Al-Qaida Intends To Attack Ships In The Mediterranean

Al-Qaida Suicide Bombers Plan To Attack Ships In The Mediterranean

Photo Credit: USCG

According to our private sources and an article in the UK's Guardian by Seumas Milne and Ewen MacAskill  published February 25, 2015 ; Al-Qaida has formed a seagoing unit designed to perform suicide attacks on commercial and possibly naval ships in the Mediterranean Sea. Citing Russian Intelligence Sources the authors of Guardian article and our own sources indicate that al-Qaida (Aqim-al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb has formed a 60 man suicide bomber crew. The operatives are dedicated enough for suicide missions but not every mission will be planned as a suicide mission. Planned tactics will include planting of improvised mines and the use of small fast attack craft for determined attacks that could end in a Kamikaze like act. The sources for this information include not only a leaked document from Russia's Federal Security Service but also a number of internal ISIS al-Qaida documents reported on by Middle Eastern journalists. Sources include briefings by Omani Intelligence giving ISIS troop estimates (35,000 by their last reported count) and estimated income ($1.5 million daily). Also among the cited sources  United Arab Emirates releases,and reports of confessions by terrorists suspects questioned by Jordan. 

 Al-Qaida has utilized small craft in suicide mode before against the USS COLE which killed 17 sailors.

Our own analysts believe that if these reports are correct and Al-Qaida does intend to attack commercial shipping in the Mediterranean they may already be contacting shipping interests in a tolls for protection racket, receiving payments through the same Swiss banks that now handle the ransom payments to the Somali Pirates.  Really there is nothing new here, this was the game of the Barbary pirates. Some shippers may pay because they operate under open registry flags like Panama and Liberia which can not offer them any naval protection. However unlike Barbary Pirates scheme there is no major Western Shipping power that will receive any benefit from this activity. In the era of the Barbary Pirates British shipping was largely left alone due to the strength of the British navy. British merchant shipping became the safest and preferred carrier  in the Mediterranean trades and so the British Navy did not offer routine protection  to any other commercial shipping and did not attack the pirates as long as the pirates did not attack British shipping. Today EU, NATO, American, Japanese, South Korean, Australian and occasionally Chinese and even Iranian ships perform escort services off Somalia for any shipping and will respond to calls for help from all shipping. We wouldn't predict a lot of success for Al-Qaida in this endeavor except for straining Western naval capabilities. Either the West will continue to shrink its naval services or finally get angry, increase forces and attack pirate/terrorist strong holds ashore, lose patience with fifth column Muslims within their own borders ,expelling most and put a screeching stop to the whole Islamic conquest movement. Of course the office holders presently in office today having created the monster won't do that but there are some indications in the West that electorates not out numbered by Muslims are changing out office holders. Basically this more hope than trend. 

                                                                  

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BOOK REVIEW: THE GREAT TRADE ROUTES

THE GREAT TRADE ROUTES 

      A History of Cargoes and Commerce over Land and Sea

           By Philip Parker
                 ISBN 978-1-59114-335-2  

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 S/V Christian Radich  PD

 ""The ancient world saw the expansion of Western Asian, Mediterranean and Polynesian civilizations as transport networks for trade were established. Later, imperial expansion reached far flung corners of the world. The Great Trade Routes examines the principal trade networks throughout history, encompassing coastal and trans-oceanic maritime trade, inland waterway traffic, and overland trade. Filled with fascinating historical detail, exotic locales, and a wealth of illustrations, the book analyzes the importance of trade to commercial and cultural exchange, focusing on great routes such as the Silk Road, the Grand Trunk, Via Maris, Hanseatic and Mediterranean sea-routes, tea and grain races and passages to the New World." Amazon's Book Description.

OUR OPINION: This is an enjoyable and informative book for anyone especially history buffs, but a bit pricey for general audiences. We'd recommend it as a library loan for anyone but at the present price we can only recommend it as a must have for the maritime and logistic professionals. It is a perfectly complimentary volume to previous recommendations we have made about certain ancient and continuing basic trade commodities such as Spices, Clay, and Salt. 

  Consider also:            

          

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JOE ROCHEFORT'S WAR, A BACKGROUND LOOK AT THE CAST OF CHARACTERS

"Elliot Carlson's award-winning biography of Capt. Joe Rochefort is the first to be written about the officer who headed Station Hypo, the U.S. Navy's signals monitoring and cryptographic intelligence unit at Pearl Harbor, and who broke the Japanese navy's code before the Battle of Midway. The book brings Rochefort to life as the irreverent, fiercely independent, and consequential officer that he was. Readers share his frustrations as he searches in vain for Yamamoto's fleet prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, but share his joy when he succeeds in tracking the fleet in early 1942 and breaks the code that leads Rochefort to believe Yamamoto's invasion target is Midway. His conclusions, bitterly opposed by some top Navy brass, are credited with making the U.S. victory possible and helping to change the course of the war. The author tells the story of how opponents in Washington forced Rochefort's removal from Station Hypo and denied him the Distinguished Service Medal recommended by Admiral Nimitz. In capturing the interplay of policy and personality and the role played by politics at the highest levels of the Navy, Carlson reveals a side of the intelligence community seldom seen by outsiders." Amazon's Book 

Description

                                                                                

For a full understanding of the man, Carlson examines Rochefort's love-hate relationship w

The Bomb Plot

Namazu's Pal Vic Socotra Remembers The First Hand Stories Of Joe Rochefort's War as told to him by the late Admiral Mac Showers, who was there. Another Reason to read your DAILY SOCOTRA: www.vicsocotra.com 


Joe Rochefort's War: The Odyssey of the Codebreaker Who Outwitted Yamamoto at Midway 


 We got snow last night, the most accumulation  of this winter, and Washington is Predictably Paralyzed. Willow is closed for an unprecedented second night in a row, and I officially have cabin fever. In the meantime, the memories of the placid waters of Pearl Harbor will not leave me alone. This morning it was the Bomb Plot message.

 That is the one that might- or might not- have provided the advance information that the Japanese were interested in the precise locations of the American fleet. It might- or might not- have resulted in a different outcome in the attack. Some say that if the fleet was at sea, and might have tried to engage the attacking Japanese and been sunk in deep water, with thousands more casualties, and the proud ships lost forever, not salvaged as they were.

 I got a note a week or so ago from a documentary filmmaker in the UK who is married to a pal who is a journalist based in the UK. Vicki Barker is the voice I trust on the CBS radio network. Her husband is interested in doing a documentary on the appalling way that Admiral Husband Kimmel, commander of the Pacific Fleet, and Lt. General Walter Short were hung out to dry in the wake of the disastrous attack on Pearl Harbor. As I have told you (over and over) I lived and worked in the buildings that survived the Day of Infamy, and I was fortunate to have been a drinking buddy and tipsy Boswell to RADM Donald "Mac" Showers, the last of the JN-25 code-breakers at Station HYPO in Pearl. My stories are sincere, but were never intended to be documentary history. I always liked to get to the loopy aspects of history- like, what was the party like at the quarters of chief codebreaker Joe Rochefort after the amazing results of the battle of Midway became known? (Answer: It was a good one). 

 Elliot Carlson is a professional historian who was working on his extraordinary biography of Rochefort through the same period, and detailed the scandalous story of Joe�s removal from command of HYPO by ankle-biting careerist hacks in the moment of his greatest triumph.

    There is still a lot of emotion in all this. I know a pompous jackass here in town who was going around trying to discredit the story of how Joe�s band of Japanese linguists and cytologists identified the target of the attack on Midway.

As you may recall, ENS Mac Showers was sitting at his desk in the Dungeon when Jasper Holmes outlined his scheme to tell the Commander at Midway (by way of secure submarine cable) to report by unencrypted radio that the fresh water plant on the coral atoll was malfunctioning. Holmes said that when the Japanese copied the radio transmission, it might reveal the identity of the target for the coming attack, and permit decisive action by the American Fleet. Joe Rochefort liked the idea, and it worked. Within a few days, an encrypted Japanese message was de-coded that revealed the target- �AF�- was having fresh water problems.

 It wasn�t perfect intelligence, but that is about as good as it gets in the world of COMINT. Joe was wary of the testy relations he had with the radio intelligence people back in Washington. He didn't want the conclusion of the elegant subterfuge to be compromised by suspicion of who figured it out. So he provided the information to the Fleet Radio Unit in Melbourne, Australia, (FRUMEL) to have them report it.

Joe had a sign behind his desk that read: �There is no limit to what you can do, so long as you don�t care who gets the credit.� And so, sixty years after the fight, people were still fighting about stealing credit for what Jasper and Joe did in the basement of the 14^th Naval District. With things like that going on, Elliot relied heavily on Mac's razor-sharp recollections to keep things straight. We are still attempting to get Mac's 26-hour oral history transcribed and declassified- money and personnel bandwidth has been a challenge but we continue to press.

 Elliot�s interviews with Mac were conducted in a much more focused manner than the ones I was doing, but they were complementary in nature.

I have asserted that the real villain in all this was Admiral Richmond Kelly �Terrible� Turner, who had been Chief of War Plans at Main Navy before the war had been instrumental in denying Hawaii access to the high-level Japanese Diplomatic messages in the Purple intelligence stream. That, and the famous Bomb Plot message are described In "Joe Rochefort's War."(Joe Rochefort's War: The Odyssey of the Codebreaker Who Outwitted Yamamoto at Midway)  )

(A rare surviving example of a Purple enciphering machine. Image National Cryptologic Museum).

The Bomb Plot message is presented on page 154 and onward in the book. The question from the filmmaker was about exactly that. I wrote him back that �Arlington Hall Station (across from where I now live) was where the Army conducted its code-breaking. Their charter- and part of the division of labor with Navy- was to attack the Japanese high-level diplomatic code (Purple) as well as less important cypher systems used by the Japanese diplomatic corps.� 

HYPO's mission was only to track Japanese Naval ships. The Bomb Plot message was in a different cypher system than Purple, known as �J-19,� and was considered a secondary priority to breaking Purple traffic. The message had originally been copied on 24 September at the Army intercept site at Fort Shafter on Oahu. They lacked translators and machine support at Monitoring Station-5 (MS-5), and so the cable in question was shipped back to Washington for processing.

According to Elliot, the message was eventually deciphered a few weeks later and circulated to the Army and Navy Radio Intelligence brass. They determined the request for detailed anchorage positions was routine and the message was then filed away without action. 

 It did not come to light until the Pearl Harbor inquiries were held- the first in the wake of the attack, and the second, more elaborate one, after the war was over and the sense of urgency slightly less. Later, when the existence of the messages were revealed, Rochefort himself was not confidant that he would have recognized the Bomb Plot message as significant. He remarked that he might have just chalked it up to the obsessive nature of Japanese collection philosophy.

That was emphatically not true for Admiral Husband Kimmel and Lt. Gen. Short were, since they had already been railroaded and scapegoated. Both were back in Washington before the existence of the Bomb Plot message was revealed to either. Eddie Layton would probably have been the one to bring it to Kimmel as his Fleet Intelligence Officer, but it never made it back to Hawaii. ?Nor did the high level Japanese diplomatic traffic transmitted in the Purple system. Richmond Kelly Turner made sure those messages did not get to Admiral Kimmel- including the ones that directed Japanese diplomatic staff to have things wrapped up by the end of November 1941. The Kido Butai, the IJN Main Body, sortied for Pearl on the 26^th of that month.

 At the dawn of the age of machine encryption, special machines had been constructed to assist the laborious process of breaking the contents of the messages- there are some great stories to tell about black-bag jobs and the like conducted by Naval Intelligence to enable the penetration of the codes. Station CAST in the Philippines had one. Station NEGAT in Washington had one.

The one intended for Pearl was in Bletchley Park in the UK. There is a story about that, too, and maybe we will get back to Beach Gradients one of these mornings soon. But if anyone tells you that Joe Rochefort was wrong, or that the guys in Australia had anything to do with Jasper Holmes and his great idea, just tell them they are pompous windbags.

 Oh, and it is good to have friends. Thanks to them , I can give you a look at some Great Americans who got passed over yesterday:

Copyright 2015 Vic Socotra

www.vicsocotra.com

Twitter: @jayare303

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Bangladesh Ferry Accident Claims Dozens Of Lives

THE HUFFINGTON POST REPORTS IN A STORY BY AP's JULHAS ALAM













Photo as published in Huffington Post

TEXT BY HUFFINGTON POST
"DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) � The death toll from a weekend ferry disaster in central Bangladesh rose to 70 on Monday, as divers finished their search after the vessel was lifted to the surface and towed to shore"

" Up to 140 passengers were thought to be on the ferry when it capsized Sunday afternoon after being hit by a cargo vessel in the Padma River, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of Dhaka. The river is one of Bangladesh's largest." FULL STORY, PHOTOS and VIDEO :

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/22/bangladesh-ferry-accident_n_6729990.html

 
  Shop Amazon Gift Cards. Any Occasion. No Expiration.

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FAMED DELTA QUEEN MAY RETURN TO THE MISSISSIPPI

http://maritimematters.com/2015/02/delta-queen-steamboat-may-return-to-americas-rivers/

 PD

THE DELTA QUEEN MAY RETURN TO SERVICE
Editor's update: The Delta Queen passed New Orleans downbound on April 5, 2015 and is presently (5/16/2015) at Houma, Louisiana undergoing renovation for service.
  The DELTA QUEEN , America's last wooden paddle wheel steamboat in overnight service has been idled and serving as a static sort of bed and breakfast for the last several years. According to an article by Shawn Drake writing in MARITIME MATTERS the steamer may be reentering commercial passenger service. The venerable old steamer has seen a multitude of services over her hull life that started in 1927 as a passenger and car ferry between Sacramento and San Francisco, California. She was pressed into service for the U.S. Navy as a yard ferry in San Francisco Bay during World War II then laid idle after the war. Then she was purchased by the Greene Line and towed via the Panama Canal to New Orleans refurbished and entered service in the overnight passenger trade on the Mississippi, and Ohio rivers. She changed hands and home ports on the Mississippi and Ohio a number of times since the 1940s and has endured a few periods of unemployment and under employment. The DELTA QUEEN has a superstructure made of wood which doesn't meet the modern regulations for over night passenger service. Previously the Congress had granted a special exemption based on enhanced fire detection and protection systems permitting overnight passenger service. The exemption was not renewed a few years ago when economic factors had decimated demand for services and the venerable old steamer was semi permanently moored. However, unlike some previous idle periods she was not boarded up and welcomed over night guests and consequently is in much better shape for restoration to full service. Shawn Drake has the story of her new owners and their plans as well as a short history of the boat with color photographs at MARITIME MATTERS . If you are a DELTA QUEEN or simply river history buff why not click over and have a look?
 
 Amazon - Shop. Connect. Enjoy. All from Earth's Biggest Selection.


                                                                     

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ISIS TARGETING SHIPPING AND INTENDS TO FLOOD SOUTHERN EUROPE WITH MIGRANTS BY SEA

"Pandemonium could be wrought" in 

Europe by "targeting" shipping, 

ISIS document claims 

PD

 Shades of the Barbary Pirates, indeed the plans by ISIS for their new strong hold in Libya are a virtual resurrection of the Barbary pirates.   but with a secondary twist, launching a half a million illegal migrants into Southern Europe. This time however they probably won't all be economically motivated illegal migrants but people ISIS forces onto the boats for a one way trip with ISIS agents mixed in. This plan, predicted by the late and un-lamented Muammar Gaddafi is designed to turn the Mediterranean into a "Sea of Chaos". But we think it may present the West and Southern Europe with an opportunity. ISIS thinks that history is trend. That faced with a half million imperiled souls, some of whom may be endangered at home as enemies of ISIS the EU will react as it has so far and rescue them at sea and eventually, for most, resettle them in Europe adding to the constant strain caused by the Islamification of Europe. But there is an alternative. while humanitarian consideration may compel the West  to rescue the imperiled, there is no obligation to admit the rescued to permanent residency or citizen tract programs. Refugee camps are permitted under international law. Armies of liberation have been raised out of such camp populations in the past the West being handed such a lemon by ISIS should make lemonade. 

Stephen Decatur in Mortal Combat with a Barbary Pirate captain,  Boatswain's made Rubin James just off the boarding plank behind Decatur took the sword blow intended for Decatur while head butting his opponent. At the moment both of James wrists were broken, but he managed to get off  a shot from one of the two pistols he carried. The sword blow struck James at the pommel on his head which seemed to barely phase him. He killed his initial opponent and went on partaking in the melee which eventually took the deck from the Corsairs. Decatur killed his first opponent in the action with the broken half of his sword. The Islamic pirates found the Americans unreasonable in combat, aggressive, and skilled. Eventually they decided that America could have the run of the Mediterranean without "tribute".   Original painting at the Naval Historical Center. Artist Dennis Malone Carter. 

 The lemonade recipe could look like this: 

Large acreage is perimeter fenced and tent cities established in advance of need.   Once refugees are settled in they are given a camp government constitution assuring that no camp government formed on the host nation's soil may violate any human right found in the International declaration of human rights or any right normally accorded the citizens of the host nation. Sharia law is expressly prohibited. A mayor/ council type of camp government constitution is given to the refugees, and supervised and monitored elections are held. This election of  camp governments should follow  a concerted effort by Western cooperative intelligence to uncover the ISIS agents that are sure to be embedded. There should be more than one camp, populations and areas should resemble medium sized Western military bases. Once populations have been settled in, and camp governments in place the population should be "employed" in construction of more permanent buildings. Basic food, clothing and shelter at this point is provided by governments and relief agencies construction workers would receive very modest wages with which they could improve their family's level of comfort. Getting the refugees out of tents and into better shelter should be the first construction priority. Schools must be provided and here is the opportunity to break the Islamic model. The school formal sessions will be limited to secular subjects taught from a Western perspective. Students should be given the opportunity to participate in student government and extracurricular activities and sports. At this point this is still a population on lock down needing special passes and Id cards to get out for short periods into the host community.

 Once the population is settled into comfortable camps having organized, supervised, but largely self governing communities the hard core Islamic militants, though not formal ISIS agents, must be neutralized. These should be banned by the detaining state from holding camp office , teaching, or leading religious observances or preaching. Actual ISIS agents found should be incarcerated. Once a system has been set up marginalizing the militant, the ideas of a government in exile and an army of repatriation should be introduced. Leaders in favor of such ideas should be permitted to communicate between and among camps. When serious visible support for such a development is perceptible, the Western allied authorities should suggest the formation of a Libyan government in exile and encourage a constitutional convention. Once there is a Libyan government in exile formed out of some of the half million people that ISIS intends to flood the West with, formation and training of an army to lead the repatriation effort can begin. Forewarned is forearmed. ISIS has telegraphed this punch. Western leaders are fools if they don't take the lead time and prepare to turn this ISIS move on its ear. We can look at this tactic as another horror of border control and out of control Islamic immigration, or we can look at as ISIS sending us the seeds of their own eventual destruction. Of course that assumes that Western politicians are capable any more of any wisdom, imagination, or any ability to really act. Unfortunately turning Southern Europe into a massive Islamic immigration station is not the end of ISIS plans for mayhem in the Mediterranean. Let's now examine their planned revival of  the Barbary Pirates protection racket.

 ISIS has published opinion by it's strategists outlining the opportunity to disrupt Southern Europe by through targeting of "Crusader ships and tankers"in the Mediterranean as soon as ISIS has a sufficiently strong foot hold in Libya. ISIS also proposes that with Libya securely in ISIS hands cross Mediterranean amphibious raids on towns in Southern Europe would be relatively easy.  Of course if Western political leaders had any sense this would be reason enough for a massive NATO/EU intervention in Libya right now to assure that amphibious raids by Islamic forces never cross the Mediterranean. Don't hold your breath most European politicians are in an appeasement mode relative to their immigrant Islamic populations at a time when these populations should be sorted into dangerous and not dangerous, with the dangerous including all those lending economic support to terror no matter how small, deported. Any body see a "sort and deport" operation anywhere in Europe besides expungement of Jews at the behest of the Muslims?  So assuming that as usual Western Leadership fails to act timely against this threat, what happens?

 According to the ISIS plan published in Arabic in an online essay titled "LIBYA: THE STRATEGIC GATEWAY FOR THE ISLAMIC STATE". ISIS further described its intention to virtually stop Mediterranean shipping through systematic disruption, which we at AAB take to mean piracy for profit, and perhaps some assailing at sea vandalism. ISIS is definitely not a naval power nor likely to become one. The Muslim world has never been very successful at naval operations. Supporting a real navy requires an industrial base. Again something that "conquers " rarely excel at.  ISIS thinks  they can bring shipping  to a literal halt , "by targeting Crusader Ships and Tankers".  In this belief they seem to be ignorant of how things in the modern shipping world really work. Most cargo today is carried not by the national merchant marines of the "Crusader nations" but by ships operated with international crews and registered under "open registries" often called "flags of convenience". Depredations on such shipping take a while to get noticed and affect insurance rates, but naval intelligence will pick up such a pattern fast. ISIS might have some access to the sea in the early days of such an endeavor if stupidity in the Western camp leadership continues as it appears likely. But the situation is very different from the time of the Barbary pirates. 

 Back then the greatest naval power in the world was Great Britain which was strong enough to win a sort of unspoken exemption for their merchant shipping. When the Barbary pirates attacked British shipping powerful British war ships punished the Barbary Coast fleets and fortifications so heavily that it simply became uneconomic to attack British shipping.  So they avoided British shipping and concentrated on the merchant shipping of weaker states which Great Britain did not offer any protection to. Eventually they simply charged such states "tribute" for allowing the shipping to pass unmolested in a kind of uniquely Islamic "protection racket". Great Britain didn't interfere with the Barbary Pirates because their own Merchant Marine was commercially dominant in the world and Barbary Piracy helped keep them dominant in the Mediterranean shipping market. The cost of doing business in the region for any competition was kept up by the Barbary Pirates until they ran afoul of the newly formed United States .

 The United States was extremely small in terms of population and national wealth but had a fine Merchant Marine and would eventually raise an effective Navy both of which operated on very effective British models and were manned by skilled American seamen. The Americans weren't reasonable at all relative to maritime protection rackets , did not confine themselves to protecting only their own shipping, burned entire fleets including their own captured vessels, attacked strong holds ashore and seemed willing to spend any amount on naval combat vice "one red cent on tribute". Perhaps the ISIS thinks that with a Muslim in the White House there will be no American intervention. They miss the point. The Merchant Marines of Europe are only a remnant kept mostly for military auxiliary purposes. There will be no divide and conquer effect in a resurrection of Barbary piracy. Once the activity become obvious enough to become visible to European political leaders the very formidable navies of Southern Europe including France, Spain, and Italy will quickly interdict the North African Coast, they will no doubt be aided by EU and NATO ships of the Northern EU including Great Britain, even if Britain eventually formally leaves the EU. 

 So clearly we don't think ISIS knows how or has the means or is likely to ever have the means to turn the Mediterranean Sea into a long term "Sea of Chaos". But with the usual shortsightedness and cowardice at work in the Western camp leadership  they will probably get off to a flying start before being utterly crushed. There really is no need for Southern Europe to endure this. Stop waiting for adult leadership to arrive from America, there isn't any there right now. Use your own modern weaponry, cross the inland sea and crush ISIS in Lybia now. Demand from the United States such support as it is obligated to give you as a NATO member. You are under attack. Don't wait for regular columns of ISIS infantry to land on your beaches, destroy them over there. Don't wait for America to do it for you, they won't be coming in any real force until the Muslims are out of the White House and trust us they will not be shot out. The American presidency even though presided over by an apparent enemy of the state will change peacefully and in accordance with U.S. constitutional processes. The nation will be years fixing the damage. But Southern Europe doesn't have two years or more to wait, there is a Muslim army on your door step and a Muslim fifth column in your midst. People who lead movements that are basically modeled after a flock of locust aren't that smart. They have telegraphed their next punch Southern Europe will you ignore the message?  Its sink or swim time Italy, Spain, France, Greece. Good luck.

TERRORISM and COUNTER TERRORISM BOOK SHELF

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ISIS PLANS TO CREATE A "SEA OF CHAOS"

Map Credit: CIA WORLD BOOK

ISIS threatens to send 500,000 migrants to Europe as a 'psychological weapon' in chilling echo of Gaddafi's prophecy that the Mediterranean 'will become a sea of chaos' 

READ MORE:  THE DAILY MAIL

TERRORISM and COUNTER TERRORISM BOOK SHELF

OUR ANALYSIS WILL BE PUBLISHED SOON
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2958517/The-Mediterranean-sea-chaos-Gaddafi-s-chilling-prophecy-interview-ISIS-threatens-send-500-000-migrants-Europe-psychological-weapon-bombed.html#ixzz3SDLRESr5
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INDIAN MIGRANT WORKERS IN LOUISIANA WIN LAW SUIT ON LABOR TRAFFICKING

THE GREATER NEW ORLEANS AREA HAD NO SHORTAGE OF UNEMPLOYED AFTER KATRINA.  WHY DID A SHIP BUILDER FEEL HE NEEDED TO IMPORT LABOR. OF COURSE HE SAVED MONEY BUT NOT AFTER THE COURT IMPOSED THE BILL FOR BREAKING THE LAW

U.S. Fifth Circuit Court Of Appeals New Orleans, Photo credit: GSA

"A New Orleans jury on Wednesday awarded $14 million to five Indian men who were lured to the United States and forced to work under inhumane conditions after Hurricane Katrina by a U.S. ship repair firm and its codefendants.

After a four-week trial, the U.S. District Court jury ruled that Alabama-based Signal International was guilty of labor trafficking, fraud, racketeering and discrimination and ordered it to pay $12 million. Its co-defendants, a New Orleans lawyer and an India-based recruiter, were also found guilty and ordered to pay an additional $915,000 each.

The trial was the first in more than a dozen related lawsuits with over 200 plaintiffs that together comprise one of the largest labor trafficking cases in U.S. history." The full story may be read in THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE: 

 To our minds this is simply the ship building industry version of the endless attacks on the Jones Act protected industries, their American jobs, and contribution to our national security and energy self sufficiency. To read about the attacks on the domestic shipping sector we suggest "BLOOD ON BROWN WATER by the National Mariners Association, available as a read on line document free in our MERCHANT MARINE INTEREST SECTION.

MARITIME LABOR BOOKSHELF

http://www.maritime-executive.com/article/indian-workers-win-us-trafficking-case

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Electronic Bills of Lading, Electronic Elements Of Entry , Pratique, and Clearance

By Johnas Presbyter, former Master & Chief Purser

 Merchant Marine Deck Officers and Staff Officers in the Purser Grades are responsible for maintaining the paper work to effect entry, pratique and clearance between ports. Such paper work usually involves Clearance documents from the last port, manifests, crew lists, stores lists and documents that relate to the actual ownership of items of cargo. The most definitive such ownership document is the Bill of Lading. These days Deck officers preparing for the ship's business and law section of their professional license exam study from reference materials and answer exam questions that reflect a paper process. In fact much of the paper work of entry, clearance, and pratique, as well as cargo ownership, is actually dealt with by on line or other forms of electronic filing, and often these filings are prepared by shore based personnel supporting the ship. Electronic filings in the maritime sector have lagged in comparison to other forms of commerce due to language barriers, non uniformity between port states relative to authentication requirements or even the ability to receive and process electronic filings. 

 In the liner trades with good shipping company and port steamship agency support the entire entry and clearance process may seem routine and smooth to the ship's deck officers who most often today aren't backed up by a staff officer Purser. However we recommend producing paper copies of key documents such as cargo manifests, crew lists, and stores and bills of ladings whenever possible. These come in handy when things go wrong and when an officer shifts to a tramp trade from liner service he or she can never know how much or little of the entry, pratique, and clearance process may be performed electronically in the various ports, especially third world ports. Knowing and being familiar with the paper requirements of the entry , pratique, and clearance processes helps keep a merchant officer prepared for the variety of paper and electronic document demands and alternatives called for in a global shipping system, especially in non liner and non hub port trades.

 

 Ship's health certification is part of entry , partique and clearance and was the first element of the process to benefit from electronic transmission of information. Radio Free Pratique has been around as long as I have and I've held an officer's license and a staff officer's certificate of registry for 50 years. Basically in Radio Free Pratique, the ship's master certifies to the port's health authorities that his ship has not visited a plague port , that he is in possession of de-insect and de-rat certifications and has no sickness aboard. In addition he must answer by radio any other ship's health questions that the port health authorities may have. If the health authorities agree radio permission is granted to proceed directly to assigned berthing and proceed to hold communications with the shore , vice having to display the request pratique signal flag and await boarding and physical inspection before starting business with the shore. Unfortunately customs duties, and cargo transfer to inland carriers requires more documentation and certification than the relatively simple conversation that is "Radio Free Pratique" . It should be standard practice to have aboard paper cargo manifests, stowage plans, stores lists, and crew lists . Customs and Border control agencies will usually want these. Many of these documents are simple lists and lend themselves to transmission by simple office FAX. Stowage plans contain more graphic elements and are often only readable in full drafting paper size. While not impossible FAX transmission of over sized documents is not always practical. Generally, however health, crew, and cargo documentation lend themselves readily to electronic transmission of one form or another. 

 Bills of Lading on the other hand, have elements of title or ownership of goods and are documents of what lawyers and notaries call "authentic acts".  Transmittal of these types of documents by electronic means is complicated by the need of accepted verification protocols. In the old days of paper documented entry these types of documents were authenticated by dated signature and / or were certified by notary. The rest of this post will deal with the various forms of electronically transmitted Bills of lading. 

Electronic Bills of Lading compared with On-Line Bills of Lading

Electronic Bills of Lading [eBLs] have been around the shipping industry since the late 1990s. However, they are sometimes confused with an aspect of shipping company service which is the delivery of a traditional Bill of Lading using on-line methods (eCommerce/eServices). In the e Commerce service the carrier provides a secure website where the customer can access, download and print bills of lading. The e-commerce process produces something which is not much more than a paper document by employing electronic means. But these kinds of arrangements to produce on-line bills of lading do not really compare with the characteristics and advantages of using a certified (industry accepted) eBL.

 A certified eBL is an amalgam of a universally accepted legal regime, technology and a community of users able and willing to accept that the eBL in use is original, unique, valid and unaltered. Like the e Commerce/ e Services arrangement the Online BL is "delivered" using electronic methods. But here the similarity ends, the eBL is subsequently printed by the customer and retains all the costs, risks and drawbacks associated with the paper document. Couriers may well be used for inland delivery to the cargo receivers. Often in the bulk trades paper documents may be claused and altered in ways which are not intended, letters of indemnity may have to be employed and the general speed of processing is slow. In addition to slower processing speed, and time is money in shipping industry,  the production and transmittal costs associated with processing these kinds of documents in paper form are much higher.

 The eBL system by contrast provides carriers,shippers, consignees, and port authorities in  international trade transactions numerous advantages. There is no paper from the beginning to the end of the process. The Bills of Lading will be signed using digital certificates [as used by banks for electronic funds transfers] which produce an encrypted signature that is unique and as  tamper proof as the computer state of the art can make it. .

The eBL provides a full equivalent to the traditional Bill of Lading and its traditional function as a document of title, receipt for the goods and contract of carriage. The eBL incorporates all the terms and conditions of the traditional Bill of Lading and is treated in the same way by the carriers P&I insurers. The Bolero Bill of Lading was the first document to be accepted by the P&I Clubs as a fully comparable transport document and may be considered as a normal working tool of the shipping industry today. .

 The benefits of the Bolero eBL are reasonably secure and attractive for shipping companies today. The problems associated with using orthodox paper Bills of Lading are eliminated., With the Bolero eBL there are no lost Bills of Lading and no fakes, the use of letters of indemnity is greatly reduced, there is no need to acquire new software or hardware. Other risks are reduced and the customers can be offered a modern speedy alternative to a very old and slow  process.

 The practicing deck officer, purser, or steamship agent needs to know about the eBL today but must also understand the paper documentation requirements that are still described in national shipping laws, and international customs conventions. Away from the hub port served liner services entry, pratique, and clearance are often more paper dominated processes than the norm in liner service along the principal trade routes. More over, the ship's officer preparing for advanced professional license examinations must know the basics of the paper system because this is still the basis of the test sections on ship's business and law. There is a reason why masters and even Chief Mates are so often  exempt from navigation watch standing on larger ships. The record keeping, compliance record keeping, and the constantly reoccurring administrative requirements of the entry, pratique, and clearance routines can often keep two officers extremely busy. An in port delay over a documentation compliance issue can sometimes be as costly to the profits of a voyage as an unintentional grounding. Like every other job on our watery planet these days, the job "ain't over till the paper work is done".



MARITIME BUSINESS AND LAW BOOK SHELF

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A FOUR STAR ADMIRAL ON A SENSIBLE ANTI JIHAD STRATEGY/ POLICY

Retired Four-Star Admiral Says The Unsayable About Islam And President Obama�s Foreign Policy Strategy http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2015/02/16/retired-four-star-admiral-says-the-unsayable-about-islam-and-president-obamas-foreign-policy-strategy/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=story&utm_campaign=ShareButtons

 AdmiralJames �Ace� Lyons USN (Rret.)

FULL STORY IN THE BLAZE:    "Another prominent retired member of America�s armed forces who has emerged as an outspoken opponent of the Obama administration�s foreign policy is four-star admiral James �Ace� Lyons.

During the Center for Security Policy�s recent Defeat Jihad Summit, the naval officer of 36 years, who served most recently as the Commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, made some simply astounding comments about Islam and President Obama�s foreign policy strategy:" We find ourselves in complete agreement with the admiral and urge all concerned Americans to red  THE BLAZE: article and watch the associated videos. 


                         

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INSURANCE COMPANY MUTINIES OVER THE BOUNTY

http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/11/07/multimillion-fight-over-hms-bountys-sinking.htm

THE INSURERS OF THE BOUNTY NOW SAY THE SHIP WAS INEXCUSIBLY UNSEAWORTHY AND NOW WANT THEIR $5 MILLION SETTLEMENT BACK

MGM  Built Replica Ship "BOUNTY" sinking off of the Carolinas, Photo USCG 

"The ship from 1962 Oscar winner "Mutiny on the Bounty" sank during Hurricane Sandy because it was unseaworthy, an insurance company that paid out $5.1 million says in Federal Court.
     Acadia Insurance Co. describes the HMS Bounty as a 52-year-old enlarged replica of the 1787 Royal Navy sailing vessel of the same name.
     The three-masted wooden ship sank off the coast of North Carolina during Hurricane Sandy on Oct. 29, 2012, while headed to St. Petersburg, Fla., according to the complaint. Two crew members died and others were injured, Acadia says.  Alleging bad faith and breach of warranty in a federal complaint filed Thursday, Acadia says the ship's owner, HMS Bounty Organization, lied about the vessel's seaworthiness, thus nullifying its insurance policy." READ THE FULL STORY AT : COURTHOUSE NEWS SERVICE



 The events in Capt. Bligh's own words

 Complete trilogy           video

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THE U.S. NAVAL INSTITUTE'S WEST 2015 CONFERENCE HAS WRAPPED

REPORT ON THE U.S. NAVAL INSTITUTE'S "WEST 2015" CONCLUDED IN SAN DIEGO.    PD Editor's Note: Day 2 summary linked at bottom of page. DAY ONE:  The gathering converged at the San Diego Convention Center February 10-12, 2015. The topic of discussion this year "Lower Budgets and Higher Demands: How Do The Sea Services Strike the Right Balance". As the world continues to descend into instability due to the foolish decisions of many Western governments on economic, defense, security, and immigration issues, Chinese economic and naval aggression, rising Russian imperialism, and the global Islamic Jihad this seems an appropriate and timely question.   As many of our readers have noted by now our staff are nearly all members of the U.S. Naval Institute , some are also financial contributors, and some have contributed articles for publication from time to time. As a publishing and publication sales organization we literally are a reaction to the Institute's constant admonition to sea service personnel at all grade levels to "dare to think , speak, and write." We constantly admonish our naval professional site visitors to join the Institute . No one can match the Institute's credibility, competence and integrity. Unfortunately despite growing internet services and seminars such as the one we are reporting on now, the Institute can't air every author who deserves an audience. American Admiralty Books is one alternative.   We don't use our real names on the American Admiralty Books blog because there is good reason for the Institute to admonish us to "dare"to think speak and write. But when we do write for the PROCEEDINGS we do use our real names because with so many leading naval lights on the editorial board of the PROCEEDINGS, there is a certain feeling of safety in taking an unpopular or uncommon position when your essay has passed scrutiny with the Institute's editorial board.  Unfortunately the Institute can't publish everyone who deserves to be published on any and all naval subjects. American Admiralty Books with our policy of allowing publication under pens names is one of the alternatives for those who dare to think , speak, and write on naval subjects.   We like to report on activities of the Naval Institute for those of our readers who have not joined the membership of the Institute or don't know their way to the Institute's various Internet sites where daily news can be obtained. WEST 2015 is one such activity: The distinguished  speakers at the conference on the first day addressed the issue of how the military and the sea services in particular can handle threats with diminished budgets. The threats continue to grow, the budgets continue to shrink.  Speakers on the first day pointed out that much of the military success in solving this puzzle depends on money, something in constant short supply. Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work said at the conference that the Obama Administration's $585 billion defense request for 2016 is $36 billion above sequestration -level financing. To our ears this sounds like continued gutting of the U.S. military but this is the norm at any Institute sponsored event, you're going to be exposed to more than one side of any naval issue. At the convention's first panel discussion titled "What Are the Force Providers Priorities", the doing more with less theme was in evidence.   To read the full official Institute Report on the Conference click here: WEST 2015 DAY 2 "Confrontations await in cyberspace, and those encounters will test military readiness, speakers said Wednesday at the WEST 2015 convention in San Diego, Calif."  FULL REPORT BY USNI

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