Ukranian ship seized

[GrauGeist]

Anyone else following this situation?

NAIROBI, KENYA -- A U.S. destroyer and a Russian warship headed Saturday for a possible confrontation with pirates who hijacked a cargo ship carrying battle tanks, machine guns and a crew of 21.

Though pursued by ships from two of the world's biggest naval powers, the pirates showed no sign of surrendering the Ukrainian vessel Faina, which they boarded Thursday off the Somali coast as it headed to Kenya. Instead, according to unconfirmed reports, they were demanding a $35-million ransom to turn over their unconventional booty, which includes 33 Russian-built T-72 tanks.

U.S. destroyer joins pursuit of pirates off Somalia - Los Angeles Times

FOXNews.com - U.S. Navy Sends Warship to Protect Ukrainian Vessel From Somali Pirates - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News

 

[Thorlifter]

I read this earlier. I hope it's Russia that is going to pay this and not the good ol U.S.

Of course, we know they really won't pay it........I'm just theorizing who would pay it if it went that way.

 

[RabidAlien]

They'll blast the thing to bloody scrap metal (read that with or without a British accent...works either way!) if they cant' get a Special Ops team on there to take out the pirates. Dang. That's pretty cool to say, though....SpecOps vs. Pirates. 21st Century, meet 18th Century!

 

[lesofprimus]

Been there done that... I would theorize that the Russians would be the first to insert a combat team onboard tho...

 

[RabidAlien]

I'd agree. Its their stuff that got 'jacked. The US would be standing by, willing to offer assistance....and more than willing to send those tanks to the bottom of Davy Jones' smelly locker in order to keep said tanks out of the hands of ....whoever would get them. Probably not friendly forces.

 

[evangilder]

The worst case is that one of the Somali warlords or worse, al qaeda gets their hands on these weapons. That doesn't bode well. But I am sure it is in the interest of both the US and Russia to make sure that doesn't happen.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

This is actually a pretty common occurance. This is the first time one with mililtary hardware has been seized however. It kind of surprised me though that whoevers hardware was onboard did not have an escort. Whenever we put our aircraft on boats we had armed guards with them.

 

[Matt308]

I'm guessing this is a lose - lose for the pirates. They can't use the equipment, they can't offload enough to make it worthwhile, they can't maintain it... it is a hostage situation with assets. I don't see anybody doing anything except the ruskies. And only for shits&grins. They don't care about the pirates, they don't care about the shipmates and they don't care about the hardware. But they do care about face. And that should put the fear of Allah in those pirates.

 

[Thorlifter]

Whenever we put our aircraft on boats we had armed guards with them.

I was thinking about that Adler. If the Russians were going to send a boat full of brand new tanks to waters that are full of pirates, why didn't that vessel have an escort?

IMO, I think this was a setup on some level. Or do the Russian's typically not send a security detail with shipments of this nature?

 

[Von Frag]

The latest news is that 3 pirates were killed onboard the ship, apparently some want to give themselves up. I lost the link to the story, sorry.