How Long Before Reacting To Pirates?

[dilloduck]

I humbly suggest that they "do this" because they are hungry and do not feel they have adequate representation within their countries. They do this to be heard.

It probably isn't our place to instill a more representative govt in Somalia, we are free to make the choice to sit on the sidelines and let them work it out on their own. We could have done the same with any number of other crises. We could believe that war is the last option.

We could capture the criminals and try them, in some international court. You know, a targeted retribution to the actual criminals. As I understand it they are on a boat in the ocean, so it shouldn't be too hard to avoid collateral damage.

Or we could just bomb the shit out of them and their country and tell them to shape up. I wonder if that would work. You know, make them cower. Because they probably don't have pride like us americans.

Even better, bomb the shit out of a country that has nothing to do with it. That oughtta work.

Offer them pardons and rehab---piracy is an addictive disease.

 

[editec]

Seems to me if you're about the business of being pirate who takes and holds large ships for randsom, you must need SOME port facilities.

One of the things that conventional military force is mighty good at is breaking stuff like ports.

I am still flummoxed as to why this hasn't ALREADY been done.

These people have sucessfully taken 40 ships and attacked hundreds more.

What's the hold up?

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Seems to me if you're about the business of being pirate who takes and holds large ships for randsom, you must need SOME port facilities.

One of the things that conventional military force is mighty good at is breaking stuff like ports.

I am still flummoxed as to why this hasn't ALREADY been done.

These people have sucessfully taken 40 ships and attacked hundreds more.

What's the hold up?

Someone will cry.

 

[Anguille]

Personally, I get big kick out of a bunch of rag tag fishermen making the biggest and most sophisticated sea vessels in the world pay tolls to pass through their ancestral waters.
LOL!

 

[dilloduck]

Personally, I get big kick out of a bunch of rag tag fishermen making the biggest and most sophisticated sea vessels in the world pay tolls to pass through their ancestral waters.
LOL!

Hell of a spin there, Ms Champion of the little people.

 

[editec]

Oh I'm inclined to understand Aguille's point.

Somalia is derperately poor, and sailing right paid that horrible poverty is the wealth of the world.

If many of us were Somalis, I suspect some of us might be hoisting the Jolly Roger ourselves.

 

[dilloduck]

Oh I'm inclined to understand Aguille's point.

Somalia is derperately poor, and sailing right paid that horrible poverty is the wealth of the world.

If many of us were Somalis, I suspect some of us might be hoisting the Jolly Roger ourselves.

Oh it's quite apparent that many here think that it's moral to steal from people who have more than you.

 

[Sunni Man]

We are not being told the true story of why the Somali's are grabbing ships for ransom and why various governments aren't doing jack about the situation. It basically because they don't want the TRUTH to be told about what they are doing to Somali's water, coast, and people.

www.hiiraan.com/comments2-news-2008-jun-somali_pirates_demand_ransom.aspx

European and Asian shipping firms have been dumping spectacular loads of toxic and nuclear waste material into the seas surrounding Somalia.
Nobody seems to be talking about that, now, do they?

The dumping's been going on for some time. Swiss and Italian firms apparently contracted with Somali warlords in the early 90's to provide for the dumping of waste along the coast. Those firms were later revealed to be shell companies set up by larger industrial concerns to find places to get rid of waste. And what waste! Radioactive waste, hospital waste, chemical wastes, cadmium, uranium, mercury and lead.
During the 2004 tsunami, rafts of cracked barrels filled with the most toxic shit imaginable washed up on shore all along the length of Somalia's very long coast. Lots of people were sickened, lots of people died. And the life of the waters off the coast has been catastrophically affected, throughout the height of the water column, in one of the most biodiverse marine areas on Earth. Fisheries have collapsed, and in fact whole communities of marine organisms have been destroyed. The coastal population of Somali people has seen one of its few reliable food sources disappear, in addition to being swarmed by tumors and having their fingers fall off.
Warlords and pirates, in addition to attacking shipping vessels in the area, have also been targetting illegal fishing boats. Since Somalia has no central government, and thus no coastal patrols, illegal fishing has been raking the coasts clean of fish for twenty years, leading to further population collapses and ecological annihilation.
Who knows exactly how disingenuous the pirates are being when they propose to use millions of dollars to help coastal populations, but a question worth posing is this: who else is going to make any protest of this kind of business-as-usual?

 

[editec]

Oh it's quite apparent that many here think that it's moral to steal from people who have more than you.

I didn't say it was moral.

I merely suggested that starving people are inclined to eschew moral considerations in favor of more immediate considerations like not starving to death.

I suppose that were I in some kind of extrme situation where I had the choice of stealing or starving, I'd be inclined to steal, too.

If you're not wired that way, then la te fucking da and a gold star in citizenship for you.

 

[Chris]

Ohh you can do it just fine, we are just not willing to do it. Personally I do not give one good god damn about Somali pirates or the supposed "innocents" that would die solving the problem.

Time to send in some Q ships.

Q ships!

I love it!

I had forgotten about Q ships!

 

[Sunni Man]

The world is only talking about the pirates and the money involved.

Meanwhile, there has been something else going on and it has been going on for years. There are many dumpings made in our sea, so much rubbish.

It is dumped in our seas and it washes up on our coastline and spreads into our area.

A few nights ago, some tanks came out from the high sea and they cracked it seems and now they are leaking into the water and into the air.

The first people fell ill yesterday afternoon. People are reporting mysterious illnesses; they are talking about it as though it were chicken pox - but it is not exactly like that either. Their skin is bad. They are sneezing, coughing and vomiting.

This is the first time it has been like this; that people have such very, very bad sickness.

The people who have these symptoms are the ones who wake early, before it is light, and herd their livestock to the shore to graze. The animals are sick from drinking the water and the people who washed in the water are now suffering.

We are people who live in a very remote town and here, we are isolated; we only rely on God.

This town is close to the sea. It is a very old town which has a mixture of Somali clans. It is not big but it has a well-knit community.

Our community used to rely on fishing. But now no-one fishes. You see, a lot of foreign ships were coming and they were fishing heavily - their big nets would wipe out everything, even the fishermen's equipment. They could not compete.

So the people here began farming and keeping greater numbers of livestock. Like in any other Somali town, all one can do is rely on oneself.

But now we have these medical hazards.

What can we do about it?

BBC NEWS | Africa | 'World only cares about pirates'

 

[Anguille]

Oh I'm inclined to understand Aguille's point.

Somalia is derperately poor, and sailing right paid that horrible poverty is the wealth of the world.

If many of us were Somalis, I suspect some of us might be hoisting the Jolly Roger ourselves.

The early Colonists were notorious for it along the New England coast. They were even more brutal. They used to lure the ships towards dangerous rocks with torches and make off with the goods that washed up on shore after the shipwreck.

 

[Anguille]

Oh it's quite apparent that many here think that it's moral to steal from people who have more than you.

You guys don't call it stealing anymore, remember? We taught you it's called redistribution of wealth.

hahahahaha!!!

Now hand over the gold bullion, yahrrrrr!

 

[Anguille]

The world is only talking about the pirates and the money involved.

Meanwhile, there has been something else going on and it has been going on for years. There are many dumpings made in our sea, so much rubbish.

It is dumped in our seas and it washes up on our coastline and spreads into our area.

A few nights ago, some tanks came out from the high sea and they cracked it seems and now they are leaking into the water and into the air.

The first people fell ill yesterday afternoon. People are reporting mysterious illnesses; they are talking about it as though it were chicken pox - but it is not exactly like that either. Their skin is bad. They are sneezing, coughing and vomiting.

This is the first time it has been like this; that people have such very, very bad sickness.

The people who have these symptoms are the ones who wake early, before it is light, and herd their livestock to the shore to graze. The animals are sick from drinking the water and the people who washed in the water are now suffering.

We are people who live in a very remote town and here, we are isolated; we only rely on God.

This town is close to the sea. It is a very old town which has a mixture of Somali clans. It is not big but it has a well-knit community.

Our community used to rely on fishing. But now no-one fishes. You see, a lot of foreign ships were coming and they were fishing heavily - their big nets would wipe out everything, even the fishermen's equipment. They could not compete.

So the people here began farming and keeping greater numbers of livestock. Like in any other Somali town, all one can do is rely on oneself.

But now we have these medical hazards.

What can we do about it?

BBC NEWS | Africa | 'World only cares about pirates'

Thanks. There are always two, (at least two) sides to a story.

 

[dilloduck]

You guys don't call it stealing anymore, remember? We taught you it's called redistribution of wealth.

hahahahaha!!!

Now hand over the gold bullion, yahrrrrr!

Sorry--I think you have more than I so tis I who will be stealing from you.-------( I mean redistributing your stuff).

 

[Anguille]

Sorry--I think you have more than I so tis I who will be stealing from you.-------( I mean redistributing your stuff).

Good luck to you. I'm happy to share my lack of a Walmart plasma tv with you because I couldn't even afford the stampede sale price. Maybe together we can afford the converter for my 5 inch portable I found on trash day 12 years ago.
Be forewarned though, I will be plucking your feathers for a down duvet.

 

[editec]

We are not being told the true story of why the Somali's are grabbing ships for ransom and why various governments aren't doing jack about the situation. It basically because they don't want the TRUTH to be told about what they are doing to Somali's water, coast, and people.

www.hiiraan.com/comments2-news-2008-jun-somali_pirates_demand_ransom.aspx

European and Asian shipping firms have been dumping spectacular loads of toxic and nuclear waste material into the seas surrounding Somalia.
Nobody seems to be talking about that, now, do they?

The dumping's been going on for some time. Swiss and Italian firms apparently contracted with Somali warlords in the early 90's to provide for the dumping of waste along the coast. Those firms were later revealed to be shell companies set up by larger industrial concerns to find places to get rid of waste. And what waste! Radioactive waste, hospital waste, chemical wastes, cadmium, uranium, mercury and lead.
During the 2004 tsunami, rafts of cracked barrels filled with the most toxic shit imaginable washed up on shore all along the length of Somalia's very long coast. Lots of people were sickened, lots of people died. And the life of the waters off the coast has been catastrophically affected, throughout the height of the water column, in one of the most biodiverse marine areas on Earth. Fisheries have collapsed, and in fact whole communities of marine organisms have been destroyed. The coastal population of Somali people has seen one of its few reliable food sources disappear, in addition to being swarmed by tumors and having their fingers fall off.
Warlords and pirates, in addition to attacking shipping vessels in the area, have also been targetting illegal fishing boats. Since Somalia has no central government, and thus no coastal patrols, illegal fishing has been raking the coasts clean of fish for twenty years, leading to further population collapses and ecological annihilation.
Who knows exactly how disingenuous the pirates are being when they propose to use millions of dollars to help coastal populations, but a question worth posing is this: who else is going to make any protest of this kind of business-as-usual?

Interesting, Sunni.

I wasn't aware of that.

Doesn't surpise me though.

The third world AND the poorer parts of America, too are becoming toxic waste dump zones.

Maine is rapidly becoming the dump site for industrial garbage from Boston and points south, for example.

Perhaps I ought to consider a career move into piracy.

Lord knows publishing isn't making me very jolly.

 

[Sunni Man]

One Woman's Fight to Rescue the Environment

Akwe Amosu

Somalia lost many things as a result of having no government for over a decade during the 90s, but one of the least obvious was an ability to protect its environment.

With no authority in Mogadishu to defend fish stocks, fragile coral reefs and already slender tree resources, it has been open season for international companies and private individuals to exploit and pollute as they wish. Waste dumping on Somalia's coast soared, as did the flushing of ship's waste tanks; in the north-east of the country, precious and scarce old-growth acacia trees were cut down by armed groups to make charcoal for export to the middle-east; environmental degradation and desertification intensified throughout the decade.

But one woman has been of critical importance in Somalia's environmental crisis. Now in her mid-fifties, Fatima Jibrell has made it her life's work to fight back. She founded the Horn of Africa Relief and Development Organization (Horn Relief) in the early 1990s and also coordinates the Resource Management Somali Network (RMSN), which includes environmental groups throughout the Horn of Africa.

We lived in this environment where we did not really need money. But the invention of money has created greedy mega-companies in Europe to come - and the European Union subsidizes these ships - to come to our coasts to suck out the marine resources, destroy the reefs. They are also doing waste-dumping.

I don't know how badly that waste is, but I am telling you, we stopped swimming in the sea. Last time I went in, I came out with patches of blue, black and green and it took me six months to get that off from my skin. I had to collect it and take it to labs in Kenya to find out whether it is an extreme toxic or not. Most of it is tar.

The ships, when they looted fish, and after they did their waste dumping, also flushed their cleaning system into our coast so they do not have to pay money on their coasts to do that. They do not want to use the system set up in their own ports.

So that's what got me. And that's why a lot of fish are coming out dead. People are getting suspicious and stopping fishing altogether, because they think everything is poisoned.

We cannot let the international world sack our resources, destroy our environment and say "No you have to stay in that destroyed environment, you cannot share the wealth that we took to Europe and America." And at the same time they are saying: "Hey, you Muslims are becoming Bin Ladens. We have to monitor you. You should close Muslim schools, because you are graduating Osamas." What alternatives do people have, when they have been made very, very angry and frustrated?

We are the biggest market for the guns made by Europe. Our charcoal and fisheries are being sacked by Europe and Arabia and we are becoming the wastebaskets of Europe. What do they expect us to do? We are people. We have brains. We will swim, we will come to Europe, we will be sent back and we will keep coming to Europe and Arabia. The only safe way for them and for us is to leave our environment intact and leave us alone.

One Woman's Fight to Rescue the Environment

 

[Anguille]

Sorry--I think you have more than I so tis I who will be stealing from you.-------( I mean redistributing your stuff).

BTW dillo, you should have mugged me BEFORE I bought this message board.

 

[editec]

The early Colonists were notorious for it along the New England coast. They were even more brutal. They used to lure the ships towards dangerous rocks with torches and make off with the goods that washed up on shore after the shipwreck.

Not just in New England, but yes, that is somewhat similar to what I suspect is happening in Somalia.