Now that the Somalian pirates have defied the US forces sent to assist and had the gall to hi-jack an American ship we are likely to see some fireworks. The oops factor has kicked in and these high seas criminals have made a mistake. When I was a boy I used to like the idea of a Pirate movie or playing game with my friends in which we, as pirates, captured ships and took prisoners who were made to walk the plank or captured one of the girls and held her hosstage, although one of them always wanted to be pirate captain. This as you can imagine was a bit of nuisance for us boys as we expecetd the girls to be girls and not tom-boys. Unfortunately this one was a tougher than some of us and got her way - she was also quite pretty and those early stirring unrecognised for what they were encouraged giving way.
The game was fun and although I had some idea that piracy was not all peg legs and parrots that squawked 'pieces of eight' I was happy to play my part. The sword fighting and the silly accents we adopted were all part of it as well as the romantic movie images, and of course the book Treasure Island, the story of Peter Pan and Hook and the popular hero worship of Sir Francis Drake who was little more than a state sponsored pirate if historians have it right. The bloodthirsty appeal of a pirate on the Spanish Main was a great draw for a boy. It was later as an adult that I realised how awful a pirate's life must have been; short, brutal and precarious.
Today we have an expectation of being able to travel wherever we wish within reason by air and sea and to be wise about going to places we consider to be dangerous, as westerners that is, but we do expect to cruise the seas with safety other than for storms and such sea borne hazards. Piracy doesn't come into it.
Except that is for the Somali pirates who are getting bolder. It is time they were reminded that attacking the US, European and Russian ships is a mistake. In 1941 the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and learned that the Paper Tiger had claws and teeth and they got badly mauled. The US was taken by surprise and in 2001 Al Queada attacked the US which created a reaction - the US got annoyed and fought back. That is a difficult fight.
The pirates of Somalia by attacking a US ship have grabbed a Tiger by the tail and the nature of tigers is to turn on their attackers and bite them. Oops! Let us watch the claws and teeth in action - take a lesson from Entebbe and the recent French attack to release a yacht siezed by the pirates, or from the bravery of the passengers inn the aircraft on its way to damage the White House.
When you insult American patroism you take a tiger by the tail and should expect to get bitten on the bum.
