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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Obama Admin Botched Pirate Standoff |
| 2011-02-24 |
| When the two pirates boarded the U.S.S. Sterett off the coast of Somalia on Monday, American officials thought they were headed for a breakthrough in the four-day standoff with a gang that had seized four Americans vacationing on their 58-foot yacht. But an F.B.I. hostage-rescue negotiator (thats right, Eric Holder guy) aboard the Sterett came to believe the two Somalis were not serious. So the Americans took them into custody and told the pirates back on the yacht to send over someone they could do business with. What happened next is sharply contested and raises questions about the crucial decision to detain the pirate leaders. American officials said the pirates on the yacht, called the Quest, seemed relieved -- even "exceptionally calm" -- when told their senior commander was cooling his heels in a Navy brig. But hours later, panic ensued among young pirates. Some Americans theorized that a fight had broken out among the gang members, suddenly leaderless, and fearing they were about to be overtaken by the four Navy warships that surrounded them. One person who has talked to associates of the pirates said their leader had told them that if he did not return, they should kill the hostages, though American officials say they do not know that to be the case. |
| Posted by:Glolutch Jerens8166 |
| #19 In the real world, it would take several hundred million, if not several billion, to train a crew and do logistical support for an Iowa-class battleship. Meanwhile, an Indian frigate used its CIWS on a mothership once, and when the secondary explosions stopped there wasn't anything left above the waterline. An ESSM (which, afaict, a modern destroyer or cruiser carries in the dozens) can hit any small vessel within the radar horizon at _mach 4_. The only reason they, or the 3" and 5" guns, aren't intimidating anyone is that we haven't been using them. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2011-02-24 22:31 |
| #18 The Missouri ain't gonna sail no more. John Paul Jones is dead. So is Patton. And Chesty Puller. Get your head in the real world. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2011-02-24 20:58 |
| #17 I do wonder what a load of pirates would think if a "Missouri"-class battleship pulled up alongside, and trained its weapons on them. Not just the 16-inchers, but the 8-inchers, the 40mm, the 20mm, and the 60 or so machine guns those warships were armed with. Today, our "cruisers" have ONE 76mm cannon. I'm sure the technology today is up to building auto-loaders for the big guns, just as they do for the small ones. I think the water off Somalia would turn brown if a couple of those big boys showed up. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2011-02-24 16:29 |
| #16 First world, meet 7th century. Our sophisticated (?) techniques have no context for illiterate young thugs from Somalia, and our display of technology isn't intimidating, its literally uncomprehended. So when we use a pressure technique in negotiations where they ought to feel optionless, instead they have a panic reaction internal disagreement, fire an RPG in an act of presumed fearsome ferocity, end up shoot each other and the hostages in a panic filled confusion, and when the SEALs arrive, resist for a moment (my guess is the dead guys are probably the shooters of the hostages and the two dead pirates before the seals arrive) so the SEALs do the two with some fight in them, and we seize 10 or 12 illiterate fools. Now we get to spend fricking millions having a "trial", wiht translators, public defenders, discovery that will demand our internal communications and strategies, where they plead not guilty and we defend then in a obvious waste of money, and then a judge sentences them to life and we pay millions more. This is so far beyond stupid it beggars the imagination. Its an amusing conceit if we were a rich nation and wanted to make a point of how fair we were, despite being so very powerful. Instead, we are just wasting money we don't have and viewed as fools, inept ones at that. |
| Posted by: NoMoreBS 2011-02-24 16:16 |
| #15 Wasn't there, but that sure does not read well. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2011-02-24 16:08 |
| #14 "So the Americans took them into custody and told the pirates back on the yacht to send over someone they could do business with." You arrest the negotiators then ask for more? And who was showing bad faith? |
| Posted by: flash91 2011-02-24 15:34 |
| #13 I stand corrected: WHEN IN THE @@#@!#*()@HJ!!! |
| Posted by: Bill Clinton 2011-02-24 15:29 |
| #12 WHEN IN THE @@#@!#*()@HJ!!! are these morons in the Justice Department If my memory si any good it is not the Justics Department who decides it is case for itself, it is the WH who decides about sending an FBI negotiator instead of a 16" shell. |
| Posted by: JFM 2011-02-24 14:39 |
| #11 We knew this even back in 1805. That was before the lawyers took over. Which by the way..... |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2011-02-24 12:20 |
| #10 So this was an attempted re-do of the previous pirate/hostage situation. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2011-02-24 12:03 |
| #9 If the Obama is outsmarted by a gang of pirates in a boat, how is he doing with the smart guys at the Kremlin? My experience is that when a Bolshevik negotiates with another Bolshevik, the Bolshevik usually wins. |
| Posted by: Frozen Al 2011-02-24 11:51 |
| #8 FBI? FBI???!?!?!?!? Obama is a fucking idiot. You don't send the FBI to negotiate with pirates. You send Marines to kill them. We knew this even back in 1805. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2011-02-24 11:47 |
| #7 will we get more serious about border security? No. Next question? |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-02-24 11:27 |
| #6 So they put a FBI hostage negotiator on a Navy ship to talk to the pirates? Now some of these FBI hostage negotiators are pretty good. But I bristle at the idea. Seems to me that bringing one of our ships up really really close to the yacht and bringing all guns to bear BEFORE you invited the leaders over to negotiate would have been a better starting point. That explains why we "tailed" the yacht with our warships for three days...they were waiting for the negotiator to arrive. WHEN IN THE @@#@!#*()@HJ!!! are these morons in the Justice Department going to realize that piracy is a high seas crime punishable by immediate execution. Read it yourself, the infamous High Seas law that the lefties tried to jamb us with actually has that provision...of course that was back when most of the pirates in the world were from Thailand or Sri Lanka. Now that they are Moslem, well, we have to bring out the kid gloves. What a complete ration of bull crap. I think the use of the term "spineless" was a bit mild for this episode. It does not bode well for us in the GWOT, there I said it and I don't care what Hillary says, it is a Global War and they are terrorists. The piracy for ransom in the Indian Ocean, the drug wars in Mexico and Central America and the Opium wars in Afghanistan are all part of the same thing. It is all cash flow for Al Qaeda and its related network of global jihadis. Now that we know Al Qaeda is involved in the drug wars in Mexico, which to me is a big duh, will we get more serious about border security? |
| Posted by: Bill Clinton 2011-02-24 11:13 |
| #5 If the Obama is outsmarted by a gang of pirates in a boat, how is he doing with the smart guys at the Kremlin? |
| Posted by: whatadeal 2011-02-24 11:07 |
| #4 Negotiation with pirates???? A police response? WTF? Today's Telegraph referred to Obama's response to Qadaffy as "spineless." That seems to be the response of the day to anything. I cannot think of anything Obumble has not botched. He and the people around him have got to be the most inept administration we have ever had. EVER! |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2011-02-24 11:02 |
| #3 I figured it was a botched negotiation. It had all the fingerprints of one. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2011-02-24 10:36 |
| #2 I stopped reading when I got to |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2011-02-24 10:21 |
| #1 This episode may wind up like the plot in the movie "Rashomon", many viewpoints with nothing to hold them together. Kind of like Zero's administration, come to think of it. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-02-24 10:15 |