April 12, 2009

Rescue

Congratulations to the Seals and all involved for the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips.

What an incredible story Phillips will have to tell the world. He's already a bonafide hero, having given himself up to free his whole crew, and then attempting a daring escape by jumping overboard. A week from now Leno and Letterman will be fighting for him.

The rescue operation was personally approved by Obama, so credit is due the president for trusting the best soldiers in the world to pull it off. He took some heat for not being more out front on this issue, but I think he played it about right, by not giving these low-lifes recognition from the presidential platform.

Maybe for the first time as President, Obama now understands what George W. Bush went through many many times in the White House. The necessity of dealing harshly with dangerous terrorist elements, when you know that your actions will make you unpopular with certain elite opinion-makers...and of course with other terrorist elements...

The rescue was a dramatic blow to the pirates who have preyed on international shipping and hold more than a dozen ships with about 230 foreign sailors. But it is unlikely to do much to quell the region's growing pirate threat, which has transformed one of the world's busiest shipping lanes into one of its most dangerous. It also risked provoking retaliatory attacks.

"This could escalate violence in this part of the world, no question about it," said Gortney, the commander of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command.

Abdullahi Lami, one of the pirates holding the Greek ship anchored in the Somali town of Gaan, said: "Every country will be treated the way it treats us. In the future, America will be the one mourning and crying," he told The Associated Press. "We will retaliate (for) the killings of our men."

Jamac Habeb, a 30-year-old self-proclaimed pirate, told the AP from one of Somalia's piracy hubs, Eyl, that: "From now on, if we capture foreign ships and their respective countries try to attack us, we will kill them (the hostages)."

"Now they became our number one enemy," Habeb said of U.S. forces.

There we go again....recruiting new terrorists by killing existing ones. So be it.

If this is Obama's way of saying 'Bring it on", good for him. You just hope some of the other countries involved can deal as successfully with hostages and cargo that they have at risk. Our ship's situation seemed like it could have been sort of a one-off. Other captured ships have lots more lives at stake, and no realistic rescue scenarios. Let's hope hostages from other currently captured ships aren't murdered in response to the U.S. resistance.

Posted by dan at April 12, 2009 11:05 PM