Petraeus: Shippers should consider armed guards

I can see the value in having shippers protect themselves from pirates and attacks, but the problems lie in hiring armed guards and providing them with weaponry that they can use to start or end attacks. It would be giving them a lot of power over what takes place on ships and could potentially cause a testy situation for the U.S. if an armed guard accidentally damaged another country's ship or citizens. It is nearly impossible for us to rely on the U.S. navy to patrol all of the waters around the globe and so there definitely needs to be some intensified safety precautions being made by shippers and the Pentagon to reduce the number of pirate attacks. I agree with General Petraeus in his notion that what we are doing right now is not enough and now that pirates have a reason to be angry with our country we do need to develop a plan that can work. What that plan is going to be remains to be seen, but I think we have the ability to put together some sort of compromise to allow protection on board especially now that the public has a reason to see the problems with the issue.