Via reader tip comes news that the South Korean Navy has now begun playing Pirates of the Gulf of Aden:

South Korean naval forces drove away pirates who were trying to board a Danish-registered ship in waters off Somalia, the military and the vessel’s owner said Friday.

The incident occurred Friday about 110 kilometres (70 miles) off the coast of Yemen, said a Joint Chiefs of Staff official in Seoul as well as shipowner Shipcraft in Copenhagen.

The Munmu the Great destroyer, carrying a crew of 300, received a distress call from the ship which reported it was being chased by a pirate boat, said Army Colonel Lee Hyoung-Kook, a JCS official who oversees the deployment.

The 2,500-ton ship Puma — carrying a generator from Singapore to Germany with a crew of three Danes, four Filipinos and five British security guards — was about 55 kilometres from the South Korean destroyer.

“The crew of the Puma, upon seeing Friday six pirates in an outboard motor boat approaching at full speed, began to zig-zag to keep them from boarding, and fired a distress flare in their direction,” said Shipcraft director Per Nykjaer Jensen.

That gave them just enough time for the Puma to call for help from international naval forces in the area, he told AFP.

The South Korean destroyer dispatched its Lynx anti-submarine helicopter, which arrived at the scene in just over 20 minutes, Lee said.

“The pirates gave up (their) attempt to board the ship and turned away when the helicopter threatened to fire,” he said.

Jensen agreed that the helicopter’s arrival saved the Puma from being seized, but he added: “We are really frustrated by these intolerable conditions whereby the pirates more often than not get away with impunity.”

The South Korean destroyer began operating this week to help fight piracy off Somalia, where several Korean ships have been seized.

Up to 20 foreign warships now patrol the waters off the Somali coast to safeguard major shipping lanes.  [Associated Press]

The first thing I am wondering is why the ship’s five security guards didn’t take these pirates out?  Secondly why did the Korean helicopter let the pirates get away?  They could have either sunk them on the spot or fired warning shots to get them to stop and then have the naval destroyer come up and arrest them.  I just don’t see how letting these pirates go solves anything?