[Author’s Note: I published the following commentary originally on November 20, 2008. I trust it will be self-evident why I’ve decided to republish it in light of the drama unfolding today between the crew of the US-flagged Maersk and Somali pirates.
For the record, despite American reporters covering it as if the Marines were invading Somalia to avenge Black Hawk Down, this hijacking is no more dynamic an event than a Sunday afternoon game of miniature golf. Admittedly the stakes are higher. But after a long and uneventful standoff, it will end as routinely as hundreds of other Somali hijackings on the high seas have ended in recent months: with the payment of a hefty ransom for the release of the US hostage(s). There will be denials all around about this payment of course.
Ironically, just days ago President Obama telegraphed America’s inability to deter these hijackings when, in answer to a question about how he intends to change its foreign policy, he conceded that America is like a big tanker that cannot change course on a dime. Because the reason many of these tankers are so vulnerable is that they do not have the speed or maneuverabilty to escape. And that they are invariably “required” to travel in this region unarmed makes them sitting ducks.
Therefore, one wonders what the US hopes to accomplish by deploying a huge war ship to take on the Somalis in their dinghies. Talk about taking a sledge hammer to a fly…. And no one is more cognizant of the fecklessness of US Naval forces in this respect than the owners of the Maersk – who have reportedly asked them to back off so that they can pay the ransom and get on with their business.
Meanwhile, the US Navy must be incensed that this rag-tag band of pirates is not only causing it to mobilize for such utter futility but also inciting so much hysteria back home.]
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Given the success of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, people all over the world can be forgiven for thinking that the pirates of Africa are emulating Disney’s fictional character, Captain Jack Sparrow.
In reality, CNN and other American news organizations are enjoying a ratings bonanza this week reporting on the daring exploits of pirates who are terrorizing the shipping lanes off the east coast of Africa.
But conspicuously absent from their reporting is the fact that the United States is primarily responsible for spawning this modern-day piracy. After all, virtually all of these real-life Jack Sparrows hail from Somalia – the country on the horn of Africa that the US military left as a failed state after its infamous Black Hawk Down fiasco.
Recall that over 28,000 US soldiers intervened in Somalia in December 1992. They did so ostensibly to drive out the fractious warlords who were keeping this chronically poor and drought-stricken country mired in civil strife and thwarting a UN humanitarian mission there.
Soon, however, even starving Somalis – who were caught in the crosshairs of warlord warfare – turned on the Americans. Specifically, US soldiers were so brutal and indiscriminate in their attempts to impose law and order that Somalis eventually regarded them not as liberators but as neo-colonialists.
(Not surprisingly, a similar war strategy incited ordinary citizens to join a militant insurgency against US forces in Iraq a decade later….)
But it had to have been an innately belligerent nationalism that compelled ordinary Somalis to engage American Special Forces in a fateful battle in the Somali capital of Mogadishu. And even though hundreds of them were killed, it was only after the Somalis shot down an American Black Hawk helicopter and dragged the captured soldiers through the streets that the US withdrew in utter humiliation reminiscent of Vietnam.
This of course explains why the Somali pirates have been able to roam the high seas all these years with relative impunity. Indeed, nothing demonstrates the sense of invincibility they developed from this notorious battle quite like their jingoistic reaction to the movie, Black Hawk Down, which depicted their David vs. Goliath feat:
As you can see, Somalis are brave fighters… If the Americans come back to fight us, we shall defeat them again. Let them try again. They’ll be making more films about us when we defeat them like we did that day.
In fact, Somali pirates have been hijacking everything from luxury liners to cargo ships off the eastern coast of Africa for over a decade. Moreover, they’ve been demanding, and getting, a king’s ransom in almost every case.
But it wasn’t until they hijacked a Saudi supertanker this week, which was hauling over $100 million worth of crude oil bound for the US, that their piracy became headline news in this country. Yet nothing demonstrates the sense of vulnerability the Americans developed after the battle of Mogadishu quite like the way they have reacted to this hijacking.
Because instead of vowing to take on the pirates, Pentagon officials have advised vessels passing through these treacherous waters to hire mercenaries (like those of the trigger-happy Blackwater group who provide security for most officials in Iraq) to defend them. No doubt the Saudis will simply pay the $25 million ransom and hope for better luck next time.
Frankly, I fear that this war on piracy will prove even less effective than the war on drugs. Not least because Somalia has become such a rogue state, where a pirate’s booty seems the only measure of success, that piracy provides the only means of gainful employment for millions of young men. And, unfortunately, after the US’s spectacular failure, no country (not even NATO, the UN or the AU) is foolish enough to intervene to try to impose law and order in this God forsaken country.
On the other hand, it does smack of a Disney farce to see the British and Russians deploying their war ships to confront these seafaring pirates in their dinghies on the high seas.
At any rate, it behooves President-elect Barack Obama to appreciate that leaving Iraq as a failed state (by withdrawing too soon) will spawn thousands of wannabe Jack Sparrows who will perpetrate acts of piracy in the Persian Gulf that make those the Somalis are perpetrating in the Gulf of Aden seem like a day at the beach.
NOTE: Reports are that Somali pirates are currently demanding ransom for the release of 17 ships and over 300 hostages.
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