DiscoverBut This Time It's DifferentHire-a-Pirate: The Billion-Dollar Business of Maritime Security
Hire-a-Pirate: The Billion-Dollar Business of Maritime Security

Hire-a-Pirate: The Billion-Dollar Business of Maritime Security

Update: 2025-05-22
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In this episode, Sinead and Alex dive headfirst into the murky, lightly armed world of private maritime security, which the global capitalist system now relies on for the movement of our goods, and where ex-special forces guys named Gary protect billion-dollar ships with zero jurisdiction and even fewer HR policies.

They track the industry’s rise from the Somali piracy boom to today’s Red Sea drone zone, unpack how shipping companies quietly hired their own navies, and ask: what happens when global trade is guarded not by law… but by Gaz and his floating armory?

It’s Blackwater at sea, but with worse uniforms and better margins.

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Hire-a-Pirate: The Billion-Dollar Business of Maritime Security

Hire-a-Pirate: The Billion-Dollar Business of Maritime Security

Brought to you by Sinead O'Sullivan and Alex Chalmers