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Pirates vs. the U.S. Navy

89 replies · 17,370 views · Started 09 April 2009

Aegix Drakan 12 Apr 2009, 12:57

Beldaran wrote:We should be.

Umm......

Terrorists wrote:
Those infidels don't understand anything except violence and power. We should hurt them, bleed them, be ruthless and inhumane, and terrify the shit out of them to the point where their god sending them to hell sounds like a welcome relief.

We should capture them and cut their testicles off on network television. We should kill their families. We should turn their banks into dust and teach them carefully and fully that if they choose to use violence as a currency, we have more "cash" than they do.

We must fight fire with fire and end their existence with brutal, unquestionable force.

Sound familiar?

Look, Beldaran. I KNOW that the only way to "negotiate" with those assholes is to use bullets. But that does NOT mean we should just outright nuke an entire country just because there happens to be a bunch of terrorists there. Do civilian casualties mean anything to you?

If you respond with such agression, not only is the UN gonna sanction your ass to all hell, every other country in the world is gonna freak and go on high alert, and point their nukes at the sky, waiting for you to so much as blink in their direction before launching all their nukes, and making Fallout 3 a reality. Now, as fun as using bottlecaps for currency SOUNDS...

Stooping to their level means their way of thinking has won out in the end. Terrorists will end up in charge of the world, except that instead of brandishing AKs and chanting tribal songs, they will be wearing suits and sitting behind desks, casually discussing who else gets the nuke. The US is supposed to be a "protector" (or at least, thats how most Americans see it). The US's job is NOT to act as judge, jury, and executioner for any country that doesn't fit their profile of a good, kind country. If that happens, then it's only amatter of time before someone says "Hey, those British guys were asses to us several hundred years back...let's pay em back!" or "Those Canadian guys are hogging all the maple syrup, and...uhh...NUKE EM ANYWAAAY!!"

Hell, if we follow YOUR way of thinking, maybe we should just nuke the US right now because they might destroy everyone else! Just like...oh my...the freakin terrorists. Grow up Bel. If you're still at the age where you think punching everyone in the face is the solution, then I await the day the cops pick you up for assault. Blowing the shit out of everyone who isn't as "pure" as you see fit makes you no better than a "Kira", a mass murderer deluded into thinking that they're saving the world.

@ Prr: 😉 I know you're not a pacifist. But I was expecting more of a "I wish we could just open fire on that little ship and straighten them out" instead of "make it their casket". XD

*note to self: Prr can get ornery. Avoid stepping on her toes. XD*

AtmaWeapon 12 Apr 2009, 14:27

I'd agree with those terms... if we were in an honest-to-goodness war, the kind that Congress and the rest of the world backs. As it is, we're not even in open hostilities.

The stance that we should slaughter innocents in order to smoke out the pirates is not only absurd, it shows serious poor character and (once again) a complete lack of ability to comprehend the complexity of the issue.

First, the pirates aren't just thieves that decided they needed to hijack ships. Somalia is a failed state and the average citizen would stab their entire family with a pencil just to be as rich as the homeless people that beg the corners of Austin. They can't turn to traditional robbery because none of the stores or banks have any money either! These ships are low-hanging fruit to them, and they're hijacking them to survive. Slaughtering people won't deter the pirates because there will still be starving people with boats. Getting the UN to do something about Somalia is a smarter course of action: when the people aren't starving there will be less pirates and the ones that exist will respond to deterrent action.

Next, it will make things worse. If your view was that we should shoot the pirates on sight I'd be sympathetic. Instead, you believe we should kill the people on shore who are starving but won't become pirates. Good idea! When we're through killing them all that will be left is pirates and citizens with a grudge. I'm sure the Taliban or Al Qaeda would be glad to offer them an olive branch to help them rebuild and get us back. We are not a country of savage imperialists that consider everyone else expendable sub-humans. Those are the countries that are our enemies (unless they can sell us something.)

Finally, it'd make the rest of the world even more angry at us. I find it odd that we're so worried that other countries will attack us but we believe we should do precisely what they accuse us of doing. Plenty of terrorist groups hole up in residential regions so they can accuse us of killing the innocent when we make a strike. Why should we cut out the middleman and attack the innocent directly? "They should have moved if they knew they were harboring terrorists" is not applicable in this or any scenario. In this scenario, you're suggesting that people who don't even know a pirate and don't have enough money for a cup of rice should pack up and immigrate to another country. To which land of opportunity should they flee? Kenya? Ethiopia?

Seriously you've got problems.

MottZilla 12 Apr 2009, 18:12

Apparently the Navy Seals killed all but one of the pirates and rescued the captain. A good outcome.

The problem is that these things like Atma said, are not real war. Conventional wars we were pretty good at and now we have very advanced traditional weapons. But issues like these are like law and order type issues. It's hard to solve these problems with bombs.

rock_nog 12 Apr 2009, 19:28

Beldaran's just bitter because they didn't use his proposed solution of slaughtering thousands of innocent people simply for the sake of one friggin' hostage. That said I'm glad they were able to rescue him.

rock_nog 12 Apr 2009, 21:25

How the hell do you come to that conclusion? With you it seems there are only two options - murder thousands and thousands of people, or don't kill anyone at all. Why only those two?

Daarkseid 13 Apr 2009, 00:43

Beldaran wrote:Hey, it's your guys' logic I'm using. So if it seems stupid, well I guess the shoe fits.

Yeah, killing 10000 innocent bystanders to get the release of 1 American is just as good as killing 3 three less innocent kidnappers for the release of that same American.

What the fuck is wrong with you?

biggiy05 13 Apr 2009, 03:48

MasterSwordUltima wrote:Why didn't anyone make a joke about parlay yet?

I was waiting on you. I made this thread in hopes of you making a parlay joke and you let me down! I can't count on you for anything these days...jeez.

Fabiano the Spy 13 Apr 2009, 05:48

biggiy05 wrote:In the mix of all this, the captain voluntarily left with the pirates in exchange for his crews safety. Ballsy move but I can respect him for thinking of his crew first.

Yeah, when this first happened I saw this on the news. When I heard about how he left, I wanted to give a salute to the man, that's bravery, that's honor. It made me proud of him and all, but shit..

But as said above, he's safe now, so that's all good.

AtmaWeapon 13 Apr 2009, 12:49

Yeah, taking out a handful of people guilty of the crime you have sent the military to deal with is so similar to killing hundreds of people who have done no crime. 🙄

I don't believe having the military kill the pirates is wrong. I believe it won't solve the problem. We're sparing a few dozen soldiers to deal with a problem the size of a country that's caused by sociopolitical issues. How's that war on drugs going? What about the war on terror? Both are more similar to this situation.

So far, the pirates either haven't killed anyone or they have killed so few that the news is not sensationalizing it. What happens when they know that if they try to bring back a hostage alive, we kill them? Something tells me that soon we won't be hearing stories about happy-go-lucky crews that overpowered the pirates and took their ships back. Instead, we'll hear horror stories as the companies have to spend weeks cleaning the blood from the instrument panels before sending the ship out on its next voyage.

Prrkitty 13 Apr 2009, 17:58

Someone said in this thread that we need to "take them out... from the inside... out". Meaning go to their hide outs... disrupt their money supply line... disrupt their bases... etc.

Stop trying to fight them once they've caused trouble... disrupt 'em BEFORE they get to do anything...

AtmaWeapon 15 Apr 2009, 13:18

We sure taught them a lesson. Sure they failed to board this ship, but they're attacking with RPGs and automatic weapons.

I can't tell if this is true because of the sixth-grade grammar and organization skills of the CNN writers, but the fifth paragraph leads me to believe it's possible this ship had a military escort when it was attacked.

Pryme8 17 Apr 2009, 13:53

prolly did..

but anyways we are trying to tip toe around them so as not to piss of china... seeing how they own the US now.

rock_nog 17 Apr 2009, 16:13

I find the whole concept of the pirates taking "revenge" to be ridiculous. Revenge for what? They attacked us, we fought back. If you're gonna loot ships and take hostages, don't cry about it when people start fighting back.

jerome 20 Apr 2009, 22:23

rock_nog wrote:I find the whole concept of the pirates taking "revenge" to be ridiculous. Revenge for what? They attacked us, we fought back. If you're gonna loot ships and take hostages, don't cry about it when people start fighting back.

Best way I can think to describe it is as "gang mentality". Gang One attacks the Gang Two. Gang Two gets pissed, retaliates. Gang One says "we're going to get revenge for them attacking us!" It's a neverending ordeal.

And I'm guessing someone's going to say "Thanks for pointing out the obvious Jerome. What's next? The sun's hot? Water's wet? You could be John Madden's replacement with those kind of obvservation skills." Just thought I'd beat someone to the punch on that. 😉

AtmaWeapon 21 Apr 2009, 01:23

What do they want revenge for? Do basic reading from crappy sources and they have plenty of reasons to be pissed.

  • When they were under a totalitarian regime, the US turned a blind eye because at least it wasn't communism. When the Cold War was over, we left them in turmoil.
  • Hundreds of ships are illegally fishing Somalia's waters, and no one in the world is doing anything about it.
  • Countries used Somalia as a nuclear waste dump, but no one cared.

In some ways, the pirates are the only navy Somalia has. At this point, they feel like any ship in their waters might be hostile, and I don't blame them.

rock_nog 21 Apr 2009, 02:19

Okay, you know what, we did a lot of stupid things during the Cold War. But for fuck's sake, the world was on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Maybe we acted a little rashly, and screwed a few people over, but we had bigger fish to fry. One wrong move, and the world would've become a cinder pile, and none of this would make a damn bit of difference. Granted, it was partially our fault, but what were we supposed to do?

Honestly, I'm just sick of this whole "sins of our fathers" crap. Countries holding a grudge against us for things that this nation did before I was even born? Take Iran - I mean, WTF!? Whatever we did against them, it was decades ago, but they're still pissed off at us and won't let it go. Though okay, I know the real deal is that they don't want any possibility of the West being glamorized, for fear of it fueling a youth uprising that would put those fundamentalist nuts in their place.

Beldaran 21 Apr 2009, 02:23

rock_nog wrote:the real deal is that they don't want any possibility of the West being glamorized, for fear of it fueling a youth uprising that would put those fundamentalist nuts in their place.

Better be careful. Whenever I point out that religion is causing problems all over the globe, the god-bots start screaming and calling me names.

rock_nog 21 Apr 2009, 02:40

Yeah, well my criticisms of religion are more tactful. At any rate, let's face it, I'm right. I mean, what was a major driving force in the 1979 revolution? It was a reaction to the perceived "Westernization" of Iran. Which reminds me - found these pictures from Iran before the revolution. Absolutely crazy.

http://www.leenks.com/link167949.html

Aegix Drakan 21 Apr 2009, 13:54

rock_nog wrote:Which reminds me - found these pictures from Iran before the revolution. Absolutely crazy.

ARE.
YOU.
FREAKING.
SERIOUS?

...0_o Uhh...They've taken quite a big step backwards since then, no? like...a massive step.

AtmaWeapon 22 Apr 2009, 00:12

Internet sources as reliable as the one that supplied the images (in fact comments on the linked page) indicate that those images were propaganda distributed by a failing government desperate to bring foreigners (and their money) into the country. There was one city that was progressive and rich and the rest of the country was dirt farmers. I was urged to verify this in wikipedia but what do you know, there's very little information to support such a claim on an encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone!

They aren't defending their country though. They are kidnapping people and demanding money.
Those cursed colonists aren't defending a country! They're just tipping a bit of tea into the water!