Readers could make a real contribution to the people of Somalia by taking their yachts over to the Horn of Africa:

Last December I wrote about a Somali pirate’s justification for his choice of career. A former fisherman, like many of his countrymen, his main gripe was with foreign fishing vessels which overfished Somali waters and bulldozed local boats out of their way.

Well it turns out that now, thanks to the pirates,  fish stocks off the Somali coast have recovered. The greedy foreign piscatorial plunderers have been scared off, leaving locals to haul in bumper catches. Now that his justification for piracy has been removed, I wonder if our pirate friend will go back to his fishing rod.

Update: On the other side of Africa, Guinea-Bissau is clamping down on foreign fishing vessels too, but so far in a less swashbuckling way than the Somalis. The tiny West African country’s government has had a trawlerful of Spanish fishermen in custody for the last two weeks (which given the flimsy state of Guinea-Bissau’s navy and its complete absence of prisons is no mean feat). Apparently, the Spaniards are “losing patience.” Should have kept to your quotas then, shouldn’t you?

The International Maritime Bureau’s live piracy map is worth a look. In 2005 (see here for 2005 map), there were many more attacks in South East Asia than off the horn of Africa, but today Somalia has become the epicentre of the industry. There have been more attacks off the horn of Africa so far this year than in the whole of 2005, while piracy in South East Asia has become a rarity.

The 2009 map also shows how much more efficient South East Asian pirates are than their brethren in the western Indian Ocean. All the raids there this year have resulted in capture of a vessel, whereas in Somalia, attempted attacks far outnumber actual attacks. Perhaps as they become more practised, the Somalis too will become more effective, enabling them to some extent to counter the increasingly forceful response by the West.

IMB Live Piracy Map 2009: red = actual attack, yellow = attempted attack

The piracy saga in the Indian Ocean has taken a nasty turn, as France’s new Napoleon, Nicolas Sarkozy, has decided capital punishment is the best way of dealing with Somali bandits in the region. French commandos shot dead two pirates as they attempted to rescue a young French yachtsman and his family. It looks likely that they also killed the yachtsman. Then, on Sunday, the US killed a further three pirates as they successfully rescued a captured ship’s captain.

Until now, the pirates have treated their hostages fairly well – possibly because ransoms have usually been paid – but if they decide to fight fire with fire their activities could become more violent. Indeed, hardline Islamists in Somalia have already vowed revenge for the killings, and another pirate who’s holding some Greek captives (over 230 hostages are being held by various pirates) warned:

Every country will be treated the way it treats us. In the future, America will be the one mourning and crying. We will retaliate [for] the killings of our men.

From the BBC:

Somali pirates say they have thwarted an apparent revolt by the crew of a hijacked Ukrainian cargo ship, according to reports. An unnamed pirate told the AFP news agency that sailors of the MV Faina tried to “harm” two of their captors.

The ship is carrying 33 tanks and other weaponry and was seized by pirates two and half months ago.

“Some crew members on the Ukrainian ship are misbehaving,” the pirate said. “They tried to harm two of our gunmen late Monday. This is unacceptable, they risk serious punitive measures.”

“Somalis know how to live and how to die at the same time, but the Ukrainians’ attempt to take violent action is misguided.”

He claimed that two of the pirates were taken by surprise when a group of crew members attacked them. “Maybe some of the crew are frustrated and we are feeling the same but our boys never opted for violence, this was a provocation,” he told AFP by telephone.

Another report of the incident, by Russian Ren TV, quoted one of the pirates as saying that the crew responsible would be “seriously punished”.

Somalia’s piracy is not just good news for the pirates themselves. Whole industries are springing up or expanding to take advantage of the bonanza.

In the town of Eyl, the pirates’ main base, where hundreds of foreign hostages are being held, new restaurants have opened to serve non-Somali food to the captives. Money changers, property developers and Land Rover dealers are doing a roaring trade as the pirates seek to invest their cash. And firms elsewhere in Africa and in the Middle East have spotted an opportunity for a quick buck by helping out with the payment system. Pirates want hard cash, not bank transfers, because getting the money from banks is slow and well-connected warlords can plunder it. So the ransoms have to be taken directly to the ships. This, however, increases the cost and the danger. As a security expert interviewed by the Sunday Times explains: “There have been attacks by other pirates on the way in [to deliver the ransom].” Air drop, he says, is safer, and “there are firms doing it out of Dubai and Mombasa.”

Smaller businesses are thriving too. Selling $3 cups of tea on credit to pirates before they brave the high seas is making life a little easier for a young mother in Eyl. Her clients pay her when they receive the ransoms. “If it wasn’t for them,” she told a Reuters reporter, “I wouldn’t be able to make a living.”

In a short but fascinating interview with the Guardian, a Somali pirate explains how he began his career:

I started to hijack these fishing boats in 1998. I did not have any special training but was not afraid. For our first captured ship we got $300,000.

Now you and I might go and splurge such a windfall on wine, women and song, but not this guy. In an impressively entrepreneurial display of business planning, he went out and bought AK-47s and small speedboats. Since then, he has captured a further 60 ships. He continues:

We give priority to ships from Europe because we get bigger ransoms. To get their attention we shoot near the ship. If it does not stop we use a rope ladder to get on board…After checking the cargo we ask the captain to phone the owner and say that we have seized the ship and will keep it until the ransom is paid. When the money is delivered to our ship we count the dollars and let the hostages go.

The 42-year old father of nine goes on to mount an interesting justification for his actions. He started off as a humble fisherman, he says, but was pushed into piracy by greedy foreign competitors:

At sea foreign fishing vessels often confronted us. Some had no licence, others had permission from the Puntland authorities but did not want us there to compete. They would destroy our boats and force us to flee for our lives.

He and his fellow buccaneers consider themselves “heroes running away from poverty.” What’s more, in a country with no government to police the seas (and a world where Egypt makes nearly $5 billion a year from policing the Suez Canal), “taxing” foreign vessels is only fair:

We don’t see the hijacking as a criminal act but as a road tax because we have no central government to control our sea. We will not stop until we have a central government that can control our sea.

H/T Chris Blattman.

Christmas 2006 and Santa brings the American right an unexpected Christmas present – the invasion of (nasty, Islamic) Somalia by (nice, Christian) Ethiopia. Times were tough in Iraq, so the cheerleaders of military force were glad of the opportunity to get out their pom poms and strut their stuff for an army that really knew how to put the boot in.

Why, they asked over at National Review (bastion of US conservatism), is Ethiopia so successful at vanquishing Jihadi foes, when the US has so much trouble? Was it a more sophisticated approach to counter-insurgency? Greater understanding of cultural drivers? No – it was because they were prepared to fight like real men untramelled by the Geneva conventions.

Ethiopians are “not worried about whether they will be seen as “occupiers” or whether their “occupation” will be viewed as benevolent,” Cliff May reckoned. Neither are they:

Overly concerned about whether their tactics will win approval from the proverbial Arab Street – or the European Street or Turtle Bay. They are fighting a war; their intention is to defeat their enemies; everything else is secondary or tertiary.

James Robbins, meanwhile, was also in thrall to the Ethiopian’s use of of ‘maximum force’, dismissing those who warned this was a war that the Ethiopians would never win. John Miller, meanwhile, wanted Ethiopian troops airlifted in to kick some Iraqi ass, while Cliff May headlined a piece: “WHY EUROPEANS AND ARABS ARE ROOTING FOR THE ISLAMISTS IN SOMALIA.”

(Oh and don’t forget daffy old Kathryn Lopez who was all weak at the knees as she warned the world not to ‘mess with Ethiopia’.)

So how did it go then? Here’s today’s editorial from the FT:

Before Ethiopia invaded with Washington’s blessing, Somalia barely registered on the global jihadi radar. Two years later, the conflict is a significant mobilising force. Videos seeking recruits and financing for Islamist militias fighting the Ethiopian-backed transitional government have proliferated on jihadi web sites. Fighters from Zanzibar, the Comoros islands and as far away as Pakistan have been drawn to the insurgency. Ethiopia’s intervention has bolstered extremist elements that the US and other western powers hoped – against the advice of most experts at the time – that it would contain.

In recent months, hardline al-Shabaab militias have gained control over much of southern Somalia. By contrast, the transitional government that Ethiopia stepped in to install can claim influence over the town of Baidoa and only parts of the capital, where roadside bombs explode daily. Ethiopian troops are bogged down fighting an insurgency that gains strength from their presence, while the government they support shows no signs of becoming more effective. It is a familiar scenario for the US and its allies in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ethiopia however, has announced its decision to cut its losses and withdraw by the end of the year.

Nowadays of course, the Somalia is largely forgotten by the American right – all the posters of Ethiopian troops have been torn down from right-wing bedrooms. But they still think their foreign policy prescription was the right one – and that Bush has left the world a safer place….

The piracy fad may be spreading around the African coast. Last week a Chinese fishing boat was attacked off the coast of Sierra Leone in West Africa. The pirates, all from neighbouring Guinea, took off with money and a boatload of fish. Unfortunately, the heavy cargo slowed down the pirates’ vessel, allowing the Sierra Leone navy to catch up with it and, after a scuffle which left four pirates dead, arrest those remaining.

The West African coast has many of the elements that make Somalia a good spot for a bit of buccaneering – rank poverty, lots of underemployed young men, unstable governments, endemic corruption and favourable geography. If ships start avoiding Suez and going the long way round the Horn of Africa instead, they might be in for a nasty surprise when they reach the opposite side of the continent.