So the question is this: should we have conceded and pay the ransom? I'm glad they did what they did. It sends a pretty clear message to the terrorists (and these pirates are equivalent to that) that we will not negotiate and won't tolerate these kinds of acts.
But, we also have to be careful, especially in this country (Somalia). We do remember that the movie 'Blackhawk Down' was based on the Blackhawk shot down in Mogadishu. These extreme Somalis, for all their barbarism, know how to co-ordinate. That's a dangerous combination, especially in a country with no real government.
No, they don't. We killed hundreds of them and lost 18 soldiers. Some say they lost thousands.
The Somalis are some of the dumbest humans that walk the planet. No central government... that place can't even rise to the title of "3rd World." That is saying something, folks.
I mean, really, lets look at some of their recent activity...
They take a Saudi Oil tanker, work out a ransom deal, then drown on their way to retrieve the money that was air-dropped into the ocean.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,479045,00.htmlThen in this latest publicized incident, the "pirates" (if you can even call them that--the ghosts of pirates of the days long past laugh at these fools as they pass the rum) try to hijack an American ship with unarmed sailors... and fail.
They end up taking the captain in a lifeboat?? and being the idiots that they are, end up surrounded by the U.S. Navy within a day.
Now, completely overtaken by the world's most efficient navy, only two options remain. You surrender, or you get taken out. But no!! In the mind of an uneducated Somalian, you ask the U.S. military for a ransom!!
And so they died. Three shots, three kills. They never knew what hit them. They left this world just as clueless as they were when they entered it.
These are young, uneducated, extremely poor, extremely small-minded people, carrying AK-47s that they are completely lacking in proficiency with.
Any ship with 2-4 trained security guards with semi-automatic rifles could stop ANY of the hundreds of Somali pirate attacks that have occurred thusfar.
Port-to-port international firearms laws, and skimpy shipping company owners who don't want to pay for ship security, are the reason why the attacks continue.
No Somalian pirate attack has circumvented an armed security detail. And they never will.
Due to the lack of security on these ships, sending our military after them may be the best deterrent at this point, but doing so is like rolling a tank over an anthill.
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Hoss, President Clinton pulled us out of Somalia because he didn't want us to have to kill any more of THEM. Not the other way around. He felt sorry for them, tried to help them out with humanitarian aid. When they jacked with a couple of our helicopters, they lost 800 people, and he pulled the plug on the operation.
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