It is lucrative work. Most of the pirates operate on behalf of shadowy Somali "businessmen" who use the proceeds to invest in smuggling the narcotic khat and human trafficking. In a country where the average income is $600 a year, pirates make between $10,000-$30,000. It takes them about six months to blow this on drugs and 4x4s before they go to sea again looking for further victims. Some of these men are former soldiers whose wages have not been paid in the absence of government. Others are tuna fishermen whose livelihoods have been ruined by the absence of a state capable of enforcing fishing quotas or rights against the Koreans and Spanish, or by foreign vessels dumping toxic waste.

An international naval force called Combined Task Force 150, based in Djibouti, concentrates on interdicting the movements of jihadists rather than dealing with pirates. If a warship happens on an incident, or is alerted to one, then it responds, but that is not a sustained strategy. The European Union is trying to put together a dedicated task force to rectify this.

Employment of high-pressure hoses to sweep the pirates off decks does not seem to have been successful. One suggested measure is to rescind antiquated laws forbidding merchant ships from carrying firearms, although that might increase the number of casualties among ships' crew as well as pirates; all-steel environments are not the best site for a gunfight. What happens if the crew kill a pirate? In the distant past that would have warranted a brief logbook entry, accompanied by the news that the corpse had been slung overboard; nowadays there would be endless inquiries, involving ships that cost $10,000 a day to operate.