Pirates Watch

I guess I don't understand the scope of the problem when it comes to pirates. I tend to think that we, the legitimate international community, have enough firepower and technology to annihilate ourselves if we wanted to, and therefore should be able to conquer anything else we set our mind to.

I'm looking at it like one of those police chases in California. The perp can run for a while but not indefinitely. Because there we are with helicopters and police cars and the ability to radio ahead. There's more of us than there are perps. If the tire puncture sticks don't get them we're eventually going to do a "pit maneuver" and pen them in. And even if we can't accomplish any of that, at some point he or she is going to run out of gas and it will be all over.

If I'm a pirate on the open seas and they want to get me, all is lost. That's my thought on the subject. I'm not going to be out there -- la la la la -- sailing, sailing over the bounding main. Probably this is where the hostages come in. Because they're going to be more reluctant to blow me to smithereens if there's hostages on board. But barring that, eventually as a pirate I'm going to lose.

So here's what we do ... at the first whiff of piracy ... and before there's hostages on board ... it's bye bye pirates.