To follow up more and clarify, I'll quote Mahatma Gandhi: "Love the sinner, hate the sin." This is a favourite quote by Christians, but alas, never does seem to get applied in situations like this.
I think the piracy ought to be stopped. I also think that the pirates ought to eventually lose their ill-gotten gains. However, I think that a purely military solution is compounding an injustice with another injustice. Starving and desperate people steal; stealing is wrong, but pretending that the one does not lead to the other, and that the fault is entirely on the thief, is willfully blinding yourself. I think developed nations should certainly patrol Somali waters to fend off pirates. I think they should also, just as assiduously, defend those waters from the predations of foreign fishing fleets (though sadly, it is too late for that to really save the fish stocks, but it will help them recover). I think that the UN should be intervening in the Somali civil war, and especially ought to be taking action with (and forcing the adherence of the Geneva Conventions by) the Ethiopian army, which invaded Somalia during the crisis. Mediators should also be appointed to try and end not only the main conflict and the Ethiopian conflict, but also to settle the question of the various Somali breakaway provinces (such as Somaliland, Puntland, et cetera).
Shooting a bunch of starving ex-fishermen and leaving again is no more ethically justifiable than what the pirates are doing. While it's certainly true that Somalia has problems beyond what was directly done by European and Asian countries, to pretend that most of their problems don't stem directly back to that is simply a lie. And none of those people were ever punished for their crimes, nor any compensation given for the destruction they wrought.
Edit: (Psst. I'm not American.)
I think the piracy ought to be stopped. I also think that the pirates ought to eventually lose their ill-gotten gains. However, I think that a purely military solution is compounding an injustice with another injustice. Starving and desperate people steal; stealing is wrong, but pretending that the one does not lead to the other, and that the fault is entirely on the thief, is willfully blinding yourself. I think developed nations should certainly patrol Somali waters to fend off pirates. I think they should also, just as assiduously, defend those waters from the predations of foreign fishing fleets (though sadly, it is too late for that to really save the fish stocks, but it will help them recover). I think that the UN should be intervening in the Somali civil war, and especially ought to be taking action with (and forcing the adherence of the Geneva Conventions by) the Ethiopian army, which invaded Somalia during the crisis. Mediators should also be appointed to try and end not only the main conflict and the Ethiopian conflict, but also to settle the question of the various Somali breakaway provinces (such as Somaliland, Puntland, et cetera).
Shooting a bunch of starving ex-fishermen and leaving again is no more ethically justifiable than what the pirates are doing. While it's certainly true that Somalia has problems beyond what was directly done by European and Asian countries, to pretend that most of their problems don't stem directly back to that is simply a lie. And none of those people were ever punished for their crimes, nor any compensation given for the destruction they wrought.
Edit: (Psst. I'm not American.)