Bring back the Q ships?

The Q-ship HMS Hyderabad, unique as the only vessel designed specifically as a Q-ship.

I saw a comment post on gcaptain that sparked my interest.  It said “Time to bring back the Q ships”.   While the entire world now engages in discussing how to stop piracy, I took a moment to research this, as I did not recall what exactly the Q ships were. Q ships where heavily armed merchant ships used in WWI and WWII with concealed weaponry that were designed to lure enemy subs into engaging them in a surface attack.  Essentially decoy ships.  As a sub closed in to what they though were unsuspecting merchant ships, the freighters unveiled heavy deck guns that easily out gunned the sub.

A bomb thrower aboard the HMS Hyderabad

The British Royal Navy first began using them in WWI and the U.S. followed suit in WWII converting a small fleet of old merchant ships.  They were used most heavily in wWI by the Royal Navy.  In the course of 150 engagements they destroyed 14 U-boats and damaged 60, at a cost of 27 Q-ships lost out of 200.  Success in WWII was mixed, as German submarines caught on to the act and used torpedoes instead of attempting a surface engagement.

Would Q ships work against Somali pirates?  I discussed this with some of my co-workers, and we all were in agreement this may actually be a very viable option against the pirates.  Somali pirates are a relatively primitive force.  They do not have the option to utilize advanced weaponry like torpedoes, and could easily become out gunned by a well armed merchant ship, crewed by military personnel.  They also lack a sophisticated communication network, so decoy ships could probably operate with success for some time before the entire network of Somali pirates realized the existence of the decoy ships.  Clearly, attacks would likely continue despite the presence of Q ships, but the decoy ships would become a means to actually capture or kill pirates in the act.  Using Q ships would present a much more dynamic response to the problem than the current maritime patrols that have done little to deter or even capture pirates.

An artists depiction of a Q-Ship engaged in battle

What do you think?

Should we re-activate some slow aging merchant ships out of the mothball fleet, and crew them with a few good mariners and a Navy Seal team?

For more on Q Ships:

Royal Navy Q Ships

Q-23

HMS Hyderabad

Q-Ships Versus U-Boats – Beyer, Kenneth M.: Q-Ships versus U-Boats. America’s Secret Project. Naval Institute Press. Annapolis, Maryland, USA. 1999. ISBN 15575000444