The ghosts of pirates

I can't say how incredible I find your analysis that Somali piracy is now the fault of the Bush administration policies of the last eight years and that the American people are ignorant about this enlightening expose because the mainstream media in which you have been a member for over 48 years is not telling them the truth as you see it.

You need to get out of London more often. And I am not a supporter of the Bush administration in case you've undoubtedly concluded.

The fact of the matter is that Somali piracy has become rampant recently for the very simple reason: it pays. And Somalia is a failed state because it was built by European colonial masters - the original pirates - from a disparate collection of tribes and clans with nothing in common.

Blaming America will not change these simple facts.

You mention Bill Clinton as the President who deployed US troops to Somalia, but I distinctly remember being dumbfounded (hey, I was a teenager!) when in the closing days of #41's term, HE sent troops to Somalia. Personally, I would tend to lay at least a LITTLE blame at the feet of a DraftDodger-cum-POTUS who failed to keep our troops properly equipped, instead seeking a "Peace Dividend". The dividend of peace is PEACE. When we equip soldiers to be police, and we prosecute enemy soldiers (aka terrorists) as criminals, we LOSE. We've BEEN there, we've DONE that, we're DOING it AGAIN.

As an American Merchant Seaman I have absolutely no sympathy with the Somalis. Whatever problems their country is experiencing are entirely of their own making, and should not be used as an excuse to condone kidnapping an extortion perpetrated upon innocent seamen plying their trade. If piracy is flourishing it is simply because it is more profitable than fishing. Why shouldn't it continue? The steamship companies don't want to incur the expense of arming their crews or supplying armed guards. Warships from Europe and Canada simply disarm any pirates they capture and then let them go. As for the one pirate the U.S. Navy captured alive, he was grinning from ear to ear when he arrived in the States. Why shouldn't he be, when he was probably treated better than he ever had been back home? Sounds like a pretty good business to me!