I have got the opportunity today.
I and I am sure many of you must have been surprised at the bravado of these pirates on the high seas who were looting ships at will in this modern era where every action is available by everybody to see on Google maps.
I am sure the action by the Indian Governement will put a stop to the piracy.
But this action was easy as the thieves wee external.
But what about the thieves sitting in the government, the politicians and criminals.
When will the government take action against them.
THAT WILL BE THE DAY WHEN I WILL REALLY PRAISE THE GOVERNMENT.
Radheshyam
Taken from "The Telegraph"
Nov. 19: The Indian naval headquarters has been decisively unshackled in conducting global operations with the destruction of a “mother vessel” of pirates in the Gulf of Aden yesterday.
INS Tabar’s operation came nine years after the Indian Navy flexed its muscles in international waters by seizing a Japanese-owned freighter, the Alondra Rainbow, from Indonesian pirates.
For nearly five years now, caution and discretion at the external affairs ministry — tacitly encouraged by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) — have constrained naval headquarters from exercising what it sees as the Indian Navy’s rightful role on the high seas as an emerging power and the largest neighbourhood force with legitimate interests in the Gulf and Southeast Asia.
With the public outcry over Indian hostages seized by Somali pirates, the navy yesterday overcame long-standing political objections against the use of force in international waters and engaging “enemies” far away from home in co-operation with multinational forces. On November 11, Tabar had tested waters by saving an Indian vessel, but no pirate ship was destroyed then.
A senior naval officer said on condition of anonymity that pressure for action to protect Indian hostages from pirates was similar to that on the government to act after an Indian Airlines plane was hijacked and taken to Kandahar in 1999.
The destruction of the pirate vessel will, therefore, be a turning point in the years-long quest at Naval Headquarters to become part of a multinational co-operative security framework in a region which is vital for India’s maritime security, he predicted.
“It is encouraging that the Government of India is looking at the Gulf and Somali waters from a security perspective, but more needs to be done,” said Rahul Roy-Chaudhury, author of two books on India’s sea power and maritime security, now a senior fellow for South Asia at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.
Roy-Chaudhury, who was in the national security council secretariat when Atal Bihari Vajpayee was Prime Minister, said “more” that is crying to be done includes institutionalising Indian naval patrols in trouble spots such as the Gulf of Aden and keeping regular contact with ships of other nations through upgraded communications.
Strategic experts are unanimous that yesterday’s action will mean a higher profile for the navy, which hitherto won international praise for disaster relief and management with other nations, such as during the Asian tsunami in December 2004.
It has not yet won accolades for armed action far away from its coast, although the rescue of the Alondra Rainbow from Indonesian pirates was a factor in convincing the Japanese to start a security co-operation dialogue — including naval co-operation — with India shortly thereafter.
At the US department of defence here, officials who are aware of tensions between naval headquarters in New Delhi and the external affairs ministry, were smiling in the knowledge that the trigger which set off yesterday’s action has the potential to change the course of defence relations between and among nations.
The Pentagon has been lobbying in New Delhi for five years for India to join the US-led Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) aimed at stopping shipments of weapons of mass destruction globally.The Indian Navy’s leadership has tilted towards joining the PSI in internal discussions in South Block, but political correctness has cast a veto over a decision in favour of the initiative.In the US Navy, there is immense interest in analysing yesterday’s action because Tabar is Russian-built. It is also the first vessel in the Talwar class — modified Krivak III class Russian frigate — to be armed with supersonic BrahMos anti-ship cruise missiles.
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