The Arms Race Against Pirates

On Apr. 14 the International Chamber of Commerce reported that piracy at sea had hit a high. In the first three months of this year, according to the Chamber's International Maritime Bureau (IMB), there were 142 attacks, the most in the first quarter of any year since the bureau began keeping track in 1991. Somali pirates were responsible for most of these attacks, which have increased sharply in number and level of violence since 2006, when Islamist authority on Somalia's coast began to crumble in the wake of a U.S.-backed invasion by Ethiopian troops. Last year, pirates used guns in at least 243 attacks and took 1,181 hostages. They're now armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. They are taking bulk cargo carriers and oil tankers along with their crews and demanding multimillion-dollar ransoms.