For everyone that hasn’t been following the story of the Pirates of the Antarctic let me have this blogger from Japan get everyone up to date:
It’s hard to say which is more astonishing—the story itself, or the lack of coverage, particularly in Japan. As far as I can tell, only the Australian and New Zealand media are covering the story, and the only place I found it was on journalist/blogger Tim Blair’s website.
The tale involves the Nisshin Maru and the rest of the whaling fleet of the Institute of Cetacean Research in Tokyo, and their antagonists, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. The Nisshin Maru plans to catch about 950 minke whales, and the Sea Shepherd Society is trying to stop them.
You might expect the world’s sympathy to be on the side of Sea Shepherd and against the Japanese, but that’s not the case. In fact, just about everyone involved in this comedy of errors is helping the Japanese and hindering the conservationists—including the governments of anti-whaling countries that wish the Japanese would stop. Even though Greenpeace is also trying to stop the Japanese, they won’t have anything to do with Sea Shepherd.
Somebody must like them, however—they had enough money to buy two ships and a helicopter that they’re using to chase the Japanese ships in the Ross Sea off Antarctica, south of New Zealand.
Here’s a listing and bios of the Sea Shepherd ships’ two crews. It makes for both entertaining and educational reading. One crew member is Tim Gorski, who is a self-described “independent documentary filmmaker/animal activist with 12 awards for my first feature film, “Lolita: Slave to Entertainment.” He wears a red head scarf. Another is John Gravois, who introduces himself this way: “Armed with only my best friend’s iPod and my trusty bicycle, I left my home in Claremont, California to pursue my two life goals; liberating the oceans from man’s tyranny, and becoming a buccaneer.” A third is a tatoo artist who claims to have founded the Whale Weirdo Foundation.
Make sure you read the rest of Ampontan’s posting because more comedy follows about this incident. Unfortunately this comedy has turned tragic with the death of one of the Japanese crew members due to a fire aboard the Japanese ship. Once again Ampontan has a great posting covering the fire and the bias reaction from the media and Greenpeace. Here is a sample:
The comedy resulting from the standoff between eco-loonies Sea Shepherd and the Japanese whaling fleet in the Ross Sea off Antarctica turned tragic when the body of one Japanese sailor was found on the Nisshin Maru after an hour-long fire.
The BBC reports that the ship is dead in the water and will have to be towed away. As the Nisshin Maru is the only ship in the fleet capable of processing whales, this year’s expedition to catch 945 minke whales seems to be over.
The BBC report is worth reading if only because it provides further evidence that conventional media sources are now nearly worthless for simple information gathering. Once the media was clearly shown to be both biased and slipshod, one would have thought they’d take steps to do their job better–or at least cover up the problem better. Instead, being caught seems to have liberated the media worldwide, because they’ve gone from bad to worse to atrocious.
Now this sad tale of the Pirates of the Antarctic takes an Aussie twist as the eco-loonies have brought their pirate fleet to Melbourne:
Customs officers have boarded the anti-whaling vessel Robert Hunter within minutes of it docking in Melbourne’s Victoria Harbour, around 3pm this afternoon.
The ship, which has spent the past few months with it’s sister vessel, the Farley Mowat, trying to disrupt the Japanese whaling fleet in the Antarctic, is tied up in Melbourne’s Docklands in the shadow of the Telstra Stadium.
Four customs officials, two of whom were armed, boarded the vessel for a routine search that could take up to two hours.
The Robert Hunter must register under a new flag before 11am tomorrow (midnight British time) when its British registration expires.
The Farley Mowat is currently sailing towards Melbourne without a flag after its registration was rescinded by Belize. It is expected to arrive on Thursday with the status of a pirate ship.
Robert Hunter skipper Paul Watson said shortly after docking in Melbourne the ship would be re-registered under another flag before tomorrow’s deadline.
As Ampontan mentioned before the good old eco-loons play it very loose when it comes to telling the truth:
The Robert Hunter’s crew anticipate repairs, including a 30 to 40 centimetre gash near the stern from a collision with Japanese whaler, the Kaiko Maru, could take until May to complete.
Captain Watson defended the tactics employed by the anti-whaling ships against the Japanese fleet.
The Robert Hunter did not ram the Kaiko Maru, he said.
"What happened was the Kaiko Maru was forcing us into the ice flows and we were trying to get out and we warned them and if you look on our videos were telling them to get away.
"They moved in on us and pushed us right into the ice flows and we suffered damage on the bow and also we had damage below the water line where the ice impacted and then they backed into us and again that’s on video also.
Here is what the Japanese have to say and you can check the video for yourself by clicking the included link:
A video recording of Sea Shepherd vessel Robert Hunter ramming the Japanese non-lethal research vessel Kaiko Maru shows the truth about the incident which occurred in the Antarctic on Monday 12 February 2007.
The recording has been placed on the website of the Institute of Cetacean Research and can be found using the link: http://www.icrwhale.org/gpandsea.htm.
“The video clearly shows the Sea Shepherd vessel ramming the Kaiko Maru and any claims by Paul Watson that it was our fault is PR spin that was swallowed hook, line and sinker by Australian and New Zealand media,” Dr Hiroshi Hatanaka, the Director General of the Institute of Cetacean Research, said today.
The recording begins with the Kaiko Maru crew member filming the exact location of the vessel when it was attacked by Sea Shepherd. It then pans to starboard showing the Farley Mowat approaching nearby and moves to port to show the Robert Hunter immediately alongside.
The wake of the Robert Hunter clearly shows the Sea Shepherd vessel turning into the path of the Kaiko Maru and then colliding with our vessel, Dr Hatanaka said.
“Japanese research vessels have no reason to ram a vessel in the Antarctic ? Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd or anyone else. It’s not what we, a scientific organization, do. Sea Shepherd is desperately trying to do as much damage to property and people as they can before they leave the Antarctic. It is not an environmental organisation ? it’s a terrorist vigilante group,” Dr Hatanaka said.
“How many more incidents like this does it take for the world to take notice that Sea Shepherd is a dangerous and desperate organization,” he said.
If you watch the video you can clearly see the eco-loons ship which by the way is flying a pirate flag, change course and head straight for the Japanese hitting the Japanese ship’s side head on. Than you have to also take into account the eco-loons throwing acid at the crew, throwing nets into the boats propeller, smoke bombs, buzzing the ship with a helicopter, etc. You can watch the videos of all this eco-loonery by clicking here. Plus his claims are even more ridiculous when you take into account the fact they have rammed whaling ships before and take credit for sinking 10 whaling ships and are credited for the only terrorist attack ever against Iceland.
I spent a lot of time living in the far east and plenty of time in Japan as well. Rarely in the media is the Japanese perspective on whaling ever given. Contrary to popular belief the Japanese are breaking no international laws with their whaling activities. This Wikipedia entry gives a pretty balanced look at Japanese whaling for those interested. The Japanese are given a quota every year by the International Whaling Commission for whales they can hunt for scientific purposes that ultimately end up on dinner plates as well. The Japanese have been hunting whales for centuries and seafood in general is a major staple of the Japanese diet. The Japanese have a population of a 128 million, but their home islands can only produce food for 40% of their population. That is why seafood and whale has been a staple of the Japanese diet.
Many Japanese feel it is hypocritical of countries like Australia and New Zealand that have small populations, but abundant land to grow food on to criticize the Japanese for providing food for their population. Many of Japanese feel that if these countries don’t want the Japanese to whale through the legal means that the IWC has allowed them to, then these countries should provide the equivalent amount of food free of charge to Japan.
The Japanese also get extremely angered by being targeted by the eco-loons when they are whaling legally while the Norwegians and Icelanders hunt whales commercially in violation of the IWC and yet the eco-loons aren’t targeting them as much they do the Japanese. Many Japanese feel that this is because of racism towards Asians compared to the white Scandinavians.
These eco-loons do more harm than good to the cause they supposedly represent. These guys are no different than eco-terrorists who burn down housing developments or trash car lots selling SUVs. I watched Free Wily 1,2, & 3 and I like whales just as much as the next guy, but I also understand the law and as long as the Japanese are following the law I have no problems with them. However, I have no respect for people that break the law by destroying private property and physically harming others which is what these eco-loons have been doing. If they don’t like the law then lobby to get it changed, but I have a feeling these guys care more about getting notariety by causing trouble and having fun cruising around the seas pretending to be pirates than actually caring about saving any whales.
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