Armed Defense Against Pirates Works

Buried in the LA Times Entertainment section is some interesting news about the Maersk Alabama, the ship that was attacked by Somali pirates early in the Obama Presidency.  In the last paragraph of the article, it is casually mentioned that the ship was attacked three more times in the next two years!  From the LA Times:

But while Phillips' story -- and by extension, "Captain Phillips" -- had a happy ending, the Maersk Alabama has not been so fortunate, facing further pirate assaults in recent years. The ship was attacked a second time in 2009, again in 2010 and yet again in 2011. Each time, though, the assailants were repelled by armed security forces.

So, the ship went from being defenseless in early 2009, to having armed guards. In the first instance, the ship is taken over, the Captain is taken hostage, the U.S. military intervenes and ends up shooting three of the pirates, rescuing Captain Phillips.

In the next three situations, the armed guards repel the pirates before they ever board the ship. That seems a much better result to me.

Funny that we end up reading about news like this in the Entertainment section of a paper discussing the movie made about the original incident. David Codrea deserves the H/T.

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