"'Ow do you know 'e's a pirate?" "'E LOOKS like one!"

[unixronin]

Since the end of August, Gortney said, there have been 50 instances where coalition ships have disrupted potential pirate attacks, throwing guns overboard and sinking small skiffs.  But in many instances they had to release the people on the ships because of the legal hurdles.

I put it to you that there is a simple solution to this:

"If we find you loitering with apparent intent in the shipping lanes, in a small boat with weapons, we will presumptively assume that you are a pirate.  Game over."

Comments

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, I think it'd be a great time to re-introduce Letters of Marque and Reprisal. :)

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

I'll drink to that!

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Of course, other people have other opinions. I saw someone the other day, claimed that the pirates were your fault, and mine. See, it's our fault that Somalia doesn't have a government, and that these poor people have to go out and rob the broad highway.


As I was a-walkin round Kilgary Mountain
I met Colonel Pepper and his money he was countin',
I rattled me pistols and I drew forth me saber,
Sayin' "Stand and deliver, for I am the bold deceiver!"

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Well, actually, that argument does have a grain of truth underlying it.

Somalia and Ethiopia had a perfectly sound and functional government and system of justice before we Europeans interfered ... we just didn't recognize it as one because it didn't have a single recognizable central governing body. It was all based on tribal and clan judges. When the West destroyed that system to introduce a "proper civilized government", the result was to create a power vacuum at the clan and tribal level. The judge system worked because each tribe was governed fairly by one of its own — there could be no accusation of bias or unfairness, of favoring one tribe over another. When a dispute arose involving more than one clan or tribe, the respective judges would meet and negotiate a fair and just solution, and the solution that was respected by all involved because they heard it from their judge. The imposed central government failed because, since it had no connection to individual clans or tribes, there was no reason they should respect it — lacking any connection to the people at the clan/tribal level, it was isolated, powerless, and ignored. Any time it tried to do anything, the tribes as a whole refused to comply because the edict was not coming from a member of their tribe, so they saw no reason to comply. They accused those in the government of unfairly favoring their own tribes, and most of the time the accusation was true — those appointed to the government DID look out for their own tribes first, because that was how the system had always worked. The emergence of the Somali warlords can be seen as a failed attempt to return to the traditional system, except that instead of government by the wisest elders of individual tribes, local rule now falls to whoever can muster and maintain the largest and strongest armed force.

"Westerners" went in with the best of Victorian half-informed intentions to "civilize" the Horn of Africa, based on the blind assumption that because there was no Western-style government they couldn't be civilized, because Western-style government was of course the only working kind. (Besides which, the tribal judgeship system was not readily exploitable by corrupt colonial administrators seeking to plunder whatever wealth could be found in the region.) The chaos in the Horn of Africa today is a direct result of that interference.



Of course, to go from there to saying that the current outbreak of Somali piracy is the fault of the West is a bit like saying that if I stop at a light and some goblin tries to carjack me, it's my fault for owning a nice car.

[jhetley.livejournal.com]

Yeah. That's why I tagged on the bit of ballad -- to my Irish and Scottish ancestors, the highwayman was a resistance fighter hero . . .

(The victim is almost always an English name, with some kind of rank or title. Funny, that.)

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

It's your own fault for not carrying a pistol. How about that? :)

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I do. :)

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

Well played, sir. Well played.

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

The U.S. never got rid of them! They don't even need to be reintroduced. :)

There has never been a Constitutional amendment rescinding Congressional authority to grant these letters. There was even a Letter of Marque and Reprisal issued in WW2 to a privately owned military company.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Huh. Learn something useful every day. :)

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

Letters of marque and reprisal were banned by treaty at the Declaration of Paris in the mid-19th century, but the United States was not party to the treaty and has never considered itself bound by it. That said, as a matter of national policy we don't issue them, mostly due to concerns about civil liability for the actions of privateers; but the government still possesses the legal authority.

The WW2 letter of marque and reprisal was issued to, of all things, a PMC fielding an armed blimp. Antisubmarine warfare. Can you imagine that? "Grandpa, what did you do in World War Two?" "Well, I was a privateer aboard the Resolute, an armed blimp hunting the Nazis..."

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

It would make a hell of a story. :)