When looking at the world today, there are many security issues which get presented on a daily basis in the maritime security realm, and will often change due to some type of existing or new development of sort of security threat. Every country has it’s own security challenges, and the United States is no different. When it comes to these newly enacted maritime security measures, policies or threats, changes will happen that can have a different effect on individuals whether it be a private business, the countries citizens or at the local, state or federal government level.
For this research paper it will discuss one of the most important maritime security issues happening today which not only affects the United States, but also an entire region, the South China Sea. In a region of huge global trade, natural resources and a fight amongst countries, leaves a great concern of the economic stability for not only the region but also the world. In this paper it will cover the topics associated with international maritime law, the implications of how the South China Sea dispute is effecting the U.S. and its security interests, who is involved in this dispute and why. Also it will discuss what options can be done to solve this maritime security challenge, the economic implications of this issue and what may happen in the future.
In the South China Sea, there is a major maritime security issue that has been growing steadily from a normal dispute to a worst case scenario of a war between the worlds superpowers. The Chinese government has virtually claimed the entire South China Sea as its own, which has overlapping territories claimed by several other Southeast Asian governments. In the last 4 years, the Chinese government has started ...
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...Chinese government, this is causing tension between the two world’s superpowers.
The United States and China hold different and opposing views of the applicable law and the meaning behind freedom of navigation. According to the language written in the UNLCOS, the high seas are open to all States, whether coastal or land-locked. Freedom of the high seas is exercised under the conditions laid down by this convention and by other rules of international law. It comprises of several conditions, but the two that apply to the U.S. and China are the freedom of navigation and freedom of over flight. The UNCLOS also states that these freedoms shall be exercised by all States with due regard for the interests of other States in their exercise of the freedom of the high seas, and also with due regard for the rights under this Convention with respect to activities in the Area.
Under the UN 1982 treaty, a state’s territorial sea extends twelve nautical miles from the national coastline (Slomanson 305). Within this area, Ecuador exercises its sovereignty over these waters as if it were a landmass (Slomanson 305). All aspects of the sea are under its control, including the seabed and airspace. Furthermore, Ecuador is allowed to impose laws that regulate the territory and consume resources that lie inside this defined area. Within this territorial sea, Ecuador “must exercise its sovereign power in this adjacent strip of water” (Slomanson 305). Additionally, Ecuador is expected to chart this water and to provide warning of navigational hazards (Slomanson 305). However, Ecuador did not act upon this and was “lax in enforcing it”. In 1951, the International Court of Justice issued this statement in response to a ruling:
First, if the CCP recognizes Taipei as an independent state, the CCP risks losing it bargaining power over the decisions and actions taken in regard to the island. A country’s bargaining power is the strength of a states claim over the disputed territory. A decline in this power mea...
The Department of Homeland Security as an umbrella department has taken in many organizations to complete their primary duties of national security. To complete their mission on boarder protection and movement from international waters the DHS had the U.S. Coast Guard assigned to it. “The Coast Guard has many duties, including the protection of coastal and inland waterways, environmental protection, the interdiction of contraband, and maritime law enforcement.” (White, 2014) Since the Coast Guard ...
As a result of free trade, global investment will be much more active among TPP nations, which will strengthen the economy. As economic activity will be mixed with many other nations’, nations will work for good relationships between TPP nations because unnecessary collisions will harm the interdependent economic body. This works well geopolitically as the current administration are aiming. Many of nations signing TPP are located in East and South-East Asia, where China is growing its influence for the sovereignty over the South China Sea and the hegemony in Asia. Professor Green and Professor Goodman analyze that the U.S. aim to strengthen economic tie between small Southeast Asian nations are to prevent Beijing’s use of mercantile coercion to quiet those nations on the maritime dispute in the South China Sea (Green, Goodman 28). This will allow the U.S. to continually maintain national security over the Pacific-Asia and hold China from getting out to the
Mingst, K. (2011). Essentials of international relations. (5th ed., p. 70). New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company.
INTRODUCTION : a brief overview of the current situation regarding the security issue in the Pacific region
During the past years when the US and China focused on business matters, relations progressed smoothly, however, whenever ideology, value and power overrode these interests both countries became intertwined in resentment and hostility. The US has to adapt to a multilateral foreign policy approach including China in it’s future, free of historical differences. China’s domestic policy should favor liberalization, which will then lead to a foreign policy that will develop a beneficial assertive behavior focused on interdependence. Thus creating a formula for cooperation, an opposing condition will lead to conflict.
Given these sets of circumstances, china, Taiwan and United States have much to gain and even more to lose if an armed conflict erupts in the Taiwan Strait. All three countries have political, economic, and national security issues involved and united states and china are both in competition economic...
From the beginning of their establishment, the bilateral relations between the United States of America and China have changed throughout the time. The bilateral relations of the two countries emerged from 1970’s with the ‘Ping-Pong’ diplomacy and there have been many pauses in their mutual relations. The US and China enjoyed cooperation in economic and military spheres and the mutual relations grew massively during until the end of 1990’s. The heads of the two states began visiting each other’s countries and the economic ties were tightening year by year. However, the issues of human rights and free speech declined mutual Sino-American relations. The American principle of democracy promotion and human rights protection minimized the Sino- American relations after the Tiananmen Square events in 1989, the US Presidents-George Bush and Bill Clinton- playing a key role in determining the further American foreign policy towards China.
In the Western Pacific, the South China Sea is a global crossroads that holds strategic importance for many nations world wide. The South China Sea stretches from the Taiwan and Luzon Straits in the north to Indonesia and the Strait of Malacca in the south with Vietnam on the west and the Philippines and Borneo on the east. In total size, the South China Sea surpasses the Mediterranean Sea. However, unlike this Near-Eastern comparator, territorial disputes and conflicting claims threaten the movement of global trade through the South China Sea, thus unbalancing regional stability in the Asia-Pacific. Claimants include the bordering coastal countries of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Republic of China (a.k.a. Taiwan), the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and Vietnam. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton addressed the United States position regarding these territorial claims. In her statement on the South China Sea, Secretary of State Clinton reaffirmed the fact that the U.S. does not “take a position on the competing territorial claims over land features in the South China Sea.”1 She goes on to state that “all parties should pursue their territorial claims and accompanying rights to maritime space in accordance with international law.”2 Consequently, the U.S. must maintain an active strategic interest in the peaceful resolution of South China Sea claimant disputes to ensure continued freedom of navigation throughout the region. This paper will provide a perspective on the geo-political and strategic issues, the conflicting claims, potential resolutions and the current U.S. position.
In conclusion, the United States should ratify the Convention on the Law of the Sea for three reasons. First, because the US must ratify the convention if the United States would like to have its exclusive economic zone extended by the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. Second because if another country is able to increase their oil production the surpass that of the United States the economy of the US will suffer. Third because any increase in the power of Russia, or any other foreign state will result in a net decrease in power for the United States.
China routinely intercepts U.S. reconnaissance flights in its EEZ; any overflight over its reclaimed islands can be expected to be met in similar aggressive ways that increase the risk of an accident akin to the U.S. EP-3 incident in Apr 2001. With U.S. naval vessels operating within 12 nautical miles of China’s reclaimed islands, a comparable maritime incident could be triggered by harassment, such as the USNS Impeccable incident in Mar 2009. While some may argue that there are procedures now to guide naval vessels’ interactions, these are non-binding and it is hard to predict how ship or ground commanders would act during heightened
Public International law International law contains of rules and principles, which preside over the relations and communication of nations with each other. International Law that is in most other countries referred to as Public International Law concerns itself only with questions of rights among more than a few nations or nations and the citizens or subjects of other nations. In dissimilarity, Private International Law deals with controversies among confidential persons, natural or juridical, arising out of situations having important association to further than one nation. In current years the line up connecting public and private international law have became more and more doubtful. Issues of private international law may also associate issues of public international law and numerous matters of private international law nave considerable meaning for the international group of people of nations. International Law consists of the basic, classic concepts of law in nationwide legal systems, status, property, responsibility, and tort. It also includes substantive law, procedure, process and remedies. International Law is rooted in receipt by the nation states, which comprise the system. Customary law and conventional law are primary sources of international law. Customary international law results when states trail convinced practices usually and time after time out of an intelligence of legal responsibility. Lately the customary law was codified in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Conventional international law derives from international agreements and may obtain any appearance that the constricting parties have the same opinion upon. Agreements may be complete in admiration to any substance except for to the leve...
Currently, International system is focusing on issues related with maritime security. Maritime security coxncern with threats that prevail in the maritime domain (Klein 2011; Kraska and Pedrozo 2013; Roach 2004; Vrey 2010, 2013). These threats include interstate-dispute, terrorism, piracy, drugs trafficking, people and illicit foods, arms proliferation, illegal fishing, environmental crimes, as well as accidents and disaster which happen in maritime domain. Thus, generally, maritime security can be defined as the absence of those threats. Meanwhile, there is an argument that inter-states dispute should be categorized as national security instead of maritime security. Thus, there is another definition of maritime security which define maritime security as good or stable order at sea (Till 2004; Vrey 2010; Kraska and Pedrozo 2013: 1). The definition of maritime security from one to another is different as the scope of maritime security is broad and each actor has different point of view on the issue. There is no universal legal definition about maritime security. The United Nation itself only
In any kind of legal relations, subject always play an important role, and it is one of the signals to determine the relation that pertaining the adjustment of any legislation system. International law is a legislation system that is a set of thousands of documents from various sources. The research about the subjects is necessary since it helps to find out the source of law, which relation pertains the adjustment of law. The subjects of international law include sovereign states and analogous entities, intergovernmental organizations, the individuals, and multinational corporations.