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This is the sort of issue that puts the lie to traditional economists who say the military is simply a drain on national resources while accepting merchant security firms and loss prevention employment as contributors to the national GDP.

Belgium is offering military units to its merchant vessels off the Horn of Africa for C115,000 per week, challenging a global aversion to guns aboard merchant ships.

France has put troops on tuna boats in the Indian Ocean and US lawmakers are weighing similar action to fight piracy.

In June, the U.S. House passed HR 2647 that would require the DOD to put armed teams on US-flagged ships passing through high-risk waters, specifically around the Horn of Africa where Somali pirates have become a scourge of world shipping.

The amendment now goes to the Senate. A separate bill would grant immunity from prosecution in American courts to any “owner, operator, time charterer, master, or mariner who uses force, or authorizes the use of force, to defend a vessel of the United States against an act of piracy.”

Opponents fear such moves will escalate the violence and raise a thicket of legal issues for personal and corporate liabilities and national sovereignty.

UPDATE: Sept. 16.

Nations representing over 50% of the world's shipping tonnage today signed an anti-piracy agreement. Details here.

The Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber's Military Affairs Committee welcomes the 26 countries competing or observing the 2009 Air Mobility Command (AMC) Rodeo.

The International Icebreaker was hosted by community firms in the Working Waterfront Maritime Museum for the beginning of the AMC Rodeo hosted at McChord AFB.

See our slide show and video. You are welcome to enjoy this premier and fun event at the Foss Waterway Seaport.

Boeing on Thursday announced a “major join” for Qatar’s first C-17. The airlifter will be delivered this summer.

There are currently 198 C-17s in service worldwide, 14 with international customers. The USAF (including active, Guard and Reserve) has 184.

International customers include the UK Royal Air Force, the Canadian forces, the Royal Australian Air Force, and the 12-member Strategic Airlift Capability consortium (blogged earlier) and Partnership for Peace nations. The United Arab Emirates announced last month that it will acquire four C-17s.

On March 13, Boeing marked the "major join" ceremony for the Strategic Airlift Capability (SAC) consortium's first C-17 Globemaster III, an acquisition of three C-17s, one of which will be provided by the United States.

During major join, the C-17 airlifter's four major sections -- the forward, center and aft fuselages and wing assembly -- are integrated, and the aircraft begins to look like a C-17 for the first time.

Hungary has agreed to both host the Heavy Airlift Wing (HAW) at Pápa Air Base, where a total of three C-17s will be based, and to register the aircraft under the Hungarian flag.

SAC includes 10 NATO nations -- Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, United States -- and Partnership for Peace members Sweden and Finland. They will share acquisition and operating costs for three C-17s over the nearly 30-year course of the agreement.

The C-17 is the only tactical aircraft capable of performing all SAC airlift missions, including strategic, tactical, military and humanitarian missions, as well as brigade airdrops, aeromedical evacuations, and landings and takeoffs from standard runways or austere airfields.