Doug’s opposition to the LOS is based on a few myths that are worth addressing:

First, critics of the LOS suggest that it takes away U.S. sovereignty. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing in the LOS makes the U.S. cede sovereignty over any land or maritime territory. In fact, under the treaty, the U.S. gains sovereignty over a large amount of maritime territory and exclusive control over marine resources in a huge area. Under the LOS, the U.S. would attain jurisdiction over an additional 3.36 million square miles – greater than the combined area of the lower 48 states. Furthermore, as the convention’s provisions on land-based pollution are strictly hortatory, nothing in LOS could compel the U.S. to do anything differently on land.

Second, he suggests that President Reagan’s objections still hold true today. In actual fact, all of President Reagan’s objections to the LOS have been addressed. In 1983, President Reagan said that the treaty strongly supported U.S. interests except for one section, which dealt with deep seabed mining. With this in mind, President Reagan directed U.S. agencies to comply with the entire treaty except the part dealing with deep seabed mining. In his Statement on Oceans Policy, he said that the Convention “contains provisions with respect to traditional uses of the oceans which generally confirm existing maritime law and practice and fairly balance the interests of all states.” In 1994, U.S. negotiators succeeded in amending the disputed provisions to reflect all of President’s Reagan’s concerns. All of the State Department’s living former Legal Advisors (representing both Democratic and Republican Administrations) signed a letter to that effect. The letter states: “[T]he Reagan Administration’s objection to the LOS Convention, as expressed in 1982 and 1983, was limited to the deep seabed mining regime. The 1994 Implementing Agreement…satisfactorily resolved that objection and has binding legal effect in its modification of the LOS Convention.”

Third, Doug seems deeply troubled by the International Seabed Authority (ISA) created by the LOS. In reality ISA is an organization of countries that neither governs the oceans nor taxes Americans. The ISA has one function: to administer the mining of minerals in the deep sea. No country can perform such a function, since no country has ever asserted sovereignty over the deep sea. Still, proprietary claims on the deep sea must be regulated for industry there to be viable. U.S. Industry groups have lined up to support the LOS, because without an ISA to give legal title for mining sites, deep seabed mining is too risky to undertake and no one will finance it. The ISA is accountable to a Council of member states. As a member of the LOS, the U.S. could veto any decision that affects the powers or budget of the ISA. The ISA has no power to levy taxes whatsoever. The LOS does contemplate taking royalties from deep seabed mining, which, if it were to ever happen, would involve payments from the companies that profit from mining only. Even the decisions on how to distribute royalties would have to survive a U.S. veto, provided the U.S. ratifies the LOS. Under LOS, no other international organization, including the UN, has any authority over the oceans. If the U.S. remains outside of the convention, U.S. firms will be forced to look on as their foreign counterparts profit from deep seabed mining.

Perhaps I should leave the last word to Admiral Thad Allen, Commandant of the Coast Guard: who noted that:

“The convention greatly enhances our ability to protect the American public as well as our efforts to protect and manage fishery resources and to protect the marine environment. From the Coast Guard’s perspective, we can best maintain a public order of the oceans through a universally accepted law of the sea treaty that preserves and promotes critical U.S. national interests.”

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