ARRRRR Pirates! - Barges in intnl waters - shooting meccas - arms lockers - gun sales

[Stand_Watie]

O.K. the 'arrr pirates' thread gave me this idea. It seems to me that there are a lot of super wealthy yachters that spend a great portion of their lives sailing the seas, forbidden in many areas from posession of defensive arms. I'm sure a lot of them simply break the law

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200502/s1306001.htm



Anyway, I was thinking that someone with a few million investment dollars could set up a barge in international waters near countries with draconian firearms laws as a multi-purpose facility -

a. Sailors porting that can't legally take their firearms into the country could rent storage space on the barge.

b. A shooting club and resort - they could even have hotel rooms, swimming pools, gambling, spas, etc - make a weekend of it and bring the wife along - I'll bet a lot of wealthy Japanese businessmen would pay good money to to shoot a .50 machine gun at floating targets. Horge tells us they go all the way to the Phillipines on shooting vacations, why not closer to home?

c. A gun dealer. You can't buy an M-16 to defend your yacht in Britain, Australia or Japan can you? Heck if your not bound by the laws of your country, why not an M2 for your yacht? If you can afford the yacht, why not a few nice toys even if you can't take them into port? Picture this with a yacht under it with a smiling grey haired guy in a sailing shirt, shorts and deck shoes...Seagulls would be plentiful for target practice almost anywhere...

 

[White Horseradish]

Hmmm.

Dammit. That is a great idea and I don't have the cash to make it happen...

 

[Fly320s]

There's probably some sort of international law, or high-seas law/treaty, that regulates firearms.

If not, where do I sign-up?

 

[CB900F]

Stand;

Yeah, the up-front funding's gonna be steep. You're platform's got to be able to defend itself from real pirates. The nearest local navy may not be interested in saving the platform, seeing as how it sorta exists to flout said country's laws.

So, what's it gonna take to be self-sufficient for defense? A good radar platform, two Phoenix, several harpoons, and perhaps the odd Mk48 or two is gonna run up the bill. And if you want stand-off anti-flyin'-machine capability, I'd think we could about double the tab.

Then again, considering some parts of the world, the pirates could be the local navy!

900F

 

[Sheldon J]

Ever see the movie "Lord of War" been thought of.

 

[candr44]

I have worked on boats for a living and been around people who travel the world in their sail boats and go from country to country and job to job. They aren't always rich. Just drifters at sea. After seeing and hearing about some of the things that go on in international waters you would be a fool not to have a few guns with you. Especially in South East Asia with pirates and smugglers.

How long would it be before some country comes to investigate the arsenal parked of their shores and confiscates everything? Or comes to demand a cut of the profits by taxing you? What would you do in a storm? How would you supply and maintain yourself? Unless you could afford a supply ship and a long supply line, you would still be dependent on the local shore and people.

Something similer is already being done in Hawaii. They had a range in Honolulu the last time I was there that catered to Japanese tourist. Their advertising angle was that you could pretend to be a gangster. It sounded interesting to rent machine guns but I never did try it myself.