US Sees 'Test Run' With Captured Pirates

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US Sees 'Test Run' With Captured Pirates
February 18, 2009
Military.com|by Christian Lowe

The U.S. Coast Guard is using the recent capture of seven pirates in the Gulf of Aden as a test case of how to pursue swashbucklers worldwide and submit them to international courts.

According to key Coast Guard officials, maritime security experts and military commanders are examining ways to safeguard ships transiting the East African waters and provide some semblance of order to the largely lawless region between Yemen and Somalia.

"We're focused on providing what we call a 'consequence delivery system,' " said Capt. Chuck Michel, head of the Coast Guard's office of Maritime and International Law. "In the absence of the territorial sovereign standing up, what we're trying to set up is some kind of legal mechanism to make it more painful for the pirates to actually go out and do their activities."

Michel said the capture by the Navy of seven pirates who tried to take over the Marshall Islands-flagged MV Polaris Feb. 11 is a "test run" of the mechanism that the U.S. military would use in the future to deter more piracy.

"The whole follow-on ... to actually getting them behind bars is an excruciating process," Michel added during a Feb. 17 interview with military bloggers.


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