Good on the French for picking up a little of the slack.  But eventually a major military power will have to step in and deal with the situation.  Which, today, pretty much means the US or China — who else has a large and strong enough military to do more than pick around the edges?  Fortunate, perhaps, that China has a serious investment in oil from Sudan.  That means their ships have to go thru the Horn of Africa.

So what can be done? Short of a miraculous intervention that would knit the fragmented segments of Somali society into a cohesive whole, it is not realistic to expect much help from the Somalian government, though it should certainly be encouraged to take more responsibility for patrolling its own waters and enforcing its own laws. The brunt of the work is going to have to be done by the countries whose ships need access to the Indian Ocean. It will also require moving beyond the traditional cliches of “not negotiating with terrorists” and that “paying ransom only encourages more piracy.”

I wonder in how far this is possible considering the political problems and instability in Somalia. I’m also, additionally, wondering whether Somali leaders aren’t secretly encouraging piracy (that’s truly a question; I don’t know the answer).

A steady application of force, as exemplified by the Ponant raid, might be enough to persuade the surviving pirates to turn their entrepreneurial skills to much better use.

LOL; beautifully put.