Re: Woah. Another news story ripe for an ME campaign

["Eric Benson" <e_r_benson@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Leon Wrote:
"Well it bloody sucks mate.  Heard about it this morning.  If our boys in
the NZSAS weren't so busy elsewhere might be a good idea if they went and
did some cleaning up of the other scum in this world.  Mongrel dog tucker is
all they are.  And there were some idiots out there who went 'oh do pirates
still exist?'  They sure do, and some of them are a fear bit closer to home
too.  One of the greatest Kiwi adventurer's ever.  He will be missed.  For
me, this is far too much a tragedy to play out in a game setting.  Yet, this
is another act of blatant terrorism, but I doubt we shall see Brazil being
bombed for the acts of a few pirates.  Though piracy is a global issue. "

Couple of things:
1)    When an international activist is snuffed and the rest of the crew
isn't, it doesn't sound a whole lot like piracy.  It sounds a lot more like
someone is silencing a critic.

2) Pirates don't break into 36-m sailing vessels and 'only steal a watch'.
Depending on the age and configuration of the boat, there was easily another
$100k+ in electronics on board (the Blake Expedition web page talks more
about the boat and makes it sound like the boat was purpose built for the
expedition).  And they only stole a watch.  Granted, it was an Omega watch,
but still... the satellite phone used in Antartica wasn't stolen?  GPS?
Radar?  Doesn't sound much like most pirates, who are in it for the
economics.

3) I'm somewhat surprised that similar things don't happen more often to
politically active critics or organizations (someone like the Sea Sheppard
Society comes to mind).  Not that I'm endorsing it, mind you, but the
underdeveloped countries tend to look at things a little differently than
the developed nations.  If you're interested in another brewing situation,
take a look at some of the arguments over fishing rights in the Galapagos.
It's basically a corrupt admiral on the take allowing fishing vessels into
the protected zone and actively taking steps to interfere with enforcement.

Adding the M-E thread to things, how would you extract a scenario out of the
action?  Would BlackEagle only side with the 'forces of good' and hunt the
terrorists/pirates/etc or would BE/BE be willing to take an operation to
'send an activist a message'?

-Eric