The navy SEAL snipers who rescued the captured American ship captain are to be lauded. In all, the US Navy's handling of the situation seems from my armchair to have been quite good. However, it should not stop there.
Piracy is a plague upon the earth. For as long as man has sailed the waters, man has preyed upon his fellows. Whether killing crews and siezing ships for the hulls and the cargo, raiding coastal settlements for slaves, loot, or other things, or even the more modern ransom-holding piracy, the lessons of history are clear. There can be only one response to piracy that will end it and make the waters safe once more.
Rome faced pirates many times throughout its long life. Each time they dallied around, allowing the pirates free reign on the seas until finally they pushed too far. Only then did Rome do what it should have done in the beginning, marshalling a large fleet, invading the pirates' homes, and killing them all. Later in the Empire's history, it became even more difficult to deal with piracy since the pirates, now Arabs and Turks, had the backing of powerful states. Still the Romans tried, and often succeeded, purging the pirates from their havens and bringing peace to shipping.
The Barbary Pirates are the next great example, and perhaps are an even better one given that they were interacting with what would become the modern Amero-European powers (in this case specifically France, the UK, and the USA, mostly). When the first American ships were preyed upon by these scum, Jefferson (the president at the time) dispatched a small fleet of frigates and a handful of Marines to deal with the situation. After a rather epic story, with the United States and their local allies poised for an incredible victory that would allow them to dictate terms to any survivors, Jefferson sold out those local allies to the leader of the pirates and withdrew the Marines (at least the commander on the ground had some scruples, as he made sure to pull out the mercenary auxiliaries he had hired). It wasn't until many years later, when the Barbary states were once again becoming a serious problem for everybody sailing through the area, that a permanent solution was found. The three states mentioned above gathered ships together and began to shell all the cities along the Barbary coast, pounding the pirate states into submission. They pretty much destroyed the pirate kingdoms, ultimately paving the way for European domination of the region (the rising tide of colonialism took full advantage of the power vacuum following the fall of the pirate states).
Now we have pirates on the coast of Somalia. How is the world, or in this case the United States (given the threats levied against it by the pirates after the heroic rescue), to deal permanently with these vile criminals? I have a few suggestions.
1) Any pirate captured should be summarily shot and thrown overboard.
2) Any act of piracy should result in serious and violent reprisals, whether in the form of naval bombardment of coastal settlements or an actual landing of Marine soldiers to conduct a more thorough and targeted purge of the area.
3) Any deaths of hostages should result in an immediate invasion of the area, not for occupation but for purgation.
In short, if any pirate has the nerve to attack shipping, take hostages, or worst of all kill any captured crewmen, then there should be no limit to how hard and how fast the USMC comes down on their heads. None should live to regret their actions. Make an example of them, kill them all, and end the threat that they pose forever.
It might get messy. Innocent civilians among the Somali population might be caught in the crossfire. Hostages would probably die in the process. But if the world coddles this kind of unacceptable activity then it will continue and it will spread. Better to end it quickly and permanently, even at a high cost, than to allow it to proceed uninterrupted. The SEAL snipers have made a start. It is now up to the USA and other countries who suffer at the hands of these pirates to step up and finish the job, before more innocents are victimized by some of the lowest scum on the earth.
