Three Shots to Freedom

It's both a sad and a happy occasion with the freedom of Capt. Richard Phillips, the man who was the hostage of Somali pirates for five days on a small covered lifeboat. It's a happy situation of course because a brave man who traded himself to the pirates in order to release the remaining crew from the pirates is now no longer a captive, and will have a reunion with both family and crew, now. The sad side effect was that three human beings had to die in order to free him.

There is not much that could have happened differently. Unfortunately, The situation had little opportunity to take a different route, as both sides were locked into it until the end. The American naval ship that had parked themselves around the tiny boat left the Somali pirates few courses. There are many who say that force it the only way to meet force, since the U.S. maintains a policy of never negotiating with terrorists/kidnappers who take American's hostage. The pirates wrote their own death warrants once they kept Capt. Phillips prisoner.

After five days, and many threats of executions, the Somalis brought Phillips into the open, apparently to carry out their threat. When they did, three Navy Seal snipers shot them dead, liberating their captive.

What many fail to address is not the meeting of aggression with aggression, but finding the root of the problem. The news, both print and televised has been full of those who's solution is to meet the "pirate threat" with outright violence. To find and bomb the encampments and bases of these Somalis. No one seems to be asking why so many Somalis are turning to piracy. Look at their country as a whole. It's horribly impoverished, and it has only a weak government system that is perpetually at war with factions within its own borders. The way to stop this is by adding American, or U.N. bombs to the mix?

We need to combat this problem by not combating it in the usual way the U.S. does, with drones and troops, but by assisting the Somali people to build up themselves, so the need for piracy is taken from the equation. Aid and diplomacy are strong weapons against desperation and violence when applied properly.