On October 7, 1994, the President transmitted the 1982 U.N. Law of the Sea (LOS) Convention, with its Deep Seabed Mining Implementing Agreement, to the Senate for advice and consent. DoD has long supported the United States becoming a party to the Convention, provided concerns with its deep seabed mining provisions could be adequately addressed. The agreement implementing Part XI of the 1982 LOS Convention removed those concerns and cleared the way for U.S. acceptance of the entire Convention, which is of major strategic and economic importance to the United States.
The value of the LOS Convention lies in the fact that it provides an authoritative compilation of the law governing the world's oceans, which supports operational rights essential to the planning and execution of the national defense strategy. By ratifying the treaty, the nations of the world, once and for all, are agreeing to be bound to principles that strike a complex but deliberate balance between maritime and coastal interests. On the one hand, the law that is codified in the Convention allows the Untied States to meet its national security requirements by assuring operational mobility and flexibility on, under, and over the world's oceans. At the same time, it recognizes a coastal state's interest in managing and protecting valuable offshore resources and coastal areas. It is this balance which the United States believes will lead to the Convention's widespread acceptability among diverse interest groups and promote the legal stability for the oceans that has been sought for so long.
Specifically, the Convention strengthens U.S. national security by confirming high seas freedoms of navigation and overflight, detailing passage rights through international straits and archipelagic waters, guaranteeing the right of innocent passage through foreign territorial seas, establishing limits on coastal state rights to extend maritime zones to the detriment of traditional navigational freedoms, and preserving the sovereign immune status of U.S. armed forces ships and aircraft. By confirming these rights in a universally recognized treaty, the Convention will also reduce prospects for disagreements with coastal nations during military operations.
In short, the international law of the sea spelled out in the LOS Convention ensures operational rights that are essential to the planning and execution of U.S. national defense strategy. It does this by guaranteeing that key sea and air lines of communication will remain open as a matter of legal right -- not contingent upon approval by coastal and island states along the route or in the area of operations. The benefits of the Convention can best be realized by the Untied States becoming a party to the Convention and continuing its leadership role in maritime matters.
