Now what? Ninjas?

With all the recent pirate attacks on American ships and even mortar shells being targeted at a congressman's plane, people are up in arms over the issue of piracy. The crew of the Maersk Alabama are asking for the U.S. to do more to combat piracy. According to an article written on MSN.com, pirates collected approximately 18 to 30 million dollars in 2008. Also, pirate attacks are up 11% in 2008, according to the International Maritime Bureau's Piracy Reporting Centre, and we would be willing to bet that much of the increase is due to the worsening global economic situation much in the same way that crime rates increase during poor economic times. This would imply that an overall improvement in the global economy would help to quell some of these pirate attacks. This also would indicate that economic aid in would have a greater effect on the pirate problem than sending patrol boats out.

Since the pirates operate in an estimated 1.4 million square miles off the coast of Somalia, these patrol boats have a vast area to cover. According to the same MSN ariticle, there are approximately 30 warships off of Somalia and that means that each ship must cover approximately 46,000 square miles. However, in March, there were 15 attacks on merchant ships and about 1400 ships passed through the area in that time making the the probability of an attack at 1.07%. While this number might seem low, a 1 in 100 risk of being attacked by pirates is not odds we here would like take.

Now, if these 30 ships were to go to the coast of somalia and patrol the waters near these ports (a delicate task because putting warships off the coast of a sovereign nation tends to be a touchy subject), it would dramatically reduce the amount of area required to cover. A quick look at Google Maps reveals 29 cities which may or may not have a port large enough for a supertanker or merchant ship. This would give about a 1:1 ratio of ships to ports and make the problems more containable.