Hunt of the Sea Wolves

By now, it was obvious to everyone on the bridge that a collision was unavoidable. The officer commanded, “Sound the collision alarm! Close all watertight doors throughout the ship!”

            Collision alarms sounded on all decks. The crew shut and secured the watertight doors, trapping terrified passengers throughout the ship. On the bridge, the crew appeared to be in a stupor as the other ship closed the last few feet on its collision course.

            “Brace for collision!” the officer shouted as he exchanged a look of acceptance of the inevitable with the helmsman. They grabbed for anything solid, and waited the last few, agonizing moments.

            The Somalian brothers watched impassively as the giant cruise ship’s form filled the windows in front of them. An instant before impact, they turned to each other and embraced, which was not common in their Islamic culture.

           “Good-bye, little brother. May Allah welcome you,” Abdelahi said in their native Somali.

L.A. Times:

From a computer screen on this amphibious assault ship, U.S. sailors kept close watch on a 6-week-old drama more than 2,500 miles away involving pirates from Somalia and a Danish merchant vessel.

A second American warship was off the coast of Somalia near the captive vessel, a 115-foot tugboat called the Svitzer Korsakov with an international crew.

As long as the pirates didn’t mistreat the crew and continued to negotiate a ransom with the ship’s owner, the U.S. would not intervene. But if the pirates became violent or deprived crew members of food and water, heavily armed U.S. sailors were prepared to storm the Svitzer Korsakov and free the crew.

Independent.ie:

The moment marine engineer Fred Parle discovered his ship was under attack from pirates he feared he was “dead meat.”

In a scene which could have been straight out of ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’, heavily armed pirates used steel ladders and lines with hooks to board the 115-foot Svitzer Korsakov off the Somalian coast.

But this was no Hollywood fiction. As the 67-year-old lay face down on the deck with his hands over his head, he did not think he was going to survive.

ABC Radio Australia:

The head of the Philippines anti drug agency, Anselmo Avenido Junior, says the agency has received intelligence the nation’s most notorious Islamic militant group, the Abu Sayyaf, could be involved in the production of marijuana to raise finances.

The Abu Sayyaf is blamed for the country’s worst terrorist attack, the bombing of a ferry near Manila Bay in 2004 that killed 100 people.

The Communist New People’s Army, listed by the US State Department as a terrorist group, has been participating in large scale marijuana cultivation in the Northern Philippines since the 1980’s, while traditionally the Abu Sayyaf relies on kidnap for ransom to fund its operations.

Mr Avenido Junior has told Radio Australia’s Connect Asia program police are receiving regular intelligence the Abu Sayyaf Group is also involved.

People’s Daily Online:

Philippine police and military have thwarted an attack on government targets in southern region of Mindanao by the extremist bandits and Muslim anti-government militants, the police announced Monday.

Manila’s troops, whose training is partly assisted by the United States, has stepped up the offensive to root out Abu Sayyaf,a listed terrorist organization by both American and Filipino governments, since the beginning of last year.

Chinese News Asia:

The first Malacca Strait Patrols (MSP) Information Sharing Exercise was held on Friday at Singapore’s Tuas Naval Base.

The Singapore Armed Forces (SAF), Tentera Nasional Indonesia (TNI), Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF) and the Royal Thai Armed Forces (RTARF) took part in the exercise.

The exercise is part of an initiative which began in 2004 and is aimed at enhancing the security of the Straits of Malacca.

The initiative comprises the Malacca Strait Sea Patrol (MSSP), the “Eyes-in-the-Sky” (EiS) air patrols, as well as the Intelligence Exchange Group (IEG).

Since its launch, piracy incidents on the Straits have fallen from 38 in 2004 to just seven last year.

United States Joint Forces Command (USJFCOM) has released online an unclassified redacted version of the Joint Center for Operational Analysis (JCOA)-sponsored study entitled “The Iraqi Perspectives Project — Saddam and Terrorism:  Emerging Insights from Captured Iraqi Documents.”

In order to accommodate continuing public interest and to provide an accurate, definitive report, this online version is made available to improve efficient delivery of this material.

The five volumes of the document, linked below, documents the history of the Saddam regime.   

The Institute for Defense Analyses produced the report under contract for the command as part of the broader Iraqi Perspectives Project. 

The Iraqi Perspectives Project examines operational and strategic insights and lessons from the perspective of former senior Iraqi decision-makers through the analysis of primary source material such as interviews and captured regime documents. 

The study’s authors completed the report after screening more than 600,000 captured documents including several hundred hours of audio and video files archived by U.S. Department of Defense. 

As part of USJFCOM, JCOA studies strategic and operational lessons from recent and ongoing military operations in order to improve the joint force.

Volume 1 contains the executive summary of the report. Volumes 2-5 provide supporting documentations.

Click on the links below to download each volume individually.

• Volume 1
• Volume 2
• Volume 3
• Volume 4
• Volume 5

Science Christian Monitor:

Fresh fighting between Islamist militants and government troops in Somalia could trigger a new phase of humanitarian crisis in war-torn Somalia and prompt the UN Security Council to consider peacekeeping operations.

International aid agencies warned on Wednesday that Somalia had become too dangerous for its workers to help more than a million civilians living in difficult conditions. Fresh fighting erupted near the capital of Mogadishu in clashes between Islamist fighters and Somali troops, Agence France-Presse reports.

“Full right rudder, sir!” the helmsman replied as he spun the wheel hard right, unable to take his eyes off the ship that continued to come straight at them.

            Passengers were caught off balance by the sudden listing as the liner struggled to turn out of the path of the other ship. Water sloshed out of the Olympic-sized pool. A boy and girl who were climbing a fake rock wall swung out wildly. Then some of the passengers began to notice the other ship.

            The entire bridge crew stared out the window in shocked fascination as the ship bore down on them. No matter how many times the officer ordered a change in course, the cargo ship changed direction and continued on its course straight at the Bali Song Flower.

            One of the lookouts on the bridge wing studied the other ship through his binoculars. His view shifted from the bow to the side of the ship, where he saw her name, Maartensdijk, painted in rough letters. Then he looked at the bridge, where he could see a tall black man in a camouflage uniform and wearing a red beret. The man was looking back, seemingly right at him. The lookout started to shout a warning, but it was drowned out by the call from the bridge over the loudspeaker, “Sound the danger signal!”

          Six loud blasts from the ship’s horn echoed across the water as the space between the two ships continued to close. The blaring warning signal got all of the passengers’ and the rest of the crew’s attention. They lined up against the railing, mesmerized at the sight of the approaching ship. None seemed to realize the imminent danger speeding toward them. But as the distance between the ships continued to close and the blasts from the horn became more frantic, it was as if the same thought went through their collective consciousness—they had to get away. But, of course, there was no place to go.

ABS-CBN:

Catholic school professor held captive by the Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf bandit group for over two months has been released, a police official confirmed Thursday.

Chief Superintendent Joel Goltiao, ARMM police director, said Notre Dame professor Omar Taup was released by the bandits last March 18 at the public market of Bongao town in Tawi-Tawi province.

Goltiao said Taup’s sister Rebecca Husam informed the police about the professor’s release. Taup was immediately brought to Zamboanga City for medical treatment, the police official said.

He said the professor would have to stay in hospital to rest and recover. He said the professor has gone thin after over two months in captivity.