Time to get tough with Somali pirates

Sen. Mark Kirk earned a reputation as a forward-thinking lawmaker with his advocacy years ago of what is now U.S. policy toward Iran, sanctions to restrict imports of gasoline into that rogue nation. Now Kirk has set his sights on a problem he sees as a growing security threat and funding source for terrorists — Somali piracy.Pirates have menaced ships since the advent of commerce at sea, killed innocent people, sold others into slavery and extracted fortunes in tribute and ransom from nations. The United States fought two wars against state-supported Barbary pirates in the early 19th century.Today’s outbreak rose amid the chaos after the collapse of Somalia as a functioning state. It began with poor Somali fishermen attacking fishing vessels from other places for ransom and exploded into a big business when criminals and terrorists turned on international shipping as a source of millions in cash.Now pirates hold 23 ships and 483 hostages, and the costs of piracy — in ransom, insurance and the growing military response — is up to $12 billion annually, says Kirk. The Illinois Republican lawmaker recently spent a week in Africa talking to U.S. Embassy officials, African governments, U.S. and Chinese naval officers and jailed pirates.Piracy is a source of millions of dollars for Somali-based terrorists, notably to al-Qaidi affiliate Al Shabaab, Kirk says. Over three years, the number of attacks on vessels, including super-tankers, in a region that is the shipping lane for 70 percent of the world’s oil have increased three-fold while the average ransom has soared to $5.4 million per ship. These criminals, far from the dashing figure of Johnny Depp in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies, are thugs. In February, pirates murdered four Americans aboard a yacht in the Indian Ocean.In calling for tough international action, Kirk says Secretary of State Hillary Clinton acknowledges current policy has failed. Noting the historic parallels, Kirk says tribute to Barbary pirates accounted for 10 percent of government expenditures in the George Washington and John Adams administrations and the menace became intolerable to President Thomas Jefferson.“We face exactly what Thomas Jefferson faced,” says Kirk. We can only hope our response gets off to a better start than Jefferson’s. A U.S. frigate ran aground off the coast of Tripoli in 1803, and its crew of 300 were thrown into slavery while awaiting ransom. A daring U.S. raid destroyed the frigate but another attack on the pirates’ ships left a dozen American corpses that the pasha of Tripoli threw to dogs to be devoured. A peace treaty ultimately freed the 300 Americans. But the pirate threat didn’t end until the Second Barbary War of 1815 when naval hero Stephen Decatur led a U.S. armada to cower the nations sponsoring piracy into submission.Kirk recommends ways to combat piracy: Stop paying ransoms. Blockade primary pirate ports. Adopt aggressive rules of military engagement to confront pirates.Russian ships aren’t attacked because every pirate to board one was killed, Kirk says. India, whose economic growth is threatened by lawlessness in the Indian Ocean, doesn’t hesitate to sink “motherships,” captured commercial vessels pirates use to tow the small skiffs that attack ships. In contrast, European Union nations back down when pirates overpower one of their vessels, so it’s not surprising they pay the highest ransoms.
Kirk says fighting piracy means economic and military assistance, preferably a multinational effort, to help the embattled Somali government and semi-autonomous regions Somaliland and Puntland confront pirates and gain control of terrorist- and pirate-controlled areas.

It’s worth noting that no ship where crewmen are armed has been captured. But 80 percent of ships are not armed, for a variety of reasons. That should change. While he was talking about the military, Jefferson was on target in saying, “I know nothing will stop the eternal increase from these pirates but the presence of an armed force.”  Sun-Times