David's Reviews > The Pirate Coast: Thomas Jefferson, the First Marines & the Secret Mission of 1805

I have read several books before this one about the topic of the Barbary Pirates and the US intervention to squash their practice of raiding towns, capturing ships, and taking prisoners for ransom or eventually as slaves. Contrary to some recent claims about the contributions of Muslims to early American history, these contributions seem to be primarily plundering American trading vessels and taking Christians as slaves, not so different from today! This did prompt America to build up strong naval and marine (...to the shores of Tripoli) forces to deal with this threat to civilization. What was different with this author's take on it was that it left me with a bad impression of how it was handled by Thomas Jefferson and his administration. America, like many of the European powers, had been paying tribute and bribes for these pirates to leave our ships alone. But the cost kept escalating. Jefferson, prior to becoming president, had always spoken out against paying the Muslim pirates. As president he ordered the building of a naval fleet to take on this challenge and put a stop to the piracy stating America would no longer pay extortion. The story generally goes that he sent the fleet to blockade the Barbary ports and challenge any pirate ships they found, capturing or sinking them. At the same time an overland force of marines, the true leader of Tripoli looking to reclaim his country, and local tribes marched on Tripoli ending the piracy and the US paying them.

But, not so fast there! According to this author the blockage was working although it lasted for several years. And the overland march was successful but stopped short of Tripoli because Jefferson had authorized peace negotiations that accomplished the release of Americans being held. The agreement was reach in part because the pirate leader saw the inevitable outcome and decided to do what was necessary to stay in power. The US ended up paying money to them and agreed to pay annual sums less than they had in the past but that's not the story most of us were familiar with. Meanwhile, the American General William Eaton who led the overland expedition was furious at how this worked out. He felt the US had used and then discarded the true ruler of Tripoli and turned many supporters into critics as their lives were left at risk for having joined a revolt. Eaton also fell on financial hard times as a result of what he did for his country and the bargain that had been struck was loaded with weasel words just because Jefferson wanted a treaty instead of finishing the war the right way.

There is way more here than I could possibly summarize but it does present a detailed account of what it took to put together a military expedition when the government wants to be stingy and supports a dodgy character to negotiate and then be recognized as a hero. Great read for history buffs interested in the rest of the story.