Editor’s Note

The world is a very big place. And 70% of it is ocean, leaving a large, wide-open space for threats to roam.

Journalist Ian Urbina wrote in his 2015 series for The New York Times and 2019 book The Outlaw Ocean of the various traffickers, smugglers, pirates, illegal fisherman and other criminals operating, often with impunity, on the high seas. While there may be no shortage of laws governing the oceans, Urbina’s coverage describes a world where enforcement is clearly lacking, if not totally absent.

Maritime security has become a major concern in places such as the South China Sea, the Arabian Gulf and off the coast of East Africa, yet the story is very different closer to home here in the U.S. Nathan Ryder, an intelligence analyst for maritime security risk management firm Dryad Global, makes this clear in his op/ed starting on page 14. Of the several thousand maritime crime incidents reported over the last decade, only nine have occurred in North America, he says. But that doesn’t mean maritime operators and agencies should allow preparation and vigilance to fall by the wayside. Judging by the dollar amounts being spent at the federal and local levels to protect our ports, waterways and territorial waters, it’s clear that they haven’t.

The continued delivery of Fast Response Cutters being built by Bollinger Shipyards (page 51) as well as the new Offshore Patrol Cutters being built by Eastern Shipbuilding (page 50), for example, will only add to the success being reported by the U.S. Coast Guard in its maritime security missions, including the seizure of criminals trafficking weapons, drugs and people at sea.

Lately, a larger portion of the national expenditure has been going toward a fleet of smaller, faster, more agile combat and patrol vessels being delivered government and commercial customers across the country. While these boat building projects ultimately are intended to keep our shores safe, they also keep U.S. shipyards and their suppliers humming. This issue, our annual combat and patrol craft edition, includes several of these success stories.

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Eric Haun, Editor, haun@marinelink.com