Easy to defend? Rubbish. One intercontinental ballistic missile would decimate their floating platform "settlements".
They are sitting ducks, one well armed rogue pirate ship could finish them.
They are sitting ducks, one well armed rogue pirate ship could finish them.
North Korea has shown that the easiest way to defend against invasion by the US is to have a number of nukes. This seems to be Iran's strategy too. Until they have nukes, they are vulnerable. After they have nukes, they are much less likely to be attacked themselves.
If North Korea, Pakistan, and (soon) Iran have managed to get nukes, I don't see why small groups of rich, smart, western businessmen won't be able to.
A floating settlement armed with robotic drones and nuclear missiles would be pretty secure I think.
Why would an armed rogue ship want to do that? Seastead platforms would only have value as a floating platform. It's not as if you could easily fence the thing.
The platforms could also be hosting things of value, like a casino. A casino would probably be able to afford really good security, and its owners might well have enough political pull to get the assistance of land-nation's militaries. It would have to be a really organized and well equipped rogue pirate ship. I'm not sure these exist. The closest analogues are small open boats of armed Somalis and actual military ships.
Most likely, the platforms would be of little value to a pirate. The few that are going to be worth hitting will probably be too hard to hit.
The only well-armed ships are navies. Yes, a navy or an ICBM could easily destroy a seastead. They could also easily destroy Monaco, Vanuatu, Dominica, or any other small country. The world is full of sitting ducks, yet we don't see them "finished" very often, because there is little profit in it for a government and it is politically unpopular.