Obama Declares War on Piracy. Yeah, Right!

In previous commentaries, I have criticized President Obama for adopting many of the war-on-terror tactics, like renditioning and wiretapping, that he condemned President Bush for deploying. However, my criticism stemmed not from his (sensible and pragmatic) adoption of these tactics, but from his cynical attempts to pretend otherwise.

Now he’s further undermining his credibility by making this patently disingenuous declaration of war on piracy. After all, not only is it every bit as foolhardy as Bush’s war on terror; but Obama knows full well that America is neither willing nor able to combat piracy on the High Seas. Not to mention that the international community is even less willing or able to do so.

But, for a little perspective, never mind Bush:  just consider that Obama’s declaration of war on piracy is about as serious, and will have about as much success, as Reagan’s declaration of war on drugs, which has never seemed more hopeless than it does today.

Mind you, I can appreciate Obama praising the Navy Seals who took out those three pirates on Sunday.  But hitting sitting ducks in a lifeboat tethered to a US war ship – even in the most challenging conditions – does not a war strategy make: a point the Somali pirates demonstrated in spades by hijacking four more ships within hours after this incident.

Meanwhile, does it matter to anyone that these pirates were probably just teenagers sent out to do the dirty work of Somali warlords; i.e., the way drug dealers often send out inner-city kids to sell drugs?  And, how credible is it that, after five days of holding the American captain of the Maersk hostage (and repeatedly threatening to kill him), they suddenly showed deadly intent? Or it is more likely that these snipers were stalking their prey and took the first clear shot they had of all three pirates at once…?

At any rate, as I proffered almost six months ago in a commentary on this menace to the High Seas, the only way to combat piracy is to do in Somalia what Bush attempted to do in Iraq; i.e., build a bona fide democracy.  And even if this is the quixotic notion Obama has in mind, the precedent President Clinton set with his woeful attempt, which was dramatized in the movie Black Hawk Down, will make such an undertaking politically, perhaps even militarily, prohibitive.

In the meantime, it behooves us to appreciate what it portends that the only means of gainful employment for millions of Somali men is piracy….

Therefore, I submit that – until he can build a coalition of the willing to rebuild Somalia -Obama would do well to stop making threats he cannot possibly back up.  Instead, he should order ships flying the US flag to fortify and arm themselves to fend off these pirates in their dinghies, and let other countries deal with them in whatever way they deem appropriate.

After all, most ship owners were perfectly happy to pay ransom demands as a rite of passage off the coast of Somalia.  And, in fairness to the pirates, none of their hostages were ever harmed until the French used force in a bungled attempt to retake a seized yacht a few weeks ago. 

Not to mention that there seems little qualitative differences between paying millions in tolls to pirates on the High Seas and giving billions in aid to leaders of African kleptocracies, which has been the way rich countries have dealt with far too many countries in Africa for the past 50 years.

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Somali Pirates terrorizing High seas