Catch and Release.
The collapse of Somalia at the Horn of Africa is well documented at least since the Blackhawk Down episode of the first Clinton Administration. Is the phenomenon of piracy off Somalia evidence of deterioration or reorganization? Simon Constable and I spoke with Robert Wright, the Transportation correspondent at the FT, and learned that two Somalia clans have learned to work together, the Hawiye Clan of Central Puntland around Haradere, and the Darod Clan of Puntland. The first documented piracy was 2005. In 2008 there were 111 attacks. Forty-two are recorded as successful, the most notorious the Sirius Star, a large oil tanker that was held for three months until a $3 million ransom was paid, and divided up on the beach. German, Italian, American (below), Indian and Russian naval vessels are now patrolling a huge piece of the ocean. There is no agreement as to what is to be done with the captured pirates, and the estimate is that of 238 pirates captured, just half were prosecuted. The others were catch and release.
Desperation Trade.
My puzzle is how to measure the piracy as a metric of the collapse of world trade. Robert Wright told us that the traffic in the Suez Canal has declined sharply. Much of the decline is because the shipping companies do not want to risk the insurance loss trying the run past Somalia, and so they send their vessels the long way around the Cape of Good Hope. I pushed Robert Wright that the piracy itself was a way of talking about global collapse. Somalia is out of resources and assets. Taking to sea in small, decrepit boats with overflowing crews and inadequate motors is not just desperate, it is madness unless the alternative was abandonment. The pirates are said to attack in packs to overwhelm the patrolling navies. Also, the trade ships know the risk, know they could pay the higher costs and go via Good Hope, and still they risk the run to the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea. Sirius Star was taken more than 400 kilometers at sea. Nowhere is safe near the continent. The ships still try it. Robert Wright told us that the drop off in pirate attacks the last months is because of weather, not because of the patrols. Also, there is still the catch and release detail. Within the last days, the German Navy has delivered nine pirates to Kenya, but there is little expectation they will be tried and jailed. Kenya does not want the trouble, and there is no Somalian court that makes sense.
Back in the summer of 1996 just before JB went off the air, one of his contacts, the Horn of Africa reporter for Economist, detailed the flood of radicalized refugees from Somalia and Ethiopia being pipelined into Canada by al Qaeda and counted as their assets. Today on Special Report, Bret Baier described American officals' growing concern about sons of Somali ex-pats from Minnesota going to Somalia to train as al Qaeda operatives.
In a previous post concerning the practice of "catching and releasing" terrorists, I used the analogy of what I had heard about the spring roundup of rattlesnake vipers somewhere in Texas.
Here's a link to BBC article that is very interesting about the big- time viper roundup, jackalopes, clean energy programs, and multi billion dollar enterprises going on in a most unlikely area.
Very interesting: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ethicalman/2009/03/rattlesnakes_jackalope_and_a_clean_energy_revoluti.html
Investopedia
George Soros
Most Famous For: George Soros gained international notoriety when, in September of 1992, he risked $10 billion on a single currency speculation when he shorted the British pound. He turned out to be right, and in a single day the trade generated a profit of $1 billion – ultimately, it was reported that his profit on the transaction almost reached $2 billion. As a result, he is famously known as the "the man who broke the Bank of England."
Soros is also famous for running the Quantum Fund, which generated an average annual return of more than 30% while he was at the helm. Along with the famous pound trade, Soros was also cited by some as the "trigger" behind the Asian financial crisis in 1997, as he had a large bet against the Thai baht.
He is also widely known for his political activism and philanthropic efforts
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Soros-Funded Democratic Idea Factory Becomes Obama Policy Font
By Edwin Chen
Nov. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Three blocks from the White House, on the 10th floor of a sleek glass building, young workers pound at computers, with giant flat-screen TVs overhead. It has the look and feel of a high-tech startup.
In many ways it is. The product is ideas.
Thanks in part to funding from benefactors such as billionaire George Soros, the Center for American Progress has become in just five years an intellectual wellspring for Democratic policy proposals, including many that are shaping the agenda of the new Obama administration.
“…there is no Somali court that makes sense.” And neither does any other court. The U.S. used to be regarded as the “policeman” of the world. If you want to identify a measure of just how far America’s stock has fallen, you need only look to the piracy issue. It would seem to be a simple matter to put a stop to it. But we’ve tangled ourselves up in so much legalese and PC red tape; we’ve practically paralyzed ourselves when it comes to being effective on any front.
Our paralysis is internal. It’s political. Years of relentless propaganda promoting relativism have left us drifting without sail or rudder. As we continue to deconstruct the value of honest work, we put ourselves at the mercy of barbarism. When denied a disciplined path to channel its virtually boundless energy toward productive pursuit, the human spirit - forever in search of self expression - becomes derailed.
Neither can eight years of incessant Bush bashing be marginalized. It was a licentious orgy that depleted us of rational thought and proper self-respect. Like the spectacle of public hangings in the market square, it hollowed out our guts. Particularly affected were those of us who shouted loudest in an effort to hide their cowardice.
Google “drifting”, especially as it relates to Saudi Arabia’s bored and bloated youth, and you will find the outward expression of the human condition in crisis. Then look at the chaos along our border with Mexico. Fueled by drugs, an overabundance of unearned cash and the hugely popular “Narco-Corrido” gangsta rap (a genre of music that includes a mix of crude lyrics and the glorification of drug traffickers), brutality flourishes as evidenced by the decapitated corpses left to rot in the weeds surrounding unpaved parking lots.
Look what’s happening to dogs in Huston’s suburbs; to good men trying to protect their properties in Arizona; the list of depravity grows longer each day. As more and more pillars of our traditions are allowed to fall, we can expect to see the chaos increasing, like a red tide choking off the very essence of what we refer to as civilization.
How long did it take to rebuild Dresden? Hiroshima? The World Trade Center site? Obviously, the Germans and the Japanese had something within them that could not be contained. Each of these would spare no effort in nurturing their fallen Phoenix back to health. I fear, we may not be so fortunate as we continue to misinterpret the signs that our markets are signaling; as we continue to grind the mirror that reflects the true state of our union into dust.
We've turned into a bunch of sissies.
For example, why are we not setting a deadline and demanding the release of the journalist Ms Saberi? How long do we let these throwback hostage takers get their jollies by brazenly trying to intimidate the free thinking world? Them and their henchmen lackies are throwbacks and a disgrace to the human race.
We should help them achieve their desire and turn their clock back a thousand years for them.
CATCH & RELEASE = CRIME PAYS
The unintended consequence of 'Catch & Release' is that it's a tool for
recruiting terrorists.
A great way to tell terrorists that 'Crime Doesn't Pay' is to have every boat in
possible danger be protected -- by whatever it takes. Be it ex-military security
guards on board, navy boats of different countries, attack drones, a simple
grenade tossed into a pirate boat, etc. Otherwise, this piracy will never end and,
may likely, spread to other areas of the world.
A few years ago Florida had a similar problem w/tourists being targeted. They
were attacked on deserted roads driving from the airport in rented cars - easily
identified by a 'Z' or other letter on the license plate. Given what tourism means
to the Florida economy, police acted quickly to stop the attacks. Given what Suez
Canal fees mean to the Egyptian economy, it should adopt the same principle --
or ask (the UN?) for help. Given what shipping means to the world economy, the
World Court or a special court set up by the UN seems a logical place for trial.
Piracy today could become more dangerous to trade than protectionist tariffs in
the 1930s. As a US stamp once said: World Peace Through World Trade. The
opposite 'No World Peace Without World Trade' seems equally true.
If we learned anything from 9/11 it should be that it was partially caused by
conciliation with terrorists. The conciliation was this: It's too difficult or expensive
to protect airplanes from terrorism, so we'll deal with the problem after a plane
is hi-jacked.
Fro JapanToday:
The Taliban’s new top operations officer in southern Afghanistan had been a prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention center, the latest example of a freed detainee who took a militant leadership role and a potential complication for the Obama administration’s efforts to close the prison. U.S. authorities handed over the detainee to the Afghan government, which in turn released him, according to Pentagon and CIA officials.
Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul, formerly Guantanamo prisoner No. 008, was among 13 Afghan prisoners released to the Afghan government in December 2007. Rasoul is now known as Mullah Abdullah Zakir, a nom de guerre that Pentagon and intelligence officials say is used by a Taliban leader who is in charge of operations against U.S. and Afghan forces in southern Afghanistan.
The officials, who spoke anonymously because they are not authorized to release the information, said Rasoul has joined a growing faction of former Guantanamo prisoners who have rejoined militant groups and taken action against U.S. interests. Pentagon officials have said that as many as 60 former detainees have resurfaced on foreign battlefields.
Pentagon and intelligence officials said Rasoul has emerged as a key militant figure in southern Afghanistan, where violence has been spiking in the last year. Thousands of U.S. troops are preparing to deploy there to fight resurgent Taliban forces.
One intelligence official told the Associated Press that Rasoul’s stated mission is to counter the U.S. troop surge.
He told the tribunal that he intended to return to a peaceful life in Afghanistan.
“I want to go back home and join my family and work in my land and help my family,” he said, according to a U.S. military transcript of the hearing.
Actually, the Somali Sharia Courts are why the Islamic Courts Union/Al Itahad al Islamia faction won in 2006 and is winning now. People are looking for fora to enforce criminal law and adjudicate civil disputes. A legitimate government is returning in southern Somalia. It is not the one we want, but they have ultras (Al-Shabab) to worry about.
This may be an opportunity to start engaging with the Islamic Courts Union/Al Itahad al Islamia moderates.