So name a single U.S. owned merchant or passenger ship that flies an American flag? Your point is meaningless --- in regards to providing protection to avoid having terroristic countries to seize assets owned by U.S. companies in international waters. Basically this is piracy. The U.S. and other western nations have long standing polices on protecting ships of any nation from unjust seizure. All the way back to the time of the Barbary nations.
Another lecturette to cover up the fact that you do not know the answer. I simply asked a couple times what flag the ship was flying. You gave a couple lecturettes on why it would not be American. Fine, where's the fucking answer? The answer is that is registered and flying the Marshall Islands flag. China starting switching its policy a few years ago, requiring all new registrations to return to Chinese registration and flag. Hong Kong flag also acceptable. But some earlier registed but Chinese owned - which is probably the case with this ship- could keep their previous registrations with the flaky little countries that participate in this game. You are anxious to dump what you do know as a substitute for providing the information being requested. If it were a newer ship, and it were flying the Chinese flag, I would be reluctant to board that ship or take military action against it and would protest and give warning diplomatically. The Americans only had to press a few buttons to find the total history and registration of the ship. It is quite possible the dumphuck Iranians did not or were not able to do that, at least from their vessel. Very doubtful they would have messed with a Chinese ship if they knew that.
And why does it matter what flags it flies? In midst of your meaningless rant - you failed to answer my question - Name a single U.S. owned merchant or passenger ship which goes to foreign ports that flies an American flag? Basically from your definition the U.S. does not have a merchant fleet -- since the ships fly flags of convenience. So if a rogue nation seizes a Royal Caribbean cruise ship then the U.S. government should do nothing since the ship is not flying the U.S. flag.
All of the recently registered Chinese ships are flying the Chinese flag, and if that ship had been flying a Chinese flag I would not have boarded it but would have gone the diplomatic protest route. China probably would have even cooperated with U.S. and Iran as well because they sort of fucked up in boarding a Chinese ship/one of their dark buddies. We have a role and responsibilities internationally but also get to pick and choose our fights. As I have said, I would not automatically put Seal Team 5 on to a Chinese ship. If it were an American owned ship with an American crew- discerned somehow through database info available- then I would take that as a possible intervention and if I had credible information that harm to the crew is occurring or was occurring. You being a tough guy want to jump right in and police every situation just because we can. Take a rest. You have a habit of making good points and then you give it all back by wrestling some aspect of it to the ground. This is usually a symptom of someone trying to compensate for a small penis. Since I do not suffer from that problem, I am free to just seek information and may be right or wrong on many things along the way.
So let me understand --- there have been international naval collations put in place patrolling the Persian Gulf and off of Somalia in the past to stop acts of piracy from individuals and rogue nations against merchant ships under any flag. You are stating you do not support this approach which has been used for at least two centuries. Your approach -- is that every nation is on their own and only should be concerned with ships flying their flag. An approach which is very limited in a world where nearly every ship flies a flag of convenience. Many of them from nations which have no international navy to enforce anti-piracy measures.
You failed to address the points once again.... Here it is -- once again -- "Your approach -- is that every nation is on their own and only should be concerned with ships flying their flag. An approach which is very limited in a world where nearly every ship flies a flag of convenience. Many of them from nations which have no international navy to enforce anti-piracy measures." An approach which basically says that pirates and rogue nations can do whatever they desire to merchant ships on the high seas. This obviously -- to any one doing the simplest thinking -- is a failed approach.