This would be great for civilian shipping in certain areas, as modern piracy seems to exclusively focus on holding crew members for ransom. Lots of comments he

This would be great for civilian shipping in certain areas, as modern piracy seems to exclusively focus on holding crew members for ransom. Lots of comments here raise good questions about its fitness as a military vessel, but maybe the point is to develop tech that civilian vessels can use? Preventing piracy has always been viewed as a task of the military, and piracy-proofing civilian vessels would go a long ways towards meeting that goal.