Ship's crew describes jumping pirates to retake control
The battle for control of the U.S.-flagged Maersk Alabama began with a bold move by some crew members to jump the pirates.
The crew of the Maersk Alabama exchange some words with media after the ship docked in Mombasa, Kenya.
In a related development, pirates fired on U.S. sailors Saturday as they tried to reach the lifeboat where Capt. Richard Phillips of the Maersk Alabama is being held.
The gunfire forced the sailors, who did not return fire, to turn back, the official said.
Capt. Richard Phillips offered himself as a hostage to the pirates during an attack Wednesday on the U.S.-flagged container ship Maersk Alabama in the Indian Ocean.
In related news, Somali pirates have hijacked an American-owned tugboat with a crew of 16 in the Gulf of Aden. The hijacking took place Saturday morning.
For more on this story, click here.
CNN VIDEO: Hostage drama continues
CBS NEWS VIDEO: U.S. options
Not a great bookend to the our Messiah’s Euro Apology Tour. But hey, he laid it out there. Now he won’t take the 3:00 am phone calls.
Pray for our guys.
Since INDenver is now using the Arab extreme Aljazeera as source for news, if feel compelled to offer another view of things.
As an overview, I would suggest reading, if you are brave enough, and open minded enough, an opinion piece by the brilliant Mark Steyn in National Review Online. He calls it “OUR REPRIMITIVIZED FUTURE.” He starts by quoting a Reuters headline, “Pirates Pose Annoying Distraction For Obama.”
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZWQwNTE2OWM2YjEwMWQzNTM4OTMzZGVhOWM0NDUxOGQ=
Gene:
I used Al-Jazeera because they had the story first when others didn’t. I don’t think you can say their coverage of the event was biased.
I do understand your concern, though; we’ve now linked to the CNN story.
Thanks for your comment!
Tom Auclair
INDenverTimes staff
Thanks Tom.
I guess I am supposed to think CNN is less biased than Aljazeera? ! !
Wow, I walked right into that one, didn’t I!
Well, Gene, I know this is going to shock you, but I went to the link you recommended and read the whole thing. While Mark Steyn is obviously a knee-jerk conservative who hates all things liberal (just as Ed Stein is a knee-jerk liberal who hates all things conservative), I believe he makes some excellent points. I particularly like the Andrew McCarthy quote. Personally, I think that in the entire area where Somali (or any other) pirates hold sway, we should shoot first and ask questions later. Freedom isn’t free, and must be defended fiercely. In the same vein, this is why I loathe the Patriot Act, and the way it has stomped all over our Fourth Amendment rights. To read the Bill of Rights (the first ten Amendments to the Constitution), go to http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html).
Did you know that Iran actually had a democratically elected government that was overthrown by oil-interest backed Western powers in 1953? The National Geographic reports that “Oil was at the root of a 1953 event that is still a sore subject for many Iranians: the CIA-backed overthrow, instigated and supported by the British government, of Iran’s elected and popular prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh.” To read the full article, go to http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/08/iran-archaeology/del-giudice-text/1).
If you have an open mind, I suggest you look at both.
p.s. – hope the web links work – I wish they had a “preview” option on these submissions. If they don’t work, advice would be appreciated.
OK – the links seem to work. I would recommend both very highly – especially the Bill of Rights.
Marymor,
Smoking a fat one??
Marymor,
I apologize. When I just made this above remark, I had not seen your post with the 2 links. Sorry. I will read it.
My opinion about shooting first is that I’d really like to see the Maersk captain survive. Of course, we could blow these suckers out of the water. I fully expect that these Somalis and their mother ships aren’t long for the surface, but what’s wrong with sitting on these guys to see about getting our good guy back? What are they going to do to survive? Catch fish to eat?
Gene – great! I would love to hear your opinion!
Steve – I, too, would like to see the Mearsk captain survive. Part of my point is that if the ship had been well-armed in the first place, the captain would not be in the position he is in. Also, as for your question: “what’s wrong with sitting on these guys to see about getting our good guy back? What are they going to do to survive? Catch fish to eat?” – that is what we have been doing, while the pirates get away with millions. And yes, in fact, they will catch fish to eat – this is what they do every day unless they have a juicy prize to hold for ransom. There is a great description of Somalia at http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0207/feature3/).
Seriously, the National Geographic is a great and little-appreciated source for international political information.
marymor, when i said “catch fish,” i really did mean to isolate this one boat. they can’t have unlimited ammo or water or food. if they shoot the captain, they all die.
i don’t think they’re suicide fishermen; i hope they’re pragmatic. their only way out is to give up the captain, alive, and survive. of course, we do need to tell them that’s their only way out.
no way the captain wants to die, but he’s in dire straits. big prayers for this guy and his vermont family.
Steve – your answer shows thought, but is incomplete. I understood you meant isolate this one boat. They don’t need unlimited ammo – just enough to continue to threaten the captain’s life. As for food and water, a human can live for weeks on what he pulls out of the sea. Raw fish provides (barely) enough liquid to meet a human’s minimal water needs. To an American this is unimaginable, but to a Somali, this is daily life. This is why nothing but brute force will have any effect – they literally have nothing to lose.
And yes, I do think we as a global community need to be doing something to reduce the desperate conditions the Somali populace lives under. In the meantime, I also think we have every right to defend ourselves by force, if necessary.
Marymor,
Glad you read the “knee jerk conservative” Mark Steyn piece. Also glad you liked the Andrew McCarthy quote. He was one of the prosecutors, successful I might add, in the case against the Blind Sheik in the 1st World Trade Center bombing, and wrote the excellent book, Willful Blindness: Memoir of the Jihad.
Find it amusing that the Patriot Act / FISA dustup the libs had against President Bush (intercept phone numbers connected between foreign and U.S. locations, to find terror suspects) is now a non-issue with libs, even when Oblama is now using it intra U.S.. It was a critical part of the offensive war on terror, that Oblama has now apparently abandoned.
From this discussion on Oblama’s first big crisis IT’S THE PIRATES STUPID, that he has found little time for, why did you leap to Iran? I cannot make the connection, except this is probably Oblama’s next big test, if he should decide he has time. Regarding your fishing around Iran for history, I can only go back as far as the Shah and Jimmy Carter’s inaction’s supporting the Shah and the take over of the religious fundamentalists, that we are still living (and dying with) today.
As to National Geographic, is is best remembered from younger days when it was a source to view bare breasts of young native women! Today, it is best used as a doorstop. If, you want a bright yellow stack of magazines for a doorstop.
I agree with Steve, prayers for the Captain.
AP Report: “An American ship captain was freed unharmed Sunday in a U.S. Navy operation that killed three of the four Somali pirates who had been holding him for days in a lifeboat off the coast of Africa, a senior U.S. intelligence official said. One of the pirates was wounded and in custody after a swift firefight, the official said.”
Now that is what I was hoping for – the best possible outcome, and the only one that I believe had a reasonable chance of the Captain staying alive. Three cheers for our Navy!
p.s. – Gene, I’m not ignoring you & will post a reply to your question later today.
No reply necessary. Thank God for Capt. Phillips and the U.S. Navy.
End of story.
Gene: you asked why I leaped to Iran – I really want to answer that. Busy now, more later.
Gene – you asked if I leaped to Iran because I think it is the next big test, and the answer is yes, I think it will be one of them, and a very big one. I wasn’t “fishing” around history – it is clear that we wouldn’t have needed to support the Shah against the radicals if we hadn’t put him there against the will of the people in the first place. History is, like it or not, and your refusal to “go back” any further than what pleases you won’t change that. Also, moving forward, while the Iranian state is our enemy, by and large the people aren’t. What they are is very different from us, and our only hope of forging a lasting peace with them after (whenever) the current government is gone is to understand them better, starting with the fact that they are not Arabs.
It’s a shame you regard the National Geographic as good only as a doorstop. You definitely come across as being unwilling to read anything you don’t know in advance you will agree with, which cries shame to your challenges to read with an open mind (as I did).
On another topic, you make a valid point about the liberals having a problem with the Patriot Act under Bush, and it being a non-issue under Obama. I have seen similar hypocrisy among Republicans regarding billions of dollars in bailouts, which were OK under Bush (i.e. TARP), but now are anathema. I think TARP was a disaster then, and I think the bailout of AIG is a disaster now. Unfortunately, it is also clear that tax cuts alone will not do the job of pulling us out of this mess – the Bush years made that clear. That said, the ongoing nationalization of our banking system worries me deeply.
For the record, I had a problem with the Patriot Act then, and I have an even bigger problem with it now. You said “It was a critical part of the offensive war on terror…”, which implies that you think it is acceptable for our Fourth Amendment civil rights to be curtailed in the name of safety. I wonder, would you have been so calm about it if our Second Amendment rights had been curtailed as well? Either the Bill of Rights means something, or it doesn’t. You don’t get to pick and choose – not if you expect to keep any of your rights. Freedom isn’t free.