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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5315049" data-attributes="member: 4937">We are going to have to be careful here to define what we are talking about then.  When I read 'pirates' I admit that I made the assumption that we were speaking of 'outlaw pirates' operating outside the blessings of any nation state.  If we are speaking of privateers, then we are speaking of a range of groups that can range to outlaws operating under a convenient pretence of being patriots to the actual navy of a country operating under the convienent pretence of being independent. But, ok, broadening 'pirate' to include a naval vessel more or less outfitted by the state and crewed accordingly, operating with a Letter of Marque and the blessing of the crown, we can't say much anything in particular about the tactics of 'pirates' generally because we've used so general of a definition to include any sort of commerce raiding on the high seas.   They'll try to strike by surprise, take the offensive when their opponents are weak, and evade and retreat when their opponents are superior.  But this is true of pretty much all warfare and naval warfare particularly.  I would presume that Sir Walter Raleigh's tactics as a 'pirate' more or less were indentical to those he used fighting the Spainish Armada in England's defense.  He took advantage of his better built more seaworthy vessels and bigger guns to out duel the Spanish with long range cannon fire.  The Spanish galleons were more or less purpose built for defending against and assisting boarding actions (big castles on the ends of the ship and lots of small anti-personnel guns), so turning it into a boarding action would not have been in his advantage.I would tend to feel that Jacobite pirates existed primarily through mutual oppurtunism than high feelings of patriotism.  It was politically convienent to claim that you were committing robbery out of an excess of high minded feeling, and it was politically convenient to recruit bloodthirsty mercenaries to be a thorn in the side of your political enemies.  The view of them as rebels against injustice strikes me more as the same sort of romantic revisionism that you find plaguing later accounts of piracy generally.   I don't really want to use Walter Scott as my primary source on the Jacobite pirates.A more idealistic group might be the band that founded the Pirate Republic on Madasgascar, but of them, I think that my assessment of their tactics holds more true than it would for Sir Walter Raleigh.  If you know of some accounts of pirates regularly using tactics other than surprise, overwhelming numbers, and closing to close quarters, I'd love to hear them.  I'm a sucker for Great Age of Sail stories.</blockquote>

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