Palos Verdes Real Estate

Somali Pirates

WW I Q-ship taking care of U-boat

I am sure this must be in the planning stage, but we’ve all heard of “bait cars” used to catch car thieves, right? What we need now are a few “bait boats” (if the fishing industry will loan the term), modeled along the lines of the WW 1 British Q Ships. Disguised as innocent, vulnerable merchantmen, they would lure a German U-boat within range, then drop the gunwales and blast the sub out of the water with previously concealed deck guns.

Stephen Decatur

While the British had to deploy over 350 of them, the Somali pirates’ field of operation is sufficiently limited that it seems like a half dozen or so would do the job — both in actual destruction and as deterrence. They could pose as private yachts, merchant ships, or whatever would best attract these roaches. I’m guessing that a sufficient number of them could be converted from existing vessels and manned with Navy Seals and Marines (a few in drag lounging on deck just for effect) for the cost of one sortie of a navy carrier group. We could even name them after the guys who took care of the North African pirates in 1801 — Stephen Decatur, Presley O’Bannon, William Bainbridge, Edward Preble. If I was still in the Marines, I’d volunteer.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 9th, 2011 at 6:48 am and is filed under Everything I've Written, History & Current Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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