Her shots, part of a deafening volley from her fellow cadets enrolled in the school's first-ever firearms training course, were taking aim at a threat half a world away: the surge of piracy off the Horn of Africa, the continent's easternmost peninsula that juts into the Arabian Sea. [More]About damn time.
And then I read this:
"If the pirates get onboard, it's all over for the crew," Murphy said, adding that merchant ships are bound by rules of engagement that prevent them from firing upon approaching pirate ships, and are often unarmed to begin with."Rules of engagement"? For pirates? Are they nuts?
When are they going to get smart and realize pirates could be treated like a resource, a commodity to be harvested? I guarantee you, if the scurvy sea dogs realized that, a whole lot of them would be looking for a safer line of work.
[Via Ed M]
12 comments:
I'm thinking a modification of the Triple S rule. Instead of shoot, shovel, and shut up it would be shoot, sink, and shut up.
Wouldn't take but a handful of crew trained and armed with M1 Garand or equivalent to keep pirates in low boats from making a boarding. Add in a few RPGs and pirating suddenly becomes much less attractive don't it.
"Bound by rules of engagement"... bound by whom? and what kind of limp-weenies are going to see pirates approaching and stop to ponder 'what rules must we follow, now?' If theya re not practicing their long-range gunnery at first sighting, then they deserve whatever they get. I will bet that even with a simple bold action 30 cal, I could make consistent hits on an approaching craft - or the operators and inhabitants of such craft - from at least 600 yards. With sea winds and such, it may not be 'one shot, one kill' but damned close enough to make it fun from the ship's side, and very discouraging from the raft's side.
At closer ranges, the whole crew could have a game of Molotov hurling! It would be great fun, just like shuffleboard on a cruise ship!
I couldn’t find the raw URL but Angela has an excellent VID link on her site that I would highly recommend watching
http://angela-stevens.com/archives/what-the-2nd-amendment-is-really-for/
My cousin is a student at CMA. Looks like I'm going to have to take him out to the range one of these weekends for a little practice with an AR pattern and an AK pattern rifle. I might even drag him to Nevada for a little full-auto training.
Harrr! I've me own rules of engagement fer scurvy sea dogs!
If you look through noonsite's archives, there was one incident witnessed by an NZ yachtie that involved two American flagged yachts fending off a boat load of Adenese pirates with AR-15s.
The Adenese a-holes actually reported them to Egyptian authorities, who had to be reminded of existing merchant vessel treaties before they would back off and not arrest the Americans.
Existing treaty gives ANY merchant vessel the right to brew up pirates ... period. There is also no requirement to rescue them once you sink their dhow or inflatable.
These treaties are unchanged sinse the late 18th Century ... all this handwringing about what to do with captured pirates is ludicrus ... captains of military vessels have the right to hang them at sea.
I think its been pointed out fairly clearly but maritime law considers pirates to be criminals against humanity and basically permits those being attacked by them to scatter their bones across the ocean floor.
If I were to own a shipping company, each boat would have two gentlemen designated to fending off pirate attacks with a nice, fresh M2 .50cal machine gun. They would get bonus pay based on the number of pirate attacks they annihilate..
Sorry... but to hell with rules of engagement. I can guarantee if it were my boat, they would get 1 shot from a Mosin Nagant off their bow, or on it. The next shot wouldn't be so friendly.
Jon, why in the world waste time with a "warning shot?" That doesn't work in armed self defense on land, and isn't called for anywhere else.
Anyone who threatens me will be looking down the bore of a .45 (or my new shotgun) just as fast as I can get it into action. They can have that split second to decide if they really want to attack or not...
I simply do not understand why anyone who values their own life would agree to be present on these ships subject to this piracy if they must be there unarmed!
There are a thousand different, perfectly suitable arms available for a ship to defend itself, especially against rafts and inflatables. There is simply no rational excuse not to use them.
"Pirates can afford bigger weapons than we can," she said. "I feel that if you start arming merchant ships, you up the risk dramatically."
Oh NOEZ!!!1 Don't provoke the pirates! They might do something mean like attack our ships or...
uh...
NM...
I can't believe no one's said this yet...
Rules of engagement? They're more like guidelines, really.
Crusty:
I say we put 3-4 M134 weapons systems down each side of these ships. Those dhows and dingeys are no match for 3000 RPM of 7.62x51 justice.
We can automate them and make it like a video game. We all know how kids like video games.
Post a Comment