Comment by throwaway27448
5 hours ago
I'm not sure the extent to which either Daesh or Andar Allah are formally operating in Somalia, but I apologize if I cast unfair aspersions. I don't believe there are any formal or uniform or centralized funding of the pirates at all, though—many were simply fisherman who could no longer make a living. This is just my understanding however. I'm also open to the idea that the pirates aren't just from Somalia.
The level of ordinance is enough evidence that there is significant outside support. RPG-7s do not grow on trees in Somalia. I hazard to guess an RPG on the black market is also a great expense to anyone who isn't being given one by one of these groups connected to the arms trade in effort to advance their goals or position in some way.
They cost under $500/launcher: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/one-for-history-books...
$300/launcher here: https://www.un.org/depts/los/nippon/unnff_programme_home/fel...
A decade ago it wasn't terrorist groups funding them.
Seems cheap to you and me but that is about the full annual income of someone from somalia. It isn't realistic for an individual to purchase one without external support.
> The level of ordinance is enough evidence that there is significant outside support.
"I have no evidence, but I can't think of other scenarios so it must be true!"
Well it isn't like you can do very much hunting with an RPG-7. Its purpose is to destroy material that you cannot with small arm fire and that sort of limits the intended purpose and customer.
Well why do you think they want to raid these ships? To buy more RPG-7s, of course!
But seriously, if they were being funded by other groups, why pirate in the first place?
Same reasons as the context of this photo (1). One party would like to advance some geopolitical interest, another party is willing to do it if they are paid and supported as such. No different than any other business deal.
1. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Reagan_s...
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