore. It's the kind of action that would put the piracy to an end (big on risk, but huge on reward), and it's not something one would expect from Obama, who's been busy doing everything imaginable to emasculate the US and the US national security posture in the name of being more "friendly" to our enemies.

Such an operation could involve multiple navies and US Marines and Special Forces to infiltrate and identify all the locations where the crews are being held. LCACs and helicopters could be used to ferry in both the Marines and to evacuate the crews. Such equipment is available on the USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship, which is in the vicinity.

Instead, the Administration is treating this like a police standoff and demanded the arrest of the pirates involved. Somali tribal elders refused, and talks broke off.

Negotiations over the American captain taken hostage by Somali pirates broke down on Saturday, according to Somali officials, after American officials insisted that the pirates be arrested and a group of elders representing the pirates refused.

Somali officials said the American captain, Richard Phillips, and the four heavily armed pirates holding him hostage remained in a covered lifeboat floating in the Indian Ocean about 30 miles off Gara’ad, a notorious pirate den in northeastern Somalia.

The negotiations broke down hours after the pirates fired on a small United States Navy vessel that had tried to approach the lifeboat not long after sunrise Saturday in the Indian Ocean.

It was the first such approach since the standoff began on Wednesday, and the vessel returned to a nearby Navy destroyer, the Bainbridge, after the pirates fired warning shots in the air, according to an American military official.

The American boat did not return fire and “did not want to escalate the situation,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

There's a further reason that the US Navy didn't return fire, and it has more to do with identifying targets and hoping to avoid hitting Capt. Phillips, than with escalating the situation further.

This further indicates the problems with trying to address the situation as a law enforcement matter and not a military one.

It also highlights the fact that the crews themselves have to take matters into their own hands - the crew of the Maersk Alabama freed themselves. They weren't going to wait for someone to come and help them. It was quick thinking and swift action that resulted in their freedom.

Some of the crew managed to hide in a secure part of the Alabama as the pirates stormed the ship, the sailor said.

As the men described the clash, a crew member pointed to his shipmate and said, "This guy is a hero, he and the chief engineer they took down the pirate... he led him down there to the engine room and then they jumped him."

The fellow shipmate then added that he stabbed the pirate in the man and tied him up.

Another crew member shouted, "Captain Phillips is a hero."

UPDATE:
There are those who think that the rest of the world is to blame for the pirates taking up their lucrative endeavors as a result of various entities encroaching on their fishing grounds and dumping in their waters.

UPDATE:
Great news. Captain Phillips was freed after a firefight between US forces and the pirates.

An American ship captain was freed unharmed Sunday in a swift firefight that killed three of the four Somali pirates who had been holding him for days in a lifeboat off the coast of Africa, U.S. officials said.

Capt. Richard Phillips' crew, who said they escaped after he offered himself to the pirates as a hostage, erupted in cheers abroad their ship docked in Mombasa, Kenya, waving an American flag and firing a flare in celebration.

The U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet said Phillips was resting comfortably on a U.S. warship after receiving a medical exam.

The Navy said Phillips was freed at 7:19 p.m. local time. He was taken aboard the Norfolk, Virginia-based USS Bainbridge and then flown to the San Diego-based USS Boxer for the medial exam, 5th Fleet spokesman Lt. Nathan Christensen said.

Christensen said Phillips was now "resting comfortably." The USS Boxer was in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Somalia, Christensen said.

The U.S. did not say if Phillips, 53, of Underhill, Vermont, was receiving medical care because he had been injured or if he was being treated for exposure after his ordeal.

U.S. officials said a pirate who had been involved in negotiations to free Phillips but who was not on the lifeboat during the rescue was in military custody. FBI spokesman John Miller said that would change as the situation became "more of a criminal issue than a military issue."

It's indeed a Happy Easter for the Phillips family. And for the second time, it was because Capt. Phillips attempted to escape that he was able to be freed by the US forces. He again jumped out of the lifeboat, and this time US forces were ready to take out the pirates. Three were killed, and the fourth was taken into custody.

UPDATE:
Even with the rescue, you've got reports trying to make the pirates out to be something that they're not. It's the attempt to claim and transform these modern day pirates into emerging businessmen with unique economic opportunities for advancement:

We are tired of your calls. We have no time for journalists," is a polite translation of some of the last quotes our team managed to extract from the pirates.

"If you bother us again, we will order someone in Mogadishu to meet you," a gang member added before the line went dead.

Often, though, the pirates are friendly and helpful, though they detest use of the p-word. "We never kill people. We are Muslims. We are marines, coastguards -- not pirates," one said.

Hostages say the pirates are normally as friendly as they can be under the circumstances. While they threaten to shoot or beat them if they do not cooperate, they also roast goat for their captives and pass phones around for calls home.

If they're Muslim, they have a funny way of showing it given that they're not showing the hospitality they claim to represent.

UPDATE:
Others blogging: Wizbang, Michelle Malkin, Tigerhawk, Tel Chai Nation, Outside the Beltway, Blackfive, AJ Strata, and Gateway Pundit.

UPDATE:
Well, give President Obama credit here. He authorized the use of force to take out the pirates.

A senior administration official said the president's order authorized force for a group of military assets that arrived at the scene late last week. When more resources arrived, Obama added them to a roster of military personnel allowed to engage militarily with the Somali pirates.

Obama was told Sunday of the rescue while he was in the White House residence, administration officials said. He phoned Phillips and Phillips' family, an official told FOX News.

"I am very pleased that Capt. Phillips has been rescued and is safely on board the USS Boxer," the president said in a statement. "His safety has been our principal concern, and I know this is a welcome relief to his family and his crew."

Obama also praised the U.S. military and the other departments and agencies for their efforts.

"We remain resolved to halt the rise of piracy in this region," he said. "To achieve that goal, we must continue to work with our partners to prevent future attacks, be prepared to interdict acts of piracy and ensure that those who commit acts of piracy are held accountable for their crimes."

If the Administration is resolved to halt the piracy in the region, they better be looking at dealing with the pirates onshore, and not just deterring them once they're at sea.

The Somali Pirate Standoffs Continues

The US Navy is in the vicinity, but no action appears to be forthcoming despite the fact that the pirates on board the drifting lifeboat are now demanding a ransom of $2 million. The Obama Administration's aloofness is even worse than President Carter's feckless response to the Iranian hostage situation. A search of the White House website for the word piracy reveals only three references, the most recent of which is from April 9. It's also telling that instead of treating the piracy as a military act, the Administration is sending the FBI. That is precisely the wrong message to send. It's the message of the weak and shows that the Administration is more than willing to continue tolerating piracy on the high seas. Hoping for the international community to respond and deal effectively with piracy is tantamount to letting it continue festering.

Further, what kind of message does this send to Americans who go overseas on travel or who work around the world? The US isn't going to be there for you either, even if you're the victim of piracy. You're on your own, just as the crew of the Maersk Alabama found. They didn't wait for the US Navy to respond, but took action on their own to overpower the pirates that boarded their ship.

Sadly, the pirates managed to take Captain Phillips hostage on a lifeboat, which is now drifting in the ocean and shadowed by the USS Bainbridge and other US Navy ships heading in that direction. The Navy is trying to stop the pirates from sending reinforcements.

Of course, anyone paying attention knows that the real issue isn't the pirates on the high seas, but the failed state of Somalia and the safe havens that give those pirates refuge. To effectively eliminate the pirates you're going to have to engage in operations on the land of Somalia. You can be sure that the Obama Administration isn't going to pursue a strategy that leads to a Clintonesque Black Hawk Down redux.

A complicating factor is that the Filipino government wants the safety of their people to take paramount concern over any military action. The overwhelming majority of those held captive by the pirates are Filipinos, but the numbers would have been far fewer had the shipping companies, insurance companies, and various navies decided on a zero-tolerance strategy that refused payment of ransoms and warned any pirates that their ships would be sunk on sight. That is how to stop the piracy off the coast of Somalia. You don't stop the piracy by continuing to provide ransoms and the economic incentive for desperate pirates to continue their terror campaign on the high seas.

The French are launching an investigation into why one of the hostages was killed in a three minute rescue operation that saved four other hostages from pirates. Sorry, but that's precisely how you get inaction on the high seas.

Defense Minister Herve Morin acknowledged that it could have been a French bullet that killed hostage Florent Lemacon, during an operation that demonstrated the risks of using military force against sea bandits.

Pirates seized a sailboat carrying Lemacon, his wife, 3-year-old son and two friends off the Somali coast a week ago. On Friday, French navy commandos stormed the boat in an assault triggered by threats the passengers would be executed.

Two pirates were killed, and Lemacon died in an exchange of fire as he tried to duck down the hatch.

"There will be of course a judicial inquiry, therefore there will be an autopsy. We cannot of course exclude that during the exchange of fire between the pirates and our commandos, the shot (that killed Lemacon) was French," Morin said on Europe-1 radio.

Still, he defended the action.

"We, I believe, made the best decision possible," he said.

There are going to be civilians killed in the anti-piracy operations, and all fault resides on the terrorists who seek out civilian shipping to plunder and hold their crews ransom.

UPDATE:
Tack on another ship to the list of those hijacked.

Pirates seized a U.S.-owned and Italian-flagged tugboat with 16 crew on Saturday in the latest hijacking in the busy Gulf of Aden waterway, a regional maritime group said.

Andrew Mwangura, of the Mombasa-based East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme, said the crew were believed to be unharmed on the tugboat, which he added was operated from the United Arab Emirates.

He said the tugboat was towing two barges at the time of capture but there were no details on their cargo.

"This incident shows the pirates are becoming more daring and violent," Mwangura told Reuters by phone.

NATO alliance officials on board the Portuguese warship NRB Corte-Real, which is patrolling the Gulf of Aden, said a distress call came from the MV Buccaneer tugboat but communications were lost six minutes later.

UPDATE:
The AP (via MSNBC) reports that there are "experts" who see the pirates as businessmen, and that the ransoms are there to protect their hostages. It's that kind of logic that enables the pirates to operate with impunity despite hundreds of years of treating the pirates as the lawless thugs that they are and which international law traditionally viewed as subject to suppression and elimination.

The possible payout for Capt. Richard Phillips would be the pirates' top priority and could trump any desire for payback after his recent escape attempt, experts said. The 53-year-old Phillips jumped out of the boat Friday before being forced back in by automatic weapons fire.
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The pirates are businessmen, not suicidal jihadists, said Scott Stewart, vice president for tactical analysis for Stratfor, a global intelligence company based in Austin, Texas.

"These are people who are trying to make money," Stewart said. "They want to survive this. They don't want to die, which is a good thing in the captain's favor."

They don't want to die? Fine. Surrender and give up piracy. Piracy isn't good for your health, and the world must drive that point home. Allowing ransoms to be paid only enables and encourages further piracy. The payment of ransoms continues ratcheting up the costs to everyone, and the demands become ever greater with each passing incident.

UPDATE:
Apparently there are plans to negotiate with the Somali tribal elders and pirates' relatives to avoid bloodshed.

With three U.S. warships in the area, the elders and relatives of the pirates holding Phillips, a father-of-two from rural Vermont, are planning a mediation mission to try to avoid bloodshed, a regional maritime group said.

"They are just looking to arrange safe passage for the pirates, no ransom," group coordinator Andrew Mwangura said.

None of this will deter future piracy, and will only strengthen the pirates going forward. There should be no safe passage, as it shows that the risks of piracy to the pirates themselves have been eliminated. Such action would only encourage further piracy.

UPDATE:
Don Surber links. Thanks!