[truportodfa]

Imp raises a good point. Piracy flourished (ie the Caribbean, the Spanish Main, Captain Morgan, as Tann pointed out) because it often had the backing of various governments. Remove that backing, and add in active and forceful anti-piracy campaigns, and we saw piracy crumble.

there also wasn't the MASSIVE discrepancy in tech between the pirates and the rest. We've got satallite imaging and US destroyers and cruisers. We've got navy seals. They are 3rd world highwaymen of the sea that are pretty lucky if they can have a functioning .50 cal on their piece of shit boat.



But back in the day, the pirates had smaller, much faster ships, there was no radio or gps, or air support, or snipers rifles or missles etc. just dinky little cannons and muskets. (which will kill you dead enough but aren't nearly as effective as cutting edge tech. which we have and the somali pirates most certainly don't)
If they'd just send a few subs over there and have them perform a few months worth of hunter killer ops on the pirates, i think it would go a long way to taking some of the fight out of them.