If the military AND pirivateers can't find Osama bin Laden, what makes you think they'd have ANY effect on Somali piracy? Bullets in brains are far more effective than letters of marque, but you need a fingerbone attached to a spine to do that, and the Somali 'government' has other things on their minds- no doubt negotiating percentages of the pirate's ransoms.

Privateering worked in the Straits of Malacca or whatever, but you're probably right.  Also I think the EU/NATO fleet will do the job eradicating piracy.  I think the stooge wasted a bullet.  They only allot you so many, and of course there's competition for those slot.  But it was fun thinking about pirates for a little while instead of dry governmental stuff.

Well, I have been known to be a blowhard so more than likely I'm wrong. I certainly would love to be a modern-day privateer with all the weaponry I coudl carry AND permission to use it.
But then I think I'd last about a month- most of that in getting lost while sailing to the Somali coast, and teh rest floating like a bobber in the ocean after suffering a mutiny