There is some collective masturbation in the U.S. media about the freeing of the U.S. captain Phillips and the navy killing three of the pirates that were with him. WaPo headlines it as An Early Military Victory for Obama.
A few more of such victories and shipping around Somalia will really be in trouble.
So far the pirates refrained from doing personal harm to the ships crews. They took some ransom and left everyone free to go. They did not damage the ships or the cargo. Backed by their insurances, the shipowners were willing to pay up. As only 0.1-0.3% of the ships sailing through the the Gulf of Aden were captured, insurance premiums did increase only modestly. With shipping rates near record lows the total damage to the world economy was minimal.
All that may now change:
"The French and the Americans will regret starting this killing. We do not kill, but take only ransom. We shall do something to anyone we see as French or American from now," Hussein, a pirate, told Reuters by satellite phone.
There are only very few U.S. or French flagged international trade ships on the oceans at all so it is unlikely that the pirates will get a chance to do harm to French or U.S. crews. But I expect the situation to escalate anyway. From now on the pirates will be more nervous and likely more trigger-happy. They may start coordinated attacks, take hostages to land or damage ships or cargo. Insurance premiums will increase.
There certainly were better ways to deal with the situation. The hostage could have been freed with a moderate ransom payment. The culprits could have been overwhelmed after that and brought to trial in Kenya or elsewhere.
Then there is the whole issue of 'follow the money'. We are told that millions are payed to the pirates but none of the money can be tracked down? At the same time where every charity dollar to Palestine gets scrutiny that his hard to believe. And who are the people behind this business. I doubt this piracy surge, which beyond the attacks foreign fishing trawlers seems to be at least partly organized crime, is directed solely from Somali ground.
Piracy, like 'terrorism', is a criminal act that should be answered with policing, not with billion dollar warships and executions. The U.S. made the huge mistake of answering to 9/11 by military means. It now made the same mistake with regards to piracy.
I fear that Obama's 'victory' here will turn out to be like Bush's 'victory' at Tora Bora. The starting point of a very costly and bloody campaign in which will no one will win.