gunboat flotilla numbered only about 30 ships. Think about
it: On any given day, 30 patrol vessels are trying to find five
guys in a Zodiac with some grappling hooks, automatic
rifles, and maybe rocket-propelled grenades in a vast expanse
of ocean. Even when the warships concentrate on the principal sea lanes, it’s not always possible for them to respond
quickly enough to thwart a pirate attack. Spread 30 patrol
cars across an area four times the size of Texas, and you don’t
have much of a deterrent … and a patrol car is a lot faster
than a warship.
Furthermore, even though more than 16 nations have
joined in the naval counter-piracy operation, there is one
important player missing: Somalia. Somalia, in diplomats’
language, is a “failed state”—one without a functioning government—which means there simply isn’t a Somali national
authority to appeal to. Piracy, at its core, is a land-based
problem because the pirates’ bases are located on shore. As
long as there’s no government to crack down on their activities, the pirates will have a safe haven in Somalia, and they
will continue to operate with impunity.
With little hope of a political solution anytime soon, commercial shipping lines are taking added steps to protect their
vessels, like installing barbed wire around the deck’s edges
and, in some cases, deploying armed guards. In addition, the
multinational naval consortium has established a special sea
lane for commercial ships, which allows it to keep a closer
protective watch over vessels transiting the area. These measures appear to be having some effect. The Associated Press
reports that they’ve cut down on the number of successful
Somali pirate attacks. In 2008, 42 successful pirate attacks
were reported; as of August 2009, the total was only 28.
It’s all in a day’s planning
As sensational as it may be, piracy, when looked at purely
from a supply chain perspective, is but another form of disruption. And disruption is something logistics professionals
deal with—and plan for—on a routine basis, identifying
threats, quantifying and ranking them, and then coming up
with ways to mitigate the damage.
In this regard, piracy is no different from any other risk—
say, a hurricane, port congestion, or a business failure by a
supplier. It’s a threat that can be rationally evaluated and
addressed as part of the contingency planning process (risk
mitigation measures might include upping insurance coverage, identifying alternative suppliers, and creating contingency freight routing plans with associated decision triggers).
But the question remains, have you done so?
Earl Boyanton recently retired from the post of assistant deputy under secretary of
defense for transportation policy, which he held from 2001 to 2008. In this position, he
was the DOD’s senior official focused on transportation in the Office of the Secretary
of Defense, spanning all DOD passenger and cargo transportation. He had oversight
responsibility for the biggest transportation operation in the world.
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