Thursday, April 16, 2009
Don't Arm the Sitting Bucks - er Ducks.
There is a group that opposes arming the vessels that are, unarmed, the easy prey of the Somali pirates. Could it be the world's arms producers, including those in the US, that are saying: "Don't arm the vessels to resist these expensive incursions!" Who else, The Doser asks, would be saying a dumb thing like that?
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2 comments:
Pretty Good Answers Why not arm the ships
Best Answer - Chosen by Asker
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1) Safety.
If you're carrying thousands of gallons of oil, liquified petroleum gas, chemicals or other hazardous/explosive material, the LAST thing you need is an errant spark.
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2) Insurance.
Most insurers for whatever reason - (I'm sure #1 is one) - will not allow it.
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3) International laws.
Most countries will not allow your ship - and therefore your cargo - entry if you are bearing arms. Ships need to make numerous stops for refueling and replenishments between point of origin and final destination.
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4) To preclude an arms race.
By some estimates, The Pirates of The Somalians have amassed a literal war chest of $80,000,000.00 U.S. dollars. They can and will buy bigger and better weapons than your civilian merchant mariners.
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5) Costs.
Up to this point, businesses and insurers have been quietly just paying off pirates (ergo the $80M). With shipboard arms, now desperate pirates will: a) become deadlier and b) start sinking ships. Depending on the cargo, that could be a $100,000,000.00 loss. That's ONE ship.
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6) Piracy is a land based scourge.
It originates from land. It is an established doctrine, from centuries of experience, that you can't eradicate piracy at sea. It's like swatting individual hornets without dealing with the hornets' nest. Its eradication will only work from land based solutions, not sea based swashbuckling which, while entertaining as movie plots, have always proven futile as policy.
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(In Somalia, piracy started 'accidentally.' Knowing Somalia is a failed state, international fishing trawlers started poaching in Somali waters, displacing legitimate, lawful Somali fishermen. Frustrated Somali fishermen, with no government (Navy or Coast Guard) to assist them, had to fend off those fishing rustlers themselves. They let out in armed fishing boats to scare away the foreign trespassers. Along the way, they 'discovered,' "Hmmm . . . Looks like we can make MORE money doing LESS work by [guess what]")
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