April and the Return to Conflict.

Just to see if you're paying attention!

Piracy April 2009

April is the first full month of spring and just as life begins to bloom after a long winter of dormancy, the human pursuit of war stirs itself and becomes manifest amid to the pockets of disconnected societies. Piracy took center stage for a while this month as Americans celebrated the rescue of Captain Richard Phillips, just before they were forced to return to navel gazing and to consider national self-flagellation as a way to make amends for decisions made by the previous administration over the use of waterboarding to extract information from terror suspects.

While all this is going on, piracy has been on the rise for the first three months of 2009, with April now standing at 44 seizures of ships by pirates around the world. Galrahn of Information Dissemination, has two posts among many that focus on this problem. The first recounts the record set this month for pirate attacks.

Galrahn's final comments set the tone to backtrack and read the whole post and examine the accompanying map that illustrates the growing menace of global piracy.

Given how the pirates have picked up on modern technology, they are probably watching the weather just like the experts. In the case of piracy in the Strait of Malacca earlier this decade, the massive south east Asian tsunami played a major role in curbing the activity. One thing to watch for is a tsunami that could potentially hit one of these pirate cities and wipe out the boats used for piracy. Weather is a significant factor one should always keep an eye on.

Read more:
April a Record Month for Modern Piracy

In this second post, Galrahn offers several options that have an historic ring that will leave an astute reader humming the Marines Hymn.

From the Halls of Montezuma,
To the shores of Tripoli;
We fight our country's battles
In the air, on land, and sea.....

This analysis assumes that if the policy regarding the use of military power stays at the current level, which is in essence ineffective despite current record levels of international naval assistance (which will dwindle in the weeks ahead), the problem will get worse as the weather improves over the next few months and the Obama administration will see its leadership credibility globally erode. This is a potentially debatable position, but history does not suggest ineffective action in the face of serious security problems that are only getting worse leads to good things.

This raises the question, if we know the diplomatic efforts are going to take a long time to develop, what tactical actions should the Obama administration approve for the military to buy time for the long term Somalia policy to form? This analysis looks at three possibilities: engage from the air, engage on land, and engage at sea.

Read the whole post to see what tactic Galrahn favors in this well thought out essay.
Tactical Options for Fighting Somali Pirates


As a nation we struggle to swat away at the bees that seem to sting us at will while our elected officials dither in a return to hyper-divided politics along two fault lines. Big war industrial vs the COIN advocates and ideologues who demand prosecution for past sins vs let's do anything short of pulling fingernails to protect the country. The idea of redirecting the country efforts will take a consensus of agreement like those worked out by such visionary leaders as Theodore Roosevelt, FDR, and Eisenhower. Many had high hopes that President Obama would be in the mold of these past leaders whom brought the experience of consensus building to the office. The ball is in his court as to see if he is able to keep the ideologues of both sides from tearing the country to shreds under his watch.

Meanwhile around the world, several countries have begun to redirect the focus of their national defense posture to reflect the changes that they perceive in the future. The following links take a brief look as some of the alignments by two of our allies and a troubling development by the hermit kingdom.

Great Britain

This short article by Isabel Oakeshott and Michael Smith, The Times looks at Britain's plan to focus on the future by adjusting her forces to confront the kinds of wars she has fought the past half century.

BRITAIN’S special forces are to be dramatically increased under plans being drawn up by the government.

John Hutton, the defence secretary, will this week signal radical reform of the armed forces in response to “lessons learnt” from the war in Afghanistan, where specialised units are seen to be playing a vital role.

Read more: SAS to Expand in Army Shake-up

Australia
Is also planning for contingencies as they encounter a new pallet of defense issues as noted in this article by Patrick Walters in The Australian.

Kevin Rudd is set to announce Australia's biggest military build-up since World War II, led by a multi-billion-dollar investment in maritime defence, including 100 new F-35 fighters, a doubling of the submarine fleet, and powerful new surface warships.

Read more:White Paper Orders Huge Military Build-up

In a companion piece, Patrick Walters takes a closer look at the proposed increase in Australian Naval power.

The naval and air power build-up is the key component in a more powerful defence force that the Prime Minister sees as essential to preserving Australia's security in a more turbulent world.
The white paper is the latest manifestation of Rudd's ambition for Australia to be able to act as a significant middle power in the Asia-Pacific region.

It is also a recognition that the power balances in our region are undergoing a historic shift with the rise of China and India.

Rudd understands that in a generation's time Beijing's formidably expanding military power could challenge the long-held military dominance of the US in east Asia with destabilising consequences for regional security.

Read more: Naval Boost a Bid for Regional Power

And finally, the hermit kingdom is again acting like a sociopathic step-child, who finds that when the focus seems to stray from providing them handouts, that banging nuclear fuel rods together brings the great powers running with armloads of goodies to sustain them until the warehouses are empty.

North Korea

This in from an article in the New York Times by CHOE SANG-HUN.

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea announced Saturday that it had begun reprocessing thousands of spent nuclear fuel rods, adding that it would use plutonium extracted from the rods to make nuclear weapons.

The announcement came hours after the United Nations Security Council placed three North Korean companies on a United Nations blacklist for aiding North Korea’s missile and nuclear programs.

Reading about them has become tedious, as they stick their proverbial thumb in the eye of the six powers and the UN.

Read it if you want: North Korea Says It Has Restarted Nuclear Work

Well, that should give any reader enough to contemplate and for most, drive them to flee to their favorite spring resting place to in bide in an adult beverage. Let us hope that We as a nation keep our eye on the ball and the future. It is not the wall we must worry about running into, it is the small things we can trip over. Looking back with a vengeful eye will cause us to trip and fall and break our neck over one of those small things in our path.

In the Finest Traditions of the United States Navy

The news this Easter Sunday that Captain Richard Phillips has been freed by the United States Navy and three of the pirates killed and one captured were executed in the finest traditions of the American Navy. Here is my initial take. We see a small group of trained men took direct action to end this first act of taking an American ship by pirates in two hundred years. The navies of the world have deployed to the region and so far have been less than successful in preventing pirates from taking their pickings of the thousands of ships that traverse those waters. My own take is that the real benefit beyond presenting an image of universal unity is an exercise that might be described as naval butt sniffing, where the world navies have a chance to sniff out each others operational methods. This awareness is leading to what Galrahn has described this way in his post Leveraging Success Going Forward.

If the US takes a deep breath and practices both patience and statesmanship, this situation will produce a framework for cooperation and mutual trust and confidence among the nations of what Tom Barnett calls the "Functioning Core." The US should do nothing that delivers the message that there is one set of rules for us and another for the rest of the world. Moreover, we have a chance to "lead from the edge" by actually listening and adopting the ideas of other nations. This is a priceless strategic opportunity that should not be wasted.

I have linked several posts that address suggestions for tackling this problem. Even though Somalia pirates are not a direct threat to our national security, they do impact our global community and at the same time as noted above offer us opportunities to move forward.

First a look at how this problem is growing.

Somali Pirates: A look since 2005

And now for solutions and comments

The US Must Speak so the Pirates Understand

An Indian Ocean “Influence Squadron” Forms

How to Beat the Somali Pirates

Piracy: The Only Solution

To get an idea of the number of ships in theatre is this order of battle provided by Information Dissemination from April 4, 2009. 5th Fleet Focus: Order of Battle.

The cost of maintaining this international fleet is in the billions and judging the level of continued piratical success is tactically a failure.

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Suggestions for dealing with this have ranged from convoys, small green water influence squadrons, to taking out the pirate bases. One idea floated was to station armed guards aboard ships transiting this region. This tactic was used during World War II when United States Navy Armed Guard was placed aboard merchant ships to protect against uboat and air threats.

[Steve Schippert] of threatswatch offers a similar view Somali Piracy: A Practical Solution -

Here is my opinion on this idea. If this tactic is adopted and modified to the conditions of this region, two things will be accomplished. First, and foremost any attempt to attack a ship would be met with the same kind of force that ended this latest act of piracy. Secondly, the cost of providing this protection would be lowered to levels that are sustainable to both the nations and the shipping companies. The true benefit would fall back to the common citizen who sees his tax dollars used more effectively and the cost of goods competitive.

Small teams could be inserted onto the ships as they approached the danger zone. The teams would have to be well armed with enough firepower to sink any of the small boats that are used to challenge them. In the same fashion of shotgun guards on stagecoaches in the 18th and 19th century they would become a known deterrent after the brigands become aware of the threat.

These teams would ride shotgun until the ship passes the danger zone and then are flown back or pick up a ride on a ship going the other way. The fear of arming crews would be eliminated as well as having weapons carried on board. This is no more dangerous than banks hiring armed guards to deter robbery.

This mission could be shared by the seafaring nations who could contribute their security teams under the mandate of the UN and following the time tested maritime rule that pirates be dealt with deadly force whenever encountered. The only time that conflict would occur is when the pirates attack. Small fishing boats or even pirate boats acting as fishing boats would be free from harm. The upshot of any successful attack would be that the pirates would insure themselves and their brethren a level of assured destruction in the response that world opinion would demand.

This leaves the pirates to prey on small craft which have been their bread and butter for the past two thousand years. Short of eliminating the pirate bases and entering into nation-building in a country with limited resources to sustain such an operation, we are faced with continuing to spend billions to police this vast area with limited results or find an effective way to make ships pirate proof with the add on measures described above.

World Police Blotter

One of the popular sections found in many local newspapers in the United States, used to be the "Crime Report" or "Police Blotter" that listed the crimes and police calls during the past week.

Today, in our global world, newspaper headlines and the blogs have taken on the same persona. A laundry list of crimes seem to have crowded war and economic woes off the front pages. To illustrate that point are the following stories. John Robb, author of the book Brave New War: The Next Stage of Terrorism and the End of Globalization, had this to say about Mexico in an interview with Danger Room, Inside the Brave New War, Part 1 » . "Groups like the Zetas are fighting a war to make Mexico ungovernable. They are taking stuff right out of the Al Qaeda in Iraq handbook. Video Executions. Beheadings. Assassination. Weakening the state. It’s the same as Iraq but in Mexico." Robbs thesis is.

That the shift from state-against-state conflicts to wars against small, ad hoc bands of like-minded insurgents will lead to a world with as many tiny armies as there are causes to fight for. Our new enemies are looking for gaps in vital systems where a small, cheap action—blowing up an oil pipeline or knocking out a power grid—will generate a huge return.

Much of the news below mirrors the scenarios that Robb predicted. The question is how the nations and people of the world unite to confront this new threat.

As we review our version of the "World Police Blotter" we begin by visiting Galrahn of Information Dissemination who writes this about the latest in confronting the pirate threat in the Horn of Africa.

His take on China being urged to join the fight.

I think that might be the smell of maturity. Just one more interesting footnote in what looks to be an evolving PLAN maritime strategy in the second part of 2008. They really are poised for a breakout into the blue next year. It will be interesting to watch, not just what they do, but how we react.
More.....PLA General: We Should Fight Pirates

And his comments on the the UN moving against piracy.

Yesterday (Dec. 2, 2008), the U.N. Security Council unanimously passed UNSCR 1846. From our perspective, the most significant aspect of this resolution is its inclusion of the Suppression of Unlawful Acts (SUA) clause. This clause, based on the United Nations Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Maritime Navigation, provides an immediately available instrument for logistically effective consequence delivery applicable to 78% of the world's States (those nations who have signed the Convention).

More....What A Cooperative Maritime Strategy Looks Like

Not to be left out the Washington Post's Peter Fromuth offers this.

Somali pirates hijack another boat -- or two or three -- every day despite the best efforts of the U.S. 5th Fleet, NATO, Russia, India and others. This is not new; pirates have been frustrating the mighty for at least 2,000 years -- since snatching Julius Caesar, then ransoming him for 50 talents, and leading Alexander the Great on a wild goose chase around the Mediterranean. As the U.N. Security Council grapples with Somali piracy, its members are in venerable company. Read the rest...Fighting Pirates - Washington Post opinion

Mumbai continues to lead with stories like the following.

President Asif Ali Zardari says his government has no concrete evidence of Pakistani involvement in the attacks, and American officials have not established a direct link to the government. But as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice landed in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, on Thursday morning, pressure was building on the government to confront the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which Indian and American officials say carried out the Mumbai attacks.
Read the whole story...Mumbai Attack Is Test of Pakistan’s Ability to Curb Militants - Jane Perlez and Somini Sengupta, New York Times

And as noted in an earlier post. Death closer to home should sweep away all concerns about pirates and Indo/Pak conflicts. My post Bloody Thanksgiving Weekend was no sooner posted when news came in that Tijuana suffered 37 murders over this past weekend.

The article by William Booth, in the Washington Post begins.

MEXICO CITY -- The death squads of the drug cartels are killing in spectacularly gruesome ways, using the violence as a language to deliver a message to society.

Increasingly, bodies show unmistakable signs of torture. Videos of executions are posted on the Internet, as taunts, as warnings. Corpses are dumped on playgrounds, with neatly printed notes beside them. And very often, the heads have been removed.

When someone rolled five heads onto the dance floor in a cantina in Michoacan state two years ago, even the most hardened Mexicans were shocked. Now ritual mutilations are routine. In the border city of Tijuana, 37 people were slain over the weekend, including four children. Nine of the adults were decapitated, including three police officers whose badges were stuffed in their mouths.

Note the same words used above, by John Robb, Video Executions. Beheadings. Assassination. Weakening the state. It’s the same as Iraq but in Mexico."

Read the whole story: Mexico Drug Cartels Send A Message of Chaos, Death - William Booth, Washington Post

Regarding this threat on our southern border, comes this welcome news.

Experts' Report Urges Changes in National Security System - Walter Pincus, Washington Post

Chief among its recommendations is merging the National Security and Homeland Security councils and creating a director for national security who would manage implementation of the president's policies rather than just coordinate the views of Cabinet members and present them to the president, as the national security adviser currently does.

And this from the New York Times.

The United States formally released on Wednesday the first part of a $400 million aid package to help Mexico fight drug trafficking, a sign of how much more involved the United States is becoming in Mexico’s brutal drug war.

Read the whole story....Money to Fight Drug Gangs Is Released to Mexico

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This article from the New York Times December 4, 2008 opens with this chilling introduction.

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TIJUANA, Mexico — The sedated patient, his bullet wounds still fresh from a shootout the night before, was lying on a gurney in the intensive care unit of a prestigious private hospital here late last month with intravenous fluids dripping into his arm. Suddenly, steel-faced gunmen barged in and filled him with even more bullets. This time, he was dead for sure.

Hospitals Now a Theater in Mexico’s Drug War

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Finally, this from EagleOne about something he heard on the way home from work.

Behind The Terror: The Role Of Organized Crime : NPR

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If this post seems redundant from Sunday's post it is because the problems persist and threaten connectivity in insidious ways. They seem to grow larger by the day. The answer to two of these issues, piracy and drug wars in Mexico are tied to economics. People will do what they must to make a living. Once one goes beyond the law, greed, just as it effects unregulated businesses everywhere will know no bounds. Laws that govern society and ensure a form of fairness, like taxes, regulatory controls, and community and social pressure set up the ruleset that allows for advancement through education, connectivity and fair and free competition.

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Many of the links and people listed in the blogroll are involved is trying to connect the world. Others are working to protect and maintain those important rulesets that have led to the advancements that have helped billions to a better future. Their efforts and voices are a tool to inform the public and help build a consensus for combating the threats of the 21st century.

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The criminal insurgency in Mexico will test our resolve to refrain from walling ourselves off. The answer lies in engagement and confronting evil. We have shown the world that our system of government is unique and for a brief window we may have been given a shot at using our bully pulpit, to lead the world by example.

Gunners Mate! "Make ready to Fire"

Wishfully this is the last thing a pirate sees after the next attack on shipping anywhere in the world. Unfortunately the Butt Monkey will raise it's verbal tail and the likelihood of this happening anytime soon, fades unless the currently deployed ships get some reinforcements.

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The news today carries a breeze of hope, when France, U.S. Draft Somalia Piracy Resolution. A reality check on this latest show of cooperation, is provided in the post The Piracy Problem, Politics and Possibilities by Galrahn of Information Dissemination.

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As noted by Galrahn:

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Most Americans don't realize just how low on the priorities list of the US Navy piracy falls in that region. There is a lot more going on in the 5th Fleet than we hear about in the news, and our nations Navy is very busy. Imagine a world where a US Navy ship opens fire in the Strait of Hormuz on an Iranian vessel and nobody hears about it.

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He take the time to put the geography in perspective by equating the area patrolled by an American force of 10 ships, is twice the size of the United States. The priority to curb this scourge seems very obvious. After a failed attack on a Japanese tanker two days ago caused oil to spike to $117 per barrel the problem is getting new attention. Imagine, if a lucky shot or two set fire to a tanker. Oil would skyrocket to prices unheard of today. I am sure the boys with the AQ, are noting this latest reaction to faltering security in this region and weighing their options to increase attacks and jigger the world's economy again.

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Galrahn recommends enlisting additional ships from countries in the Pacific region whose economies are at risk of higher prices. Japan, China, Russia, India, Australia and South Korea could make the difference if the world got serious in stopping this growing problem.

The problem is growing as noted in other posts,Somali Pirates: Spanish boat captured? and Somali pirates: Attack on oil tanker.

French Couillies II

As a follow-up to the story, The French Des Couilles where it was being speculated that the French would take action against the Somali pirates who seized a French vessel and her crew of 30 last week. Not since the times of the painting above, has piracy been dealt with so quickly.

The French waited until the ransom was paid and the hostages freed to strike back. And reported in a post by Information Dissemination entitled, Vive La France: France Raids Somalian Pirate Camp. French Special Forces then raided the pirates, captured 6 and are returning them to France for trial.

The French Admiral said:

"It is the first time an act of piracy in this area has been resolved so quickly ... and it is also the first time that some of the pirates have been apprehended," Admiral Edouard Guillard told the news conference.

Viva La France!

The French Des Couilles

Contemporary popular history has been tough on the French. Jokes about surrender and the coolness of relations after the start of the Iraq War should be tempered with the acknowledgement that France has a new president, elected by people who knew of his desire for a change in direction. These updates courtesey of Information Dissemination and Eagle1 on the breaking story of the seizure of a French cruise ship by Somalia pirates France Pulls Out the Big Stick, and Somali Pirates: Not Home in Eyl? show that the French are showing some couilles (balls).

France regardless of popular myth, have sent their forces in harms way many times in the past half-century, as peace-keepers in Africa, and the Middle-East. They have taken casualties and have not been afraid to shoot back when shot at.

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History almost forgets the suicide bombing in Beirut that took lives of French soldiers as well as US Marines.

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The toll for those to young or forgetful to remember:

"In the attack on the American barracks, the death toll was 241 American servicemen: 220 Marines, 18 Navy personnel and 3 Army soldiers. Sixty Americans were injured. In the attack on the French barracks, 58 paratroopers were killed and 15 injured, in the single worst military loss for France since the end of the Algerian war.[6] In addition, the elderly Lebanese custodian of the Marines' building was killed in the first blast.[5] The wife and four children of a Lebanese janitor at the French building were also killed.[7]"

The French have been our allies for over two hundred years and this writer wishes them godspeed in their efforts to crush this scourge.

"Shiver Me Timbers...Pirates!" Said the First Mate

While the focus of the nation and the world has been mostly on the battles in Iraq and Afghanistan, a sinister scourge has been blooming like algae in the warm waters of the Arabian Sea, the Horn of Africa and the Malacca Straits in South East Asia. Piracy has returned with a vengeance not seen in almost two hundred years to prey on ships and their crews.

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The latest headlines today, tells of The hijacking of the French cruise ship Le Ponant, a 288 ft three masted ship that was returning to the Mediterranean after dropping off her passengers in the Seychelles. The pirates thought to be based out of Somalia seized the ship and her crew of 30 yesterday. The French Navy along with the ships of Task Force 150 of the US Fifth Fleet are in the area. Several blogs are following this development better that the MSM, Pirates seize French ship off Somalia.

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Information Dissemination and Eagle1 are covering this story with an eye to detail and their minds tuned into the larger strategic picture. They noted a link to a incident map showing piracy in the Horn of Africa. UNOSAT_Somalia_Pirate_Attacks_Map_2007_Highres_v4.pdf (5.9MB).

The map is just the tip of one iceberg that threatens commerce. The Piracy attacks map. gives an overlay of attacks world wide spanning several years.

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The good news is that warships from many countries are joining the effort to suppress this threat. Countries that for the past half century have been content to stay in their home waters and let the United States, be the ocean police.

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This growing problem comes at a time when our own Navy is challenged about how to construct the fleet for the next half of the 21st century. That debate continues to sputter and flare, as the Navy struggles to build the right combination of ships, as two forces debate having big expensive blue water fighting force or sea control with many smaller ships that can cover a wider area and prevent the incidents as described above, from continuing to be a common occurrence. This debate is being covered in the most insightful manner by Galrahn, at Information Dissemination, with posts like LCS, and Shipbuilding.