We had discussions
on The Law of the Sea Convention
in this class in 2009 and 2012.
The major concern is
how far into the oceans does national sovereignty extend.
Originally it was 3
miles, the distance a cannon ball could fire.
Then it was extended
to 12 miles, the distance of artillery shells.
Early international
discussion got the UN involved in 1960 to settle some
disputes and
standardized such issues as measurement is to be from
the mean-low-water
mark and 12 nautical miles or 13.8 land-lubber miles.
Next round of UN
meeting lasted from1967 to 1982.
This got involved
with the continental shelf which depended on depth of water and could
extend from 200
miles but not more than 320 from mean low water mark. Right of
“innocent passage”
granted in this
area, but the sovereign state can set standards for pollution, taxes,
notifications.
Russia has declared
their continental shelf extended under the arctic ocean to the North
pole.
The UN Convention of
the Law of the Sea created an exclusive economic zone of 200 nautical
miles, 230 statute miles, in which ocean resources are reserved.
Definitions extend from surface of the sea to the air above and to
the sea bed below. Proposes right of free navigation, which is
challenged by China in the Sea located North and West of the
Philippines known as the South of China Sea.
China is
challenging that armed naval vessels are allowed from their areas.
The US Navy says all vessels are allowed free passage. The general
attitude of the UN and International Courts are for any conflicting
claims to be worked out between the parties based on the general
guidelines above.
Why an interest in
South China Sea? One is that some think there are significant oil
deposits. Vietnam and China lay claim to The Paracel Islands which
are almost equal distance from Vietnam and
China, so you can
see how this could be understandably disputed. The two countries have
each put oil rigs there and have put people on uninhabitable reefs.
In a tiny battle, but decisive, between patrol boats, Vietnam had
more men and boats than China, but Vietnamese boats had operational
failures which allowed the Chinese to shoot at stationary targets and
the Vietnamese withdrew. They then oil concessions to India ; which
adds one more country into the mix.
Second point is
unrestricted passage by all world navigation. Our Navy makes a point
of keeping the seaways open to all. Kadaffe tried to declare the
Gulf Sidra portion of the Mediterranean off of Libya as closed
waters. We shot down his fighter jets.
You can see on the
charts that China has a large island, Hainan, off her south coast
which extends her claims further into the South China Sea. The
Chinese sea coast from Taiwan to Vietnam is about 850 miles
The Philippines has
Luzon and Palawan making an equal coastline bordering the Contested
area.
As is the Nor&So Vietnam coast about the same, too.
And Malaysia is the greatest coast, but far to the southern end of
the Sea. Indonesia has a tip of Borneo and an island, Natuna Besar
,which marks the far end of Chinese claims.
Remember that the
definition of “government” is the dominate coercive force
in a locale, Thus a street gang can claims territories by being the
biggest bully in the area. So too, this is the game that China
is playing. Notice
the red line, she is claiming the entire Sea as her own. The USA
once had Manifest Destiny as a guide. China has the nine dash line.
The claim is made and we have to see if anybody can object.
China is playing the
game superbly, using the rules of international law. While reefs and
shoals
are not considered
by the Law of the Sea to be land, an island is. An island is defined
as always above the water line. An island can claim for its
sovereign economic zone a radius of 230 miles of ocean, that is 460
miles in diameter. The South China Sea is only 700 miles wide at
each end. A stepping stone of three islands, can claim a span about
double that. The Sea is a little over 1500 miles long. Each island
can claim rights to 16,600 sq miles in area.
How do you make an
island? Anchor a barge? Well, yes, that is the start, Make that
barge a dredge that takes up material from the shallow sea bed around
a reef and pile sand and coral and some cement to make that reef into
an island permanently above sea level. Dredge a channel and you
have a protected anchorage. Put 24,000 cubic yards of it in a line
on top of the reef and you can create an airfield.
Brilliant.
This was done by street bullies with a damn good lawyer.
Timing is good, too.
We would like to counter the Chinese claim as if we are defending
the rights of
our former colony,
the Philippines, but they throw us out between hurricanes and
volcanoes, then invite us back to help clean up. China is wining and
dining the murderous president of the Philippines while we are
objecting to his violation of civil rights by assassinating drug
dealers. We are on our own 7,000 miles from home while being the
Coast Guard for the entire maritime world.
Law
of the Sea Update.
==> (handout scsd01.txt)
Now a change of
pace. The USN is the largest and most powerful in the world
today. Albeit down to just over a hundred ships from thousands at
the end of WW2. The U.S. has ten super aircraft carriers and twelve
smaller ones, equivalent to the best WW2 aircraft carriers that are
used for helicopters.
China has a first
carrier intended for training and is building another. Aircraft
carriers are intended to be a show of overwhelming and irresistible
force around the world.
China had been
careful to not send their one aircraft carrier to the South China Sea
because that could provoke the USN to send one of our behemoths
there. China has no cruisers, a few destroyers and mostly patrol
boats. Is there any question about who would win any confrontation?
Lets take a look
back in history to the battle of Agincourt in 1415 where an English
foot army and a French army of mounted knights engaged. The French
had trained men in armor and their horse were protected by a guard of
pike-men to protect from sword attack. The English army had leather
armor. But they also had their long bow which could send arrows over
the French-pike men to penetrate the French armor. It doesn’t
take much to see the direct analogy of the weaker Chinese as armed
with missiles to go over our protective escorts and penetrate the
defenses of our magnificent aircraft carriers.
Capacity.
Other than North Korea, this is the most
likely spot to generate a war. Both entangle China.
Thus
you might be interested to compare the U.S. military to the rest of
the world:
US
has 65 acres of flight decks. Rest of world has 28.
*
The USN has ten Super carriers -- and ten bigger than the size of
WW2 carriers for helicopters.
*
China has one aircraft carrier, bought from Ukraine when the Soviet
Union went belly up, that is used for training. China is building a
super carrier of their own design. Target date 2020.
*
India bought a carrier from Russia, now scrapped to be replaced with
a new one they are building
*
Russia has one carrier that just finished a month off Syria. Our
carriers operate on 6-month tours.
*
France has one which was last deployed for anti-pirate duty in the
Indian Ocean.
*
Several countries have the smaller helicopter carriers –
Australia, Italy, Japan, Spain, Thailand,
China
has six modern nuclear submarines and 52 old diesel types.
The
USN has 72, all nuclear that can travel underwater at full speed
forever.
Chinese
Air Force has 420 modern fighter and bomber aircraft. US has over
4,000.
The
Chinese Army is three times the manpower as ours.
Neither
side wants an economy busting war. Yet each has national pride to
consider.
Wars
are initiated by public support of personalities. Nobody wins a war.
History is written by the Winner.]
Other
notes
If Global Warming were real, then these low islands would disappear,
drowned by ice melt.
Problem solved.
New U.S. secretary of state, “We’re going to have to send
China a clear signal that, first, the island building stops and,
second, your access to those islands also is not going to be
allowed.”
That second demand is going to be awkward. Regardless of its
legality, blocking China’s access to its new occupied islands
would amount to an act of war and risk armed conflict as a response.
Sen. Marco Rubio has
a Bill that would impose asset freezes and travel bans on people and
entities who “threaten the peace, security or stability”
of the South China Sea or East China Sea. He would also restrict
foreign assistance to countries that recognize China’s
sovereignty there.
Military is not the
only option; a full range of actions and players exists, including
sanctions, negotiations, regional countries, and international civil
society involving efforts by the United States, major powers such as
Japan and India, and regional states such as the Philippines and
Vietnam.
In addition to the
nine-dash-line. China has announced a Second Island Line that is
farther South and East of both the East and South China Seas that
includes parts of Japanese islands and all of the Philippines. Does
that bring memories of the Monroe Doctrine that puts all Latin
America behind a curtain of US influence to the exclusion of the
other world powers. This was to protect the newly independent
nations from colonization by European powers. (John Kerry declared
the Doctrine as over in 2013. )
Or consider of the
Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, free of Western powers, under
the leadership of imperial Japan in 1940. Might makes Right.
Japan had ten battleships and ten aircraft carriers. We had
three aircraft carriers and, after Pearl Harbor, zero Battleships in
the Pacific. Weakness encourages opportunism. In
1941 Europeans were elsewhere occupied in their own
survival and Japan thought they could do what they wanted in the
entire western Pacific. into the Indian Ocean.
Naval News
Service, Dateline SOUTH CHINA SEA -- Carrier Strike Group1,
including aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70),
guided-missile destroyer USS Wayne E. Meyer (DDG 108), began routine
operations in the South China Sea, Feb. 18.
Prior to
their operations in the South China Sea, ships and aircraft from
within the strike group conducted training off the islands of Hawaii
and Guam to maintain and improve their readiness and develop cohesion
as a strike group. The strike group recently enjoyed a port visit to
Guam and after departing the Marianas, conducted operations in the
Philippine Sea.
Vinson last deployed to the
Western-Pacific in 2015 and conducted a bilateral exercise with the
Royal Malaysian Navy and Royal Malaysian Air Force in the South China
Sea. Vinson first operated in the South China Sea in 1983 and in
total, has operated there during 16 previous deployments over its 35
year history. “
I read this as a
transit thru the SoChSea on the way to the Gulf where we usually have
a carrier to tend to Iraq, Iran and Syria. Traveling with one
destroyer is essentially without escort , the one is to pickup downed
pilots. I take this as to reduce provocation. Each carrier in
deployments for the last ten years has 4 destroyers and an air
control cruiser. In war time a task force would have a dozen. {I
have seen nothing of Vincent showing up in the Gulf –
maybe there is more to this for the SoChinaSea.}
Carrier USS Bush has
just arrived in the Mediterranean. All carriers were home for
Christmas and these two deployed in January.
Feb 22 – China apparently had installed weapons, including
anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems, on all seven of the islands
it has built in the South China Sea.
{They have not built
docks and hotels for tourists – they have armed the new islands
as if knowing they have done something wrong and deserving
punishment.}
US position is that
we will not contest the island-like structures, but will support a
coalition of our Allies if they do something. Philippines, Malaysia,
and Vietnam. {Vietnam, an ally?! But Japan and Germany became allies
much sooner, within 5-years. It has been 42 years {30 April 1975}
since the fall of Saigon. 58,220 American soldiers had been killed
almost 3 times that wounded. Even today, we are paying Vietnam
veterans, their families or survivors more than 22 billion dollars a
year. }
China is not the only nation building
islands in the South China Sea. Vietnam has also started projects
mostly within the past two years in constructing islands at 10 sites.
Together, Vietnam has built slightly over 120 acres of land in the
area. By comparison, China has created over 3,000 acres of land in
the Spratly Islands. Before and current pictures of the ten new
islands are at.
http://www.businessinsider.com/vietnam-building-islands-in-south-china-sea-2016-5/#spratly-island-2014-2016-1
Domino Theory.
From the Cold War, we have a domino
theory in SE Asia, that if conquest of one nation is not thwarted,
then the next neighbor will be attacked, and if successful then the
next is conquered. Thus we had to make a stand in Vietnam. It
pretty must stands to Newtonian rules, any power will advance until
stopped. China has made claims to the South China Sea, the East
China Sea and to the Yellow Sea all the way to Japan. AND there is a
second, totally arbitrary line of desired influence that runs from
the middle of Japan to New Guinea (along the Marianas Ridge) that
encompasses most of the area actually occupied by Imperial Japan in
1942 which saw the hard fought battles of Saipan, Guam, the
Philippines and Okinawa. Do we sit patiently waiting for Second
Pacific War to be brought to us?