Why can't warships fire on pirates?

The warships send helicopters or otherwise "scare" the pirates away, but after that, they can't fire on the pirates? When the pirates surrender, all they can do is arrest them and return them to Somalia? This doesn't make sense to me. How can the pirates holding the US captain call for reinforcements, while the US Navy isn't allowed to fire upon and sink the reinforcements? The pirates say they are not afraid of the warships. Ya think? Since the warships aren't allowed to use any of their weapons, I wouldn't be afraid either.
Additional Details
For clarification, I'm talking about sinking known pirate ships that do NOT have hostages. Helicopters have "scared" them off, and saved ships, but then nothing else. Once they are far enough away from their original target, they should be fired upon and sunk since they were caught red handed right?

MVR

The warships have very specific procedures to follow regarding their supervision of a pirated vessel. Generally, the US Navy will not fire on other vessels other than in self-defense, especially with a hostage onboard. There are other factors in play, but suffice it to say that the CO of BAINBRIDGE is doing everything in his power to ensure an outcome where Alabama's master is safely freed.

gary l

welcome to failing of america...thanks Libs!

Hater Police

Killing the hostage is not the best outcome.

Dan K

There are hostages involved. Firing upon the pirates would probably jeopardize the lives of the hostages.

Don

Cause they value that American hostage's life. Otherwise - yes

M&T

See that's the problem...idle threats...what we need to do is uncork some of those big guns and those wooden legged Parrot lovers would crap down their good legs! Not to mention they wouldn't be able to hear for weeks...but no we'll just give them a very stern warning like we did the North Koreans.

dawg

THE U.S. is not going to do any thing except talk. and this is B.S.with leaders like obama,and pelosi the whole world will soon know they can do any thing they want.and will not have to answer to the us.

DebbieP

DON'T YOU PEOPLE WATCH THE NEWS? These pirates are in a closed boat holding an innocent american ship's captain hostage and they don't want to kill him. The reinformcent ships are holding 300 more hostages. The U.S. tries other means before just blowing all these people up.

Marvin the Martian

We would like to avoid hostage deaths. The French just had that happen, they probably got the least worst outcome possible.

If a ship approaches and we can be sure there are no hostages, then we can safely fire on and possibly sink it.

Irrespective of what happens on sea, at some point we will have to take action on land. Our response must be brutal so that in the future they will avoid our ships.

asmul8ed

There is a point to be made about firing upon ships with hostages aboard. That doesn't mean that we can't have surgical ops which eradicate the pirates. If the risk of death for a pirate was a higher certainty, there would be less occurrences of piracy. The issue is that the US and other naval powered nations don't really want to get too involved in the policing of pirates. To the nations that can do something about it, the reward for eradication of pirates is not high enough as compared to the risk and expense. Those that don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. European nations didn't give credible weight to piracy until it got out of hand, and it was too late. We'll see what happens this time.

Earth Needs Oil

What good would it do to distroy the ship that the pirates took.

kevinkg

okay this might be hard to believe, their is this thing called international law...and we happen to be a nation that actually follows it...do not worry, this is not the first time something like this has happened...ask leon...smile

WCSteel

Obama is a coward and wont give the order.

If the commanders give the order they will be courtmatialed and imprisoned by the traitor in Cheif.

Adam B

They can actually seize or sink their ships and take them back to the home country of the arresting ship. They just don't want to, because it's too inconvenient and/or costly.

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