Editorial: Coast Guard Boarding Tactics Arousing Alarm

The Waterways Journal has both damned and applauded the Coast Guard, depending upon issues. Today we broach a subject that lies in betwixt. The issue is vessel boardings. Without qualification, we recommend that Coast Guard personnel consider professional mariners to be on our side unless it is proven otherwise.

Today we are hearing about Coast Guard personnel brandishing weapons and holding people at gunpoint in a manner mariners believe to be too militaristic. On the other hand, the Coast Guard has reported a dramatic increase in the number of incidents where its boarding parties are met with violent resistance while stopping ships carrying migrants attempting to enter the United States illegally. These incidents are not towboat or tug related. Still, members of boarding parties have cause to be alert, too.

If the United States is to protect itself against terrorism, its protectors cannot perform as they did prior to September 11, 2001. The inspection of too few ships and containers has been a major complaint. Everyone wants protection. Yet, we can’t always agree with the way that we are protected.

The people factor is crucial. We believe most people understand that our defenders must be allowed to do their jobs and not be hamstrung. But some disagree with the methodology.

Complaints sent to us have been limited thus far and to us do not seem overly abusive. Of course, we were not there. One report from the Gulf Coast said the Delta Queen was not allowed to enter the Port of New Orleans after leaving drydock early and its arrival back in port would not meet the earlier scheduled arrival time. That seems to us to be more of an inconvenience than an abuse. Another report dealt with the Belle of Louisville and how the vessel’s landing was to be watched and boarders monitored. We have been told that happens at other sites and is common.

Another mariner said that a Coast Guard team in training boarded his vessel. The timing was bad, he said, because the tug had a ship in tow. He said Coast Guard personnel should treat professional U.S. mariners professionally. Fair comment.

In another complaint, a mariner said the boarding party held all crewmen at gunpoint on the tug’s bow (except the captain) for more than an hour.

“I have been boarded at least a dozen times but never in such a militaristic manner,” he said.

As to countering threats of terrorism, we understand that the Department of Homeland Security has been transforming U.S. coastal defenses. “…from a search and rescue service that also policed for migrant and drug smugglers to a more militarized force aimed at stopping terrorists,” wrote Charlie Savage of the Boston Globe in 2005. “According to the Coast Guard, the U.S. has 95,000 miles of coastline, 361 ports, 200 daily arrivals of foreign vessels, and 76 million recreational boaters to monitor. In 2004, the Coast Guard performed 19,000 security boardings, a policy enacted after the September 11 attacks.”

The Coast Guard began targeting vessels from foreign countries for increased boardings in 2004. Countries with below-average compliance with international security standards are prime targets.

The boarding team is the basic element of the Coast Guard’s operational law enforcement. The team leader is the boarding officer, who sometimes is accompanied by an assistant boarding officer. All team members are armed and in uniform and are federal law enforcement officers. All must pass specified requirements.

High-tech equipment is utilized by the Coast Guard to carry out law enforcement responsibilities, and the quality of harbor surveillance is improving. As long as two years ago, cameras could read 12-inch lettering more than a mile away. Using data from new transponders, displays could show the location of every major vessel entering U.S. waters. At Tampa Bay, Fla., for instance, no vessel can pass eastward of Sea Buoy T without permission of the captain of the port, who evaluates data and notifies the ship’s captain if that vessel is to be held up west of the buoy for boarding.

Is the Coast Guard too militaristic? It is a concern.

On August 2 during a Coast Guard subcommittee hearing on marine safety, a common theme was that the agency is being diverted from its marine safety mission to a security mission. It was pointed out that the relationship between the professional mariner and the Coast Guard has deteriorated and has not been the same since 9/11.

U.S. Rep. James Oberstar (D-Minn.), chairman of the House Committee on Health, Transportation and Infrastructure, said during the hearing, “We want to restore that relationship.”

A question put to the group involved the feasibility of Coast Guard personnel working with a large, seasoned, stable civilian staff. Could it work? It was referred to as a “blended workforce.” That strategy did not work well with the regional exam centers, one delegate pointed out. It seems to work well with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, said others.

As it related to the work of the committee, Oberstar said: “…frankly, I intend to withhold action on the Coast Guard authorization until we get this issue resolved.” A spokesperson in Oberstar’s office did not seem to take it that way.

However, Fairplay, a British publication, printed the day after the August 2 hearing said that Coast Guard funding for the coming fiscal year “will be held up until the agency deals with complaints over its safety programs. That was the promise yesterday from James Oberstar….”

Fairplay said the long hearing pitted Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen against two panels of union and shipowner spokesmen, and charges were heard “that since 9/11, the Coast Guard has become too military and too security-centric to the exclusion of its safety and mariner oversight programs.”

The publication quoted Oberstar: “People who see the Coast Guard today see guns, boots and an aura of martial law. If I had my way, I’d move the whole Coast Guard back to the Department of Transportation.”

Oberstar’s spokeswoman sent us a brief portion of the hearing transcript, but it did not include any of the exchange during the panels. It seems obvious. There is smoke, and there is fire. The material we received leaves no doubt that delegates and the commandant got an earful.

The outcome of this exchange will not be clear for some time; the charges are being heard and considered. Hints of change are in the air. To our knowledge, they are still only hints. It is clear that Oberstar is not totally pleased by Coast Guard operations.

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