How to Deal

The basic tactics are simple:

First, negotiate with the pirates and keep them talking. (For the legalistic Americans, this could be complicated by a problem with definitions. If the pirates are deemed to be terrorists or working with terrorists, then talks would be precluded. The United States does not negotiate with terrorists. So, for the moment at least, it's important that they be identified exclusively as criminals.)                     

Second, prevent the pirates from taking the hostages onto the land where they can be scattered and hidden in countless places. The shoreline is the red line they must not be allowed to cross under any conditions.                     

Guillaume Goutay, commander of the French warship L'Aconit, which took the lead in the French operation last week, told the Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche that the pirates wanted "to prolong the conversations as much as possible so they could get to the coast." They had seized the 12.5-meter Tanit hundreds of miles out at sea, but were only 70 nautical miles from shore when the first French warships arrived on the scene. On board the Tanit were the boat's owner, 28-year-old Florent Lemaçon, his wife and their 3-year-old son, as well as two friends, guarded by five Somali pirates.                    

"We were looking at people who didn't want to listen," said Goutay. When the coast was only about 20 nautical miles away, the warship fired on the Tanit's mast, bringing down the sails. The pirates, hysterical, put guns to the heads of some of the hostages and threatened to kill them, but after hours more of negotiations, some of their rage and fear subsided. The next afternoon, concerned that the Tanit might make landfall during the night, the French decided to act. With authorization from President Sarkozy, they attacked at dusk. Accounts vary slightly, but it appears that snipers took out the three Somalis on deck as a Zodiac-type boat with eight commandos rushed the Tanit. Those hostages on the deck were secured quickly, but two pirates had Lemaçon in the tiny cabin. He took a bullet in the head during the shootout—possibly from one of his rescuers—and died soon after.                       

The account of the American liberation of Captain Phillips from one of the Alabama's enclosed lifeboats has obvious parallels. The vessel had made it to about 20 miles from shore, and tensions escalated when the American destroyer Bainbridge, which had shadowed the boat and then actually given it a tow as part of negotiations, reportedly started taking it back out to sea. The decisive moment came at dusk. The SEAL team on the Bainbridge had been authorized by President Barack Obama to use lethal force if Phillips's life seemed in imminent danger. By the official account, one of the Somalis pointed a gun at him, but that most certainly had happened before. Indeed, the Somalis had shot at Phillips when he tried to escape earlier in the week, apparently before the SEAL sharpshooters had arrived. What is clear is that three snipers now saw that they had clear shots at two of the Somalis who had put their heads up out of the cabin, and one who still was inside. "Three pirates, three rounds, three dead bodies," as a senior U.S. military official told The Washington Post.                      

There will be more.

© 2009