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Comment by hef19898 | Hacker News Reader

hef19898

So, this guy is basically advocating that the US, unilaterally, can ognore the Paris declaration of 1856? Well, the US never signed it (what a surprise...) in the first place. I really hoped the Ukraine war showed how respecting international law and treaties goes a long way in forming coalitions and stabilizing politics.

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Agreed -- and I should point out I don't personally support this piracy idea at all. Just 1) entertaining, 2) intellectually interesting to see how old school, Blackbeard-style piracy with letters of marque is actually still a possibility.

Yeah, intellectually it is interesting. I just fear that this will, ultimately, backfire. Privateering works better against an abundance of targets. Russian oligarchs and Russian Naval assets are lower in number than, say, Western shipping. So nothing would block Russia from issuing Letters of Marque and Reprisal against, e.g., shipping going to the EU and the US. Which would tie down a load of naval assets, and could hurt the West more than Letters of Marque would hurt Russia, once their assets are seized there's nothing else to be seized.

But hey, Pirates, harr!

EDIT: Now that I think of it, any prospective privateer is facing a couple of challenges (privateering is business after all): If you operate under an US Letter of Marque you have a limited number of prizes. Those prizes are comparatively easy to capture, legitimacy isn't your immediate concern and selling the prizes is a solved problem.

If you operate for the Russians, potential prizes are plenty. Legitimacy is a major concern, so. As is selling those prizes for money. Capturing a container ship is easy (just ask the Somalis), piloting it to a friendly port as well, crews are really small nowadays. Selling 10k TEU is a different story so, especially if the party issuing your Letter of Marque is short on hard currency. And has a limited number of deep sea ports. Those ports are, lucky for any potential privateer, close to the largest ports of origin in the Pacific. One just has to be careful to not piss of the Chinese. resorting to Letters of marque could turn the Pacific into a, almost, hot war zone resembling the Caribbean during the golden age of piracy.

Unlikely scenario, but stranger things have happened. It would make a great military fiction novel so!

It may be able to reverse global warming, if the Pastafarians are right.

> So nothing would block Russia from issuing Letters of Marque and Reprisal against e.g., shipping going to the EU and the US

Nothing except the US Navy patrolling shipping lanes, as they already do.

If Russian had a global navy they might have a stronger position. But as it is now, pirates will never encounter a Russian ship. They will likely encounter a US ship, especially if they try to disrupt that tanker full of Cheetos (or whatever).

Ah, despite all the patrolling Somali pirates had a quite successful run. Now scale that up at least ten fold. And the US Navy would then be the privateers' problem, not the problem of the Russian Navy, which could stick to the Russian coast where it can operate under aerial protection.

If anything, the Russians could benefit most from a full-blown privateering program.

I think you may be confusing the existence of Somali pirates to mean the US Navy doesn’t depress pirates. There would be many more than that without the Navy.

Privacy still exists [0] with more in the Straits of Malacca than off Somalia.

This piracy is much less due to the actions of the US Navy. I’m not sure why you think it would increase 10x if Russia endorsed privateering.

I think Russia’s position is moot since their fleet would never stop this in the first place. So their privateering position doesn’t seem to matter. While there’s lots more US (and US-bound) ships, I don’t think Russia’s navy is preventing any piracy.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy_in_the_21st_century

Will backfire? I think that there remain enough grownups in the Congress that this guy's idea will never get a vote on the floor of the House.

Sovereign states can always 'unilaterally' decide to do whatever they want. It all boils down to strength, really: the US can get away with much more than anyone else (Ukraine 2022 is not so different from Iraq 2003, and yet...) because they are much stronger than anyone else.

In this case, the main limitation is that the US and Russia don't want a direct war so will refrain from direct attacks. Even this guy is not suggesting the Navy should do it. But if Russia was much smaller (and without nukes) I think the US could actually be OK with sending the Navy to seize any Russian vessel they could find.

Privateers, under a proper Letter of Marque, are considered to be legitimate mercenaries. No much difference if it is Privateer Babossa of Commodore Norrington who's doing the seizing at sea, as long as the former is operating a letter of marque. Both parties are, basically, part of the same Navy. The other option would be outright piracy.

EDIT: Sure, sovereign states can unilaterally decide whatever they want. in case they are not North Korea they risk to break multiple treaties so. As Russia showed us, one miscalculation in such a sovereign decision bears the risk of turning said country into an isolated country, just like North Korea.

Countries can withdraw from treaties first so as not to formally break them, or just indeed break them.

The point is that the consequences depend on who you are. Russia is up against the US/West so consequences are severe and, again, we can contrast this against the consequences for the US of invading Iraq, which were none.

The real restriction is probably not really legitimacy but that that Russia would retaliate in kind.

Ukraine is not a state sponsor of terrorism like Hussein's Iraq was. I'd call this a very significant difference.

From the Russian point of view Ukraine provides weapons to militant groups whose objective is to kill the separatists. This is not far from terrorism.

Not far? It's about as far as it gets, really. Wouldn't you fully expect ANY nation to defend itself in this way?

I absolutely would! But hen I'm one of the few people that never really considered Afghan or Iraqi resistance against US and / or NATO forces to be "evil".

Understanding, e.g., Putin's motivation doesn't mean defending him.

Of course not, I'm not some authoritarian totalist. It was a small piece of land not critical to Ukraine as a whole. I don't think it was the right move for Ukraine to make.

Was it right for Putin to flood the disputed territories with Russian nationals then lay claim to said areas to "protect Russians"?

That would be weird if it happened but from what I understand what you're saying isn't accurate. A lot of people were leaving the area rather than entering.

Hawaii is small so it's fine to giveaway, isn't it?

There's more than one reason to see another country as a potential target for invasion.

> like Hussein's Iraq was

Bull.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijackers_in_the_September_11_...

“The hijackers in the September 11 attacks were 19 men affiliated with the militant Islamist group al-Qaeda. They hailed from four countries; fifteen of them were citizens of Saudi Arabia, two were from the United Arab Emirates, one was from Lebanon, and one from Egypt.”

Iraq is not mentioned even once in the article.

Do not attempt to shift the goal posts. The 2003 invasion of Iraq was specifically tied to Saddam's possession of WMDs (demonstrably false) and his willingness to use them (therefore also false), and the constant linking of Iraq to 9/11 (fake news).

transcript of US General Wesley Clark on the Iraq Invasion | American War Generals (2014) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcWs4TFSjrY

   00:04 I got called in by an officer on the
   00:07 Joint Staff who told me that he said you
   00:09 know we're gonna invade Iraq. I said but
   00:11 why? And he said I don't know he said I
   00:15 guess because we don't know what else to
   00:17 do. But in fact the why of it went back a
   00:21 decade to the spring of 1991, it went
   00:26 back to the argument inside the
   00:28 Republican Party about whether or not
   00:31 the Gulf War should have ended with the
   00:35 capture of Baghdad and the overthrow of
   00:37 Saddam Hussein. And in 1991 when I talked
   00:40 to secretary Wolfowitz you know he said
   00:42 we didn't get rid of Saddam Hussein and
   00:44 and we should have, he said we've only
   00:47 got five or 10 years to clean up the
   00:51 Middle East these old Soviet surrogate
   00:54 regimes like Syria and Iraq get rid of
   00:56 them before the next superpower comes
   00:59 along the challenges

This is the undisputed historical reality. These are not hidden truths, this is public knowledge. Anybody intimating otherwise is either deliberately misconstruing past events to suit their own version of how they want things to be or is a useful idiot[2] oblivious to the nonsense they are spouting.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2008/de...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot

It's irrelevant in the scope of the discussion. Iraq '03 was wrong, and the current Russian invasion of a democratic country is wrong.

> It's irrelevant in the scope of the discussion.

1. It was relevant to the point being made further up :- that is to say, on the world stage, might unfortunately makes right

2. You don't get to police the boundaries of what I choose to respond to.

> Iraq '03 was wrong, and the current Russian invasion of a democratic country is wrong.

Which was my point. Whether the US does it in Iraq, or Russia does it in Ukraine, or Saudi Arabia does it in Yemen[1][2], or Israel does it in Syria[3]

Which is why I expect we'll see sanctions levied on Saudi Arabia and Israel any day now.

[1] Saudi-led coalition strikes target Yemen capital after drone attack: https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20220214-saudi-led-c...

[2] The Saudi blockade on Yemen is a war crime, and only civilians suffer from it: https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/05/24/the-saudi-block...

[2] Syria: Two civilians killed in Israeli attack near Damascus: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/7/syria-two-civilians-... “Since war broke out in Syria in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of air attacks inside the country, targeting government positions as well as allied Iran-backed forces and fighters of the Shia group Hezbollah.”

> I really hoped the Ukraine war showed how respecting international law and treaties goes a long way in forming coalitions and stabilizing politics.

Isn't it? The world is united. There is one country flagrantly violating international law, and that's russia. They are paying for it. All other countries are in agreement that this must end.

The coalition is forming. And it will eventually succeed in taming Russian aggression.

I just hope that this time we demilitarize russia like we did with Germany and Japan. The world has had enough with russia swinging a broken bottle around and adding very little value to anything.

It is constitutional to enter into treaties that to undermine other parts of the constitution. So the US avoids that. 1856 was a gamble but now it absolutely has the leverage to avoid that.

This is a bit of a hilarious take. I mean we have international laws and treaties already. Nazi Germany was found guilty of “Starting a war of aggression” (but the USSR wasn’t, funny that).

The truth is international laws and treaties are worthless for the most part. The only thing enforcing them are states - states that have complete sovereignty over whether or not to enforce them.

For the most part international laws and treaties are just cover for powerful nations doing what they want.

Well, the USSR was called out for the various wars with Finland and Poland, up to the point the Western Allies promised help before retreating to "my enemies enemy..." with Stalin. SO when exactly did the USSR start an invasion without being called out? And don't count invasions during WW2 against the Axis, those don't count once a war started.

I mean Germany was found guilty during the Nuremberg trials in part for its invasion of Poland - the one where the USSR secretly agreed to it and murder thousands of Polish Officers.

Yet the USSR was not one of the defendants at the trial but rather one of the judges.

At the time so, USSR was called out for it, the Allies were not that hot on the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, were they? Lucky for them they ended up on the right side (and winning side) of history.

I doubt anyone in congress has any idea what international laws are, and they're too petulant and grandstanding to care anyway. That's why we have a commander in chief, I guess.

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