specialreport
BY STEVE GEARY, EDITOR AT LARGE
a call to arms?
The decision to arm
merchant ships may
carry some risks. But it
also appears to be our
best hope for keeping
crew members out of
harm’s way.
IN ITS NOVEMBER 2009 ISSUE, DC VELOCITY PUBLISHED AN
article about maritime piracy by Earl Boyanton, who recently
retired from an executive post at the U.S. Department of Defense.
The story led with an account of the April 2009 Maersk Alabama
incident—the attack by armed Somali pirates, the retaking of the
vessel by its unarmed crew, and the hostage crisis that ensued.
While working with the author on the development of the article, we learned that since the April attack, Maersk Line had made at
least one important change to its operating policy. By the time the
article was published, the Maersk Alabama had become an armed
merchant ship. We made a deliberate decision to omit that detail
out of respect for the safety of the people on board the ship.
But the news leaked out anyway. On Nov. 18, the Alabama was
attacked again, and news services around the world reported that
armed guards on the ship had repelled the attackers. So now we can
talk about the difficult decision made by Maersk Line’s leadership—a call that was controversial in some camps but which many
argue was the right one.
The firestorm over fire power
Maersk is not alone in arming its ships. In late October, Spain
authorized fishing vessels to carry guards armed with military
weapons. About three weeks later, reports surfaced of a Spanish
