LOST here refers to the long-pending Law Of the Sea Treaty. As a fromer naval personage, this is something that has attracted my attention at various times. When the original push for this was on in the 80’s, Ronaldus Magnus, Reagan himself, turned away from this proposal as a seriously flawed instrument whose impact will negatively affect US national security.
We are set to take a policymaking trip down memory lane with the Bush Administration urging accession to the Convention on the Law of the Sea in a recent statement made by the President on the issue. The Treaty was crafted from 1973 to 1982 and 154 countries have become signatories to it, along with the European Community.
In 1982, President Reagan refused to sign the Treaty, claiming specific objections to its terms. Those objections have not been resolved.
This piece from Tech Central Station goes on to note the specific problems with this treaty, and also notes some of the more recent arguments advocating its ratification by the US as proposed by John Negroponte and Gordon England from within the depths of the Pentagon bureaucracy. Why are they arguing this? Essentially to give the Euros (and others) a warm fuzzy glow when they think of us! (Cough! Gasp! Retch! Spit!)
…if anyone suggested the Negroponte-England rationale for acceding to the Law of the Sea Treaty as a rationale for agreeing to Kyoto, the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court and the re-establishment of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, they would be laughed out of policymaking circles. Fair arguments can be made for joining any one of these treaties. But those arguments need to be made on the substance of the treaties, not just because “all the cool countries are doing it.”
The Law of the Sea Treaty remains flawed. It does little to advance American interests when it comes to freedom of navigation, it could prove environmentally harmful, it restricts American military and intelligence naval operations and it calls for technology transfers that could run afoul of intellectual property laws and be dangerous to boot. President Reagan was right to reject calls to sign the Treaty in 1982. The Bush Administration should reverse course and refuse to push for the enactment of the Treaty in the present day.