The American fleet has positioned itself off the Libyan coast, starting the naval blockade of Tripoli. Tension is rising in the area after the first incidents and the war may have unforeseen consequences in North Africa in this turbulent situation. The President of the United States has given permission for the Navy to act “as it deems necessary ”, and hostilities can start at any time. Gaddafi is not to blame:we are in 1801 Long, long before Afghanistan, Iraq, the Gulf War, Vietnam, Korea, the world wars, or Cuba.
The young American nation gained independence from England in 1783. Until then, during the war of independence, American ships were protected on their voyages through the Mediterranean by the French fleet thanks to a mutual defense treaty. Those were years when in the states of North Africa -formally part of the Ottoman Empire- it was common to carry out acts of piracy against unwary merchants, capturing their ships and demanding ransom for their crews, something very similar to what is currently happening in the waters of Somalia.
Once independence was achieved, and as a sovereign state, the American navy was left without protection from a French state that would soon suffer its own revolution. In October 1784 Moroccan pirates captured the brig Betsey , but thanks to the intervention of Spain, which negotiated the release, the story had a happy ending. Even so, Spain gave advice to the new nation:it is convenient to offer a tribute to the Barbary states that guarantees "protection". The United States then sent negotiators to the area to formalize treaties with the different states, and in 1786 they signed an agreement with Morocco that would put an end to their acts of piracy.
But with Algeria the negotiations were not so easy. In July 1785, two American ships, the Maria and the Dauphin , were arrested and a ransom of 660,000 dollars was requested. The budget of the negotiators to obtain peace with Algeria was only 40,000 dollars, so an attempt was made to negotiate a reasonable ransom but it did not come to fruition and the crews of both ships remained imprisoned for ten years.
The prisoners described in their letters the conditions of slavery in which they lived, although in many cases their slavery was far better than the slavery of the black population in America. For example, they could own money and property and one of them, named James Leander Cathcart , he even became an adviser to the King of Algeria, although most had to work for pirates in appalling conditions that led to death for many. In any case, your letters from him pushed the American people to ask the government to take measures to prevent further acts of piracy .
In March 1785, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams they met with the Tripoli ambassador in London to request an end to hostilities with a country “that had done them no harm ”, but the ambassador's response was that, according to the Koran, “all those nations that do not recognize the Prophet are sinners and it was their right to enslave him yes”.
T. Jefferson and J. Adams
Jefferson and Adams agreed that paying tribute would encourage the Barbaries to continue their piracy, but while Jefferson advocated a punitive operation, Adams believed that after such a recent war of independence it was better to pay tribute until a fleet was available. adequate. So finally the United States paid the ransom and for the next 15 years up to a million dollars a year as a tribute to prevent further acts. During all this time, Jefferson continued to fight for the cessation of payments –which came to account for 20% of the state's income – while the American fleet grew stronger.
But the time came when Jefferson became president of the United States of America, and the Pasha of Tripoli The only thing that occurred to him was to ask him for a tribute of $250,000. Now Jefferson was the boss, he refused to pay the tribute and the Pasha declared war on the United States, although Algeria and Tunisia preferred to stay out.
It was a strange declaration of war, not in writing, but the American flag was destroyed in front of the consulate and the American Congress authorized the sending of forces but the declaration of war was not voted on.
On August 1, 1801, after three hours of exchange of fire, the schooner USS Enterprise captured the gunboat Tripoli , causing 30 casualties for none of the Americans, but as there was no formal declaration of war the ship was released.
During 1802 and 1803, the United States continued to send the best of its fleet to the area, blockading the Barbary ports. In October 1803 the Tripoli fleet managed to capture the USS Philadephia intact after running aground while patrolling the port of Tripoli. The entire crew was captured and the ship was placed in such a way that she could be used as a battery against the American fleet. 
Frigate Philadephia in Tripoli
In February 1804, an “American commando ” captured a pirate sailing ship christening it USS Intrepid , approached the USS Philadelphia enough to board it, taking the enemy crew by surprise (funny, the pirates were on the American ship, and the Americans on the pirate) and destroy it so that the Berbers couldn't continue using it.
In the following months there were several clashes, and perhaps the most notable action was when the USS Intrepid loaded with explosives was directed towards the port, although it exploded before time - perhaps by enemy fire - without reaching the objective.
In the spring of 1805, a group of American soldiers together with a small army of mercenaries crossed the desert from Alexandria, in Egypt, to the city of Derna, managing to capture it. This fact constitutes the first time in history that the American flag was raised in occupied enemy territory .
Shortly after, on June 4, 1805, the Pasha of Tripoli accepted the signing of an agreement. The curious thing about the agreement is that the United States agreed to return the more than one hundred Barbary prisoners while Tripoli released three hundred Americans, but due to the difference in the number of prisoners, the United States would pay $60,000 as a ransom. So, he won the war but he paid .
This war served to give the United States a military reputation, becoming a power capable of waging wars across the seas, which would undoubtedly have a lot of influence on its future global interventionism (part of the anthem of the Marines refers to this war). In addition, it would serve to make the different American states more aware of being a single country when facing a common enemy.
The problems with the Barbary pirates were not over yet, and a second war against the Barbary pirates took place a few years later, but that is another story.
Collaboration of Emilio (Offler)
Images:1, 2