The US extended its claims on the ocean floor by an area twice the size of California, securing rights to potentially resource-rich seabeds at a time when Washington is ramping up efforts to safeguard supplies of minerals key to future technologies.
China attempts to maintain their territorial claims in the South China Sea after the Philippines and Vietnam conduct island-building operations there in the early-00s: CHINA BAD!!!
America expanding their territorial claims in the Pacific because they want more natural resources: Yeah, this is fine and reasonable and democratic.
Canada, who gets no say in the matter because we’re entirely reliant on the US for trade and defence: fuck, eh?
One of these claims is compatible with UNCLOS, the other absolutely is not. The US pulls plenty of international dickery, including not ratifying UNCLOS, but this claim fits within that existing international law just fine
I did some reading and while it’s true that the continued existence of the US federal government is a large collection of dick moves forming one gigantic meta-dick move, this is actually pretty straightforward. The UN Convention on the Law of the Seas defines a range of distances from the seashore where a state can claim the seafloor/minerals etc as its own; everything past that is the high seas. The US hadn’t previously maxed out its claims, so there was wiggle room under UNCLOS to expand said claims.
Now, why would they bother, why is it suddenly worth the extra administrative cost of claiming even deeper offshore waters, that’s an interesting question. I’d say it’s a good indicator of the increasing cost and difficulty of extracting natural resources (likely technology has brought the cost down some, too), pushing nation-states to pursue ever more exotic and costly extraction methods, but overall this doesn’t seem that significant (we all already knew that was a trend, that’s why we’re all on this community).
The push to expand territories is a troubling one, because sure, this is a legally uncontroversial move, but if expanding territories is at this point our best option for propping up the system, we’re in for another era of wars. But we all knew that already.
It should be noted that claim is not the same as the better-known exclusive economic zone. The continental shelf thing is only for seabed resources, not stuff in the water column. But that’s all that the US is claiming, so it is indeed in line with UNCLOS
I’d argue that expanding the zones a bit doesn’t incur costs other than updating some maps, as existing radar systems etc were already reaching into the newly claimed areas, undoubtedly.
Am I worried about my country’s creeping reach, and have I suddenly realized there’s yet another way to slowly encroach on territory? Yes.
policing a space/securing it for industry costs. They didn’t change the maps just to feel good about themselves, this is only the first step to opening these spaces up for exploitation.
If nothing else, they need a presence to help the companies quash unionization efforts on the mining rigs, don’t they? And that costs.
China attempts to maintain their territorial claims in the South China Sea after the Philippines and Vietnam conduct island-building operations there in the early-00s: CHINA BAD!!!
America expanding their territorial claims in the Pacific because they want more natural resources: Yeah, this is fine and reasonable and democratic.
Canada, who gets no say in the matter because we’re entirely reliant on the US for trade and defence: fuck, eh?
China bad
America bad
Simple
One of these claims is compatible with UNCLOS, the other absolutely is not. The US pulls plenty of international dickery, including not ratifying UNCLOS, but this claim fits within that existing international law just fine
Except it’s not really compatible with UNCLOS.
The US interpretation of UNCLOS would allow them to claim like half the Pacific
What do you think isn’t in line with it? This isn’t an exclusive economic zone claim.
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Part XI
There are 58 articles in part XI. Which ones are you talking about?
Nice whataboutism.
Stick to the point, though. This is a dick move (increasing the territorial claims, that is - not pointing out whataboutism, that’s all good!)
I did some reading and while it’s true that the continued existence of the US federal government is a large collection of dick moves forming one gigantic meta-dick move, this is actually pretty straightforward. The UN Convention on the Law of the Seas defines a range of distances from the seashore where a state can claim the seafloor/minerals etc as its own; everything past that is the high seas. The US hadn’t previously maxed out its claims, so there was wiggle room under UNCLOS to expand said claims.
Now, why would they bother, why is it suddenly worth the extra administrative cost of claiming even deeper offshore waters, that’s an interesting question. I’d say it’s a good indicator of the increasing cost and difficulty of extracting natural resources (likely technology has brought the cost down some, too), pushing nation-states to pursue ever more exotic and costly extraction methods, but overall this doesn’t seem that significant (we all already knew that was a trend, that’s why we’re all on this community).
The push to expand territories is a troubling one, because sure, this is a legally uncontroversial move, but if expanding territories is at this point our best option for propping up the system, we’re in for another era of wars. But we all knew that already.
It should be noted that claim is not the same as the better-known exclusive economic zone. The continental shelf thing is only for seabed resources, not stuff in the water column. But that’s all that the US is claiming, so it is indeed in line with UNCLOS
I’d argue that expanding the zones a bit doesn’t incur costs other than updating some maps, as existing radar systems etc were already reaching into the newly claimed areas, undoubtedly.
Am I worried about my country’s creeping reach, and have I suddenly realized there’s yet another way to slowly encroach on territory? Yes.
E: why the downvotes?
policing a space/securing it for industry costs. They didn’t change the maps just to feel good about themselves, this is only the first step to opening these spaces up for exploitation.
If nothing else, they need a presence to help the companies quash unionization efforts on the mining rigs, don’t they? And that costs.
I find it amazing how every time you see the shittiest take in this community, it’s a lemmy.ml user. It never fails.
That or hexbear but yeah
No, they’re both bad
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Literally the same bullshit getting pulled in the South China Sea.
“This ocean is all MY ocean, because I said so”
(oh oops there’s oil there teehee completely unrelated)