I will be impressed when they have the balls to even look a Chinese ship in the eye, let alone board one.
4
U_Sound_Stupid_Stop19 hr ago
+12
Yeah, advertising it in advance sounds like a good way to fall into some kinds of traps...
"oh wow, drones are coming out of this ship!"
12
zIFeathers21 hr ago
+100
American pirates!
100
Irr3l3ph4nt20 hr ago
+36
Fun fact, some of America's first diplomatic moves as a country were to sign treaties with pirates to pay them off so they would leave their ships alone. So technically, besides signing a few alliances, the first thing they've done was negotiate with terrorists. Just a bit jarring when you look at the current foreign policy.
36
ccblr0620 hr ago
+7
Are you talking about in the 1800s?
7
Irr3l3ph4nt20 hr ago
+27
1780s-1790s, then Jefferson got tired of paying, built a fleet and Tripoli happened.
Note that during the same period, the US refused to help their main ally, France, during its revolutionary war, after France almost bankrupted themselves financing the American revolution and sending ships to help, triggering said French revolution. I bet the French were really mad.
27
thegoatmenace20 hr ago
+12
But like, who would the Americans have helped in the French Revolution? The Monarchy that supported them, or the revolutionaries who aligned with them ideologically (and had some key American revolutionaries among them). It was kind of an internal thing, they weren’t rebelling against a foreign colonial power.
12
Ocelitus15 hr ago
+4
And it isn't like the French weren't helping the American revolutionaries as a way to proxy conflict with the British.
4
Irr3l3ph4nt19 hr ago
-2
Frankly, that's a bad excuse. The American government knew exactly the ideological hypocrisy of their stance. They just didn't want to stop trading or get more pirates or attacks on their ships. And ironically, the French ended up paying privateers to attack their ships since they were trading with the Republic's enemies.
-2
too_much_feces18 hr ago
+5
The US also refused to help Haiti when they against the French for the same reasons we revolted against the British.
5
4h20m00s15 hr ago
+3
I must have missed the part where the American revolution was a slave revolt in colonies where \~90% of the population were slaves rather than a revolt led by a bunch of wealthy slavers who didn't want to pay taxes.
3
BaggyOz9 hr ago
+1
Sought of like how the Americans revolted after being asked to pay taxes to cover some of the expenses incurred fighting the French and Indian War.
1
derkrieger15 hr ago
+3
Because that was what everyone did at the time. At first we did, then we built ships with the explicit purpose of killing the pirates so we didn't have to pay them. Sweden even helped out because they were keen on the "f*** pirates" stance. It was a major blow to the Pirates in the Mediterranean and slowly dominoed into more countries saying "f*** pirates" after seeing that it could work out.
3
Bhaal5275319 hr ago
-6
We didn’t have a real navy at the time. Go read up on history a bit before spouting nonsense.
-6
Irr3l3ph4nt18 hr ago
+3
Maybe keep reading?
3
TrickshotCandy12 hr ago
+1
Aaaaaaaaargh!
1
mikezer020 hr ago
+20
these people are so f****** stupid its honestly incredible
20
0Hakuna_Matata021 hr ago
+20
Oh yea this will definitely end well
20
No_Manufacturer86821 hr ago
+18
According to Trump the war was over /s. What a joke!
18
Brilliant_Version34421 hr ago
+8
I guess those us marines won’t be heading home anytime soon I mean what Middle East country will want to deal with and probably forced to pay for the ghost fleet to be anchored in their port
8
Significant-Colour21 hr ago
-2
Some of them won't be heading home at all, unless their bodies get fished out of the water.
There is a very solid chance of something going wrong, maybe a helicopter crash, maybe a ship... missed rope, forgotten check...
-2
TowelCarryingTourist20 hr ago
+8
So,is this like the piracy and theft of Venezuela's oil? Is a Qatar bank account to have more b**** deposits?
8
Scriefers20 hr ago
+5
No. This is war.
5
BloodWorried744618 hr ago
-3
but not at war. there’s no congressional approval.
-3
Scriefers17 hr ago
+5
That concept has been dead since 1945. Argue semantics all you want. When I see a duck I call it a duck, not a Hooded Merganser or whatever other species it may be.
5
DeepBreathOfDirt17 hr ago
+2
The US took 100M in gold from the Venezuela, too.
2
Gadshill21 hr ago
+4
This would apply to vessels of the shadow fleet carrying Iranian oil.
4
ObviouslyRealPerson19 hr ago
+4
OK?
we'll board those, but for fishing boats in the pacific it's instant death sentence...
4
derkrieger15 hr ago
+1
Dont wanna waste perfectly good oil but brown people fishing? Eh the US Government doesn't care about them
1
Libinky18 hr ago
+2
How fing stupid is he? Dumb question.
2
Old_Caterpillar_538520 hr ago
+3
So what stops Iran from turning some these into drones / floating IEDs? What's losing a few 30 year old tankers to the regime for the PR win?
3
R3D4F20 hr ago
+2
Make Israel Great Again!
2
Hazelnutpie1918 hr ago
+1
It's not boots on the ground!
It's just boots on deck.
1
Stockengineer18 hr ago
+1
Poop deck
1
dawgblogit18 hr ago
+2
Really going to be hard finding a bomb hidden in a tanker when its beeing escorted..
2
[deleted]17 hr ago
-1
[deleted]
-1
Ocelitus15 hr ago
+2
The article is very short and answers your question.
40 Comments