SECRETARY GATES THE APPEASER?

WASHINGTON, April 13 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Monday that three Somali pirates who were killed by the Navy's Seals to end a hostage crisis were "untrained" teenagers.

Addressing an audience at the Marine Corps War College in Quantico, Virginia, Gates said that the slain pirates, aged at between 17 to 19, were heavily armed but inexperienced.

They were shot dead on Sunday at the end of a five-day standoff with the U.S. military after they attacked a U.S.-flagged cargo ship about 400 kilometers away from Somali and held an American captain as hostage.

"As long as you've got this incredible number of poor people and the risks are relatively small, there's really no way in my view to control it unless you get something on land that begins to change the equation for these kids," Gates told students and faculty members.

He also noted that there is no purely military solution to piracy in the region.

The discussion on anti-privacy did not halt with the successful rescue of the captain, as President Barack Obama vowed to combat the rise of piracy off the coast of Somalia on Monday.

"We remain resolved to halt the rise of piracy in this region," he said. "To achieve that goal, we must continue to work with our partners to prevent future attacks, be prepared to interdict acts of piracy and ensure that those who commit acts of piracy are held accountable for their crimes."

In the meantime, the U.S. Navy urged the country's shipping industry to strengthen security of their boats by deploying more armed guards and adopt more preventive measures.

Editor: Mu Xuequan

COMMENT

I have warned that this so-called Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is the same Robert Gates who coauthored with Zbigniew Brzezinski the 2004 Council on Foreign Relations paper "Iran: Time for a New Approach"-- and this "new approach" is negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran--the same Iran run by the Holocaust denier working on his second ton of partially enriched uranium.

Gates sees "kids"--deplores their untrained status.

How many "untrained" Viet Cong "kids" did we face with a Johnson Administration which was harsher with the Joint Chiefs in November 1965 when they sought permission to mine Haiphong and bomb Hanoi than that administration ever was with the enemy.

DICK, Doper Islamo Commie Kenyan, hates America and Gates is part of the DICK administration hobbling America--

Hey, DICK, do you recall your bud Osama bin Laden telling ABC News in 1998 that when Traitor-Rapist-42 pulled us out in the wake of Blackhawk Down he was emboldened to do the Embassies, the Cole, 911?

And, DICK, Somalia is the same nest of Islamofascist sewage it was then.

But due to DICK's "Muslim faith" and Gates being the anti-Defense bureaucrat, the odds of our settling accounts in the region are Zero Hope It'll Change.