Keeping Us Safe: The French?

How about we put down the tea, stop snickering at "tea-bagging", and help the FRENCH fight off piracy.

From the NY Times:

French forces detained 11 suspected pirates during an assault on what they described as a pirate “mother ship” in the Indian Ocean off the eastern coast of Somalia Wednesday, less than 24 hours after an American cargo ship was attacked by pirates in the same region.

The 11 detainees are being held on board a French frigate, the Nivôse, part of a European Union antipiracy task force patrolling in the area, the French defense ministry said in a statement.

The French forces initially responded to a distress call from a Liberian-flagged container ship, the Safmarine Asia, which came under attack by rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire from two small pirate skiffs Tuesday night. A helicopter from the Nivôse arrived on the scene and observed the skiffs retreating and returning to the mother ship, which was being used as a floating base about 460 miles off the Somali coast, according to a statement by the European Union’s Maritime Security Center.

The French forces then mounted their assault on the mother ship on Wednesday, finding a range of firearms and equipment on board the suspect vessels. The Nivose is now en route to the port of Mombasa, Kenya, with the vessels in tow, the Maritime Security Center said. Authorities are expected to prosecute the pirates in France.