How many Somalis is it worth killing to regain an oil tanker?
it should be none, of course.
and hostage taking is not to be justified.
(there is, admittedly, a very good case to think that hostages have on the whole not been harmed much yet purely because the pirates are having their demands met; and are, also, not stupid).
to be fair, i merely liked Adler's usage of the 'out to lunch' phrase (whilst simultaneously praising) and felt it was a perfect fit for the absurd argument crackerjack posted above from the often fine AHA.
(clearly, Somali piracy - as noted on the relevant thread - is a sympton of the broken state. though, funnily enough, most pirates are supposed to come from Puntland.)
OT but interestingly - and a little differently from the 'wholly independently-acting European firms dumping' thesis i myself seem to remember fingering on that thread -
some maintain
Local warlords, many of them former ministers in Siad Barre’s last government, received large payments from Swiss and Italian firms for access to their respective fiefdoms.
Most of the waste was simply dumped on remote beaches in containers and leaking disposable barrels