Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Pirates undeterred?
CNN is reporting that Somali pirates have attacked another ship flying the flag of the United States, this time unsuccessfully. If true, it invites again the question, why has our deterrence, which prevented pirate attacks on American-flagged ships since the Jefferson administration, failed? This is the crucial question posed by the Maersk Alabama episode. This is the question to which the public ought to address itself.
To repeat myself to the point of tedium, there are only two ways to defeat piracy: Deterrence (the prevention of the attack because of the threat of retaliation that outweighs the possible benefits) and interdiction (the blocking of the attack by intervention at the moment, either by escort or self-defense).
Interdiction as a method of preventing piracy is enormously expensive and would tie down the navies of the United States and other civilized countries at chokepoints all over the world. The alternative, arming merchant ships to the teeth and training their crews in anti-piracy tactics, seems both inadequate and risky in and of itself.
We are therefore left with deterrence, which appears to have failed in the case of the American flag.
The problem, of course, is that deterrence only works against people who have enough to lose that they would prefer to keep what they have than bet it for the possibiliity of booty. Pirates do not have enough to lose to be conservative in the placing of such bets. Put differently, if these people were not pirates, what sort of miserable lives would they lead? The United States can change the piracy cost-benefit calculation, but only by guaranteeing that each pirate attack, whether successful or not, will result in disproportionately high damage to pirates and their allies. That means retaliation beyond interdiction.
If there is an alternative response that will stop piracy, somebody should offer it in the comments.
25 Comments:
By 
Escort81, at
Wed Apr 15, 02:27:00 AM:
TH, I am up late and just "pushed the button" on my TurboTax filing, and saw the reports you have blogged on. (I did not override key sections, unlike our Sec. Treasury, from the great Class of 1983 at, er, Dartmouth.)
Anyway, is it possible that what we have (in terms of the pirate footsoldiers) are essentially relatively young East African gangbangers with AKs, RPGs and sat phones, all high on khat? Is it possible that they cannot even differentiate among flags or identify a particular flag, and are also illiterate (and therefore cannot read the transom, displaying the ship name and country of registry)? That is, all they see is a ship that is worth trying to hijack. They may take their marching orders from someone older and literate, sipping a beverage back on the "mothership" and handling the books, but the actual boarding parties are daring, not without skills, and sadly easily replaceable. But I don't think any Somali pirates will say to themselves (for example) "oh, they are flying a German flag, we'd better not touch them." So it is not as if one country can deter attacks on its vessels. It is truly an international problem.
The AP story which ran late on 4/14 was headlined: "Ending Somali piracy: few options for US forces."
By 
, at
Wed Apr 15, 02:33:00 AM:
Self defense is cheaper than having the navy patrolling at a higher tempo. Attacking and rehabilitating Somalia will be infinitely more costly in blood and treasure than arming merchants.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 04:55:00 AM:
I respectfully say humbug.
The navies of the world exist. It isn't much more expensive to use them for intradiction than to keep them on other duties.
If navies aren't useful for dealing with pirates then why do nations keep sending a few naval ships to the area and occasionally actually engage the pirates?
It is the politicians of the world who won't fight the pirates. That is the fact.
Saying the navies are too busy or not equipped properly or too expensive is the sort of tripe politicians use for cover.
Don't talk to me about the extra cost of interdiction while our governments spend thousands of billions of $ - that translates to trillions of $ - on idiotic schemes that produce no known benefit to anyone.
Schemes which are so out of control that no one knows where the money eventually goes.
By Andrew Hofer, at
Wed Apr 15, 05:55:00 AM:
You probably didn't mean this, but "poverty causes piracy?"
I don't think so. I think we will find these are reasonably well-financed and centrally orchestrated gangs. The stepped up attacks may, in fact, be a test of the new administration's will or an attempt by Al Qaeda-like organizations to do just what you suggest, tying down our military in global interdiction.
In any event, your logic about credible deterrence holds.
By Neil Sinhababu, at
Wed Apr 15, 07:14:00 AM:
I agree about the impossibility of interdiction -- the ocean is big and it would be prohibitively expensive to patrol everywhere or escort everybody.
Matt Yglesias argued a while ago that the best way to deal with pirates is to make them unwelcome on land. Eventually they have to come to shore somewhere and get supplies without getting arrested by the authorities. One of the reasons that you don't get piracy in other parts of the world is that governments generally stand together against pirates, whatever differences they might have on other issues.
Somalia, however, is basically in a state of anarchy, so nobody's out there arresting the pirates. If there's a way to stabilize Somalia in some fashion or another, that would be a big help. Of course, prospects for doing that in the short term aren't especially good. But maybe something will come along down the line.
By Dr. Sanity, at
Wed Apr 15, 07:43:00 AM:
You do not achieve behavioral modification by just one behavioral intervention--especially if there is reason to believe that the intervention (in this case, the Navy shooting the pirates who held an American hostage)is not an ongoing policy, but an aberration. You may be correct in your analysis of the pirate's having nothing to lose; but I suspect they don't believe the US is really committed to deterrence under Obama. It may take multiple "behavioral interventions" of the sort just completed with the Maersk Alabama for them to believe.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 09:25:00 AM:
Not only is their an alternative solution, it is the only real solution, namely, the state of anarchy must be stopped in Somalia and economic conditions improved. The guys on these boats are just teenages and probably don't know the difference between the United States and the United Arab Emirates.
But I also don't believe interdiction is as hard as everyone makes it out to be. The first mate of the Maersk stated they had been attacked over a period of 5 days, and in many cases these ships are attacked repeatedly or can see that trouble is coming. I don't see that it would be so difficult to have a carrier in the region that could project air power within a matter of minutes to any American (or possibly other countries') distress calls.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 09:47:00 AM:
Begin shelling the coastline whenever there the problem gets too tiresome. This really isn't a big deal. There is no "defeating" pirates, the criminal underclass of a stateless society. There is only a convincing argument that they need to move inland and bother other people. Eventually, there own neighbors in Gul or wherever they live will slaughter them, out of a desire to resume fishing and end the shelling. This shouldn't take two minutes for anyone to figure out-- Deterrence is the only answer.
By Georg Felis, at
Wed Apr 15, 11:13:00 AM:
In short, the answer here lies not in interdiction OR deterrence, but in interdiction AND deterrence.
Brings me to one of my pet projects. What would be so hard about building a smaller “jeep” type carrier on a cruiser hull, which would have several dozen armed Predator drones onboard? With long-duration drones and rotation, it could keep tabs on a dozen or more merchants over hundreds of miles, and with satellite drone control, you don’t have to keep a full crew of drone pilots onboard. And one Hellfire missile into a pirate boat is about right.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 11:39:00 AM:
It's one thing to think about and recognize root causes, which are almost always moot, and another to tame them, no matter what a noble endeavor that may be.
So seek out the root causes of poverty and anarchy all you want, I will applaud your efforts.
But piracy is also a tactical problem. It is here and now, and we should beat it down if we can even if getting at the root causes takes a generation or two.
My apologies for the following. I wrote it elsewhere, but as the days have passed and I have considered other viewpoints, I think these thoughts still stand ok. I'm not saying it is the answer, but it may be worth trying as an experiment on some ships.
Two little things seem true.
1. There is no solution to the piracy problem that does not involve some injustice to someone, at least there will be no universal agreement that the outcome was just.
2. Naval assets are insufficiently dense to solve the problem by themselves. Right now a single hostage situation is sucking assets and leaving other areas uncovered and undefended.
Taking a lesson from the unconventional war in Iraq, I think part of the solution involves enlisting the locals, in the case the ship crews, to multiply the force available to deter the attacks.
To that end I wonder whether the crews should be given the means, and the incentive to defend their ships. The means should include tools, tactical advisors, and longer term, training. For an incentive I suggest a bounty fund, say $250,000 payable in equal shares to ship's crew for each pirate killed or captured in the defense of their ship. The safe keeping of the tools on port visits doesn't seem like a show stopper, though perhaps for some shipping companies giving the crew access to weapons may not be appealing.
M.E.
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Wed Apr 15, 11:51:00 AM:
TH: "That means retaliation beyond interdiction."
Okay, TH, how do you do that? The world won't use food as a weapon. Many of the sea raiders these days are bandits from the interior of the country. Many of the money men probably live in Europe* or in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf.
(*Example: More than few top guys in Nigeria's crime syndicates have homes in France. They fly in and out of Lagos for quick meetings.)
By TOF, at
Wed Apr 15, 12:05:00 PM:
Having fought in a couple of wars, but none since 1985, the only long-term solution is to take them out. That means arming merchant ships; that means using naval forces to seek and destroy the so-called mother ships from which they operate. If they persist, take out their home ports.
The Law of the Sea is a worthless piece of paper without force backing it up.
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Wed Apr 15, 12:52:00 PM:
"If they persist, take out their home ports."
Would you shell Acapulco to get rid of Mexican drug cartels?
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 12:57:00 PM:
Simple method. Place a ring about the entire upper deck of the ships. The ring is six feet out from the hull. Their hooks will place ropes six feet out, unless they can climb vertical using only hands and feet while being sprayed with water they are not boarding.
And yeah, the occasional salvo of naval gunfire into the port to piss off the angry ants there is appropriate. You have to realize that no one in that port is above making a living off the pirates. When a cup of tea is $15, the economy is dependent on piracy. Make that dependence hurt.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 01:32:00 PM:
Not knowing much about this tactically other than the ships are really large, and the crews really small, with jobs to do, there's a lot of unprotected areas at all times that enable the random grappling hook and resulting attack.
Thus, the only real solution is to lay down the law of a zone around the ships. Stay back, or come prepared to swim home. Arm the ships, and include appropriate weaponry that can sink threatening vessals. Pirates captured should be summarily executed, to avoid future screwing around with them.
The risk/reward has strongly favored these guys up until now. The only way to deter it is to raise the stakes. Kill enough, and you might bring out more brazen or hardened 'pirates', but it'll certainly reduce the expectation of an easy haul.
If they raise the stakes, then look at Naval solutions. But IMO, this matter really should tie up military assets. Those guys have more important things to do.
Finally, if we determine that there's some centralized hand at work, take a pass over them with one of our "UFOs" and drop something large and explosive on them, just to remind them that they're tugging on Superman's cape.
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 01:33:00 PM:
I meant to say "should NOT" tie up Naval assets ... not at this point anyway.
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Wed Apr 15, 01:44:00 PM:
Intentionally targeting civilians by the military is a war crime, Moody Deep Thinker. And I'm not talking about the "liberal" definition of war crime. I'm talking about the "conservative" definition.
For better or worse, things have changed since the 19th-century Anglo-Burmese Wars.
The "blow-everybody-up" approach is useless in the current debate.
By Dawnfire82, at
Wed Apr 15, 02:32:00 PM:
Blockade. 100 miles of 'grace' area (for fishers and the like), and everything else is subject to search and seizure. Run the blockade, you get sunk.
You could probably even get the Somali 'government' to sign off on it.
There's your interdiction + deterrence.
What is lacking is the will to do anything about it. Maybe the French (who seized another batch of pirates today) will man up and put us to shame.
That's what ended the Barbary threat you know... the European monarchies were completely embarrassed that the upstart, weakling United States in distant America moved to strike the pirates and defend their interests while the Europeans were paying tribute.
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Wed Apr 15, 02:56:00 PM:
Officials say the length of Somalia's coast is 1,800 miles, Dawnfire82. Is an effective blockade possible and cost-effective?
By Georg Felis, at
Wed Apr 15, 03:06:00 PM:
DF82, that presumes Europeans can still be embarrassed. Good luck.
By Dawnfire82, at
Wed Apr 15, 03:39:00 PM:
DEC: With modern technology, I believe so. Warships move faster and for longer periods of time than in the past, (able to cover more territory per ship) and have radar, sonar, and aerial assets including UAVs, helicopters, and satellite imagery. Carrier participation would add fixed wing aircraft. There is no pirate vessel able to outshoot even the lightest US escort, so there would be no need to double or triple up ships, like naval blockaders used to do.
Also, it would not be necessary to hermetically seal the entire coastline, especially with the presence of armed escorts already in the waters. There are better places for pirates to hunt for lone ships, and worse places, depending on bottlenecks, traffic, currents, the presence of their own harbors and the range of their ships. Focus on the better places.
Dirty tricks could be used as well. Purposefully under-patrol a certain area with surface vessels, but watch it with attack submarines for example. A few submarine ambushes would put the fear of God into blockade runners.
As for cost effective: Naturally, a focused use of naval assets would cost more than routine use. At the very least, some of the crews would probably qualify for hostile fire pay. But we have more ships than we honestly know what to do with. Our naval power outstrips the rest of the world's *combined*. And we've got to pay them (the sailors) whether they're in Somalia or the South China Sea.
Given the extreme size of the federal budget, the additional monetary costs would be negligible.
Also, it's possible (though I wouldn't really bet on it) that we could convince other powers to foot some of the bill, seeing as how we'd essentially be providing a public good. The Gulf Arabs might be up to writing a check. I'm sure they're tired of worrying about their oil getting hijacked.
In my opinion, the idea solution would be to identify the pirate vessels, raid their harbors, burn their docks, seize their ships, and hang them. But, as you mentioned, the governments of the world are a lot wussier now than they used to be, so I instead advise a blockade.
If there are any naval officers out there with something to add or contradict, please feel free.
By Escort81, at
Wed Apr 15, 05:13:00 PM:
I like DF82's idea, and would respectfully suggest using the term "establishing a cordon" instead of "blockade" -- channelling my inner JFK during the Cuban Missile Crisis, who also did not want to use that term. Really, you aren't doing a blockade, since that term connotes sealing off a coast from otherwise legitmate economic activity and shipping in and out of its ports as a means of applying leverage against an established government. Since there is no established government and very little legitimate economic activity (except for coastal fisherman who go out of and return to the same port), the term might not really apply.
To DEC's point about the size of the coastline, my understanding of it is that very little of it is actually usable. There are a relative handful of ports that have sufficient resources and infrastructure to act as resupply points for the motherships. It is quite difficult to stay at sea (even along the coast) for extended periods of time without regular resupply, and it can't always be shuttled out. The sea is a harsh environment, and Murphy is king -- things always go wrong and equipment breaks down. So, obviously focus on the key ports with a watchful eye for other new locations.
The sub idea is really thinking outside of the box! I assume you are thinking of a fast attack sub and not one of the SSBNs. I happened to see an attack sub surfaced and running south at about 15 knots last week as I was about to land at Ft. Lauderdale airport -- it is quite a fearsome sight. It is rare to see that, but I can only guess it was headed to Key West and wanted to get there fast and make itself known.
By Dawnfire82, at
Wed Apr 15, 05:28:00 PM:
"I assume you are thinking of a fast attack sub and not one of the SSBNs."
Of course. That's why I specified 'attack cubs.'
I wanted to give a link to this article.
The pirates apparently not only know the US flag (of course... who doesn't?) but intend to attack them on purpose and massacre their crews.
You think that would put a little fire in the belly of the Obama administration?
By , at
Wed Apr 15, 06:21:00 PM:
Many good points:
1) Dr. Sanity's truth about behavioral modification. The pirates won't change fast, they haven't been hurt enough for long enough.
The Somali pirates have every reason to believe we - that is the nations as a set - will lose interest and not do much.
2) Eds first point is right:
"There is no solution to the piracy problem that does not involve some injustice to someone, at least there will be no universal agreement that the outcome was just."
No free lunch, there Will be collateral damage when force is used.
3) And several correctly note that massive retaliation against Somali ports might work but it is not politically acceptable.
Administer the most harsh and dangerous medicine last. Try the others first.
4) True, Interdiction - that is fighting the problem at sea - is expensive and difficult. But I doubt that anyone really knows how well it would work.
It must be an international effort. The US would be seriously strained in trying it alone. And there is no reason to do so. All nations dislike piracy and many can contribute some resources.
Taste the pudding of serious interdiction. Don't keep debating how it must taste. Find out.
5) Don't be gulled by the mantra that we cannot patrol the entire world. We don't need to.
The problem is off East Africa and based in Somalia.
When enough pirates die and rewards become rare Somali piracy will end. It is irrelevant that piracy is not unknown in other seas. Or that it may reappear in the future.
5) True. An effective Somali government would diminish the power of the pirates. But flying pigs could also deliver themselves to butchers.
Keep trying to stabilize and rationalize Somalia. Meanwhile do not limit other anti-piracy efforts. One does not exclude the other.
6) Arming merchant ships is fine. It won't happen if international law keeps everyone uncertain about what is permitted in self defense.
Shippers will choose to pay ransoms rather than to go to jail for shooting at attackers.
Armed merchant ships and their must be given the benefit of any doubts after defending themselves. That protection can only come from the political realm.
K
By Escort81, at
Wed Apr 15, 06:30:00 PM:
DF82 Re: flag ID, I stand corrected. The Somali pirates evidently have that knowledge. As DEC implies, it may be wrong to underestimate their sophistication (and financing), at least at the more senior levels, such as the 25 year-old quoted in your link. The shock troops may not be as up to speed, but how hard is it for them to get on the VHF or sat phone and describe what they see?
The good news, sort of, is that there are not that many U.S. flagged vessels out there, especially in that part of the world (partly because of the Jones Act). The U.S. flagged vessels that are out there in that patch of water should have one of your subs cruising nearby -- that would be video I would pay to watch when that thing surfaced.
It will be interesting to see what the Obama administration does. The real recommendations, of course, will come upstream from the Pentagon and the Navy, and then the White House will make a decision. But it is no so bad if the White House "gets out of the way" and picks one of the plans the Navy sets forth.
And I though everyone was going to like us after Jan. 20. Now we have this character Ismail in Harardhere (from your link) indirectly calling out a the son of a late but prominent member of the Luo tribe in Kenya, who happens to be the CINC for a reasonably significant military force. It is almost as if we are going backwards in time to a point before nation-states.
