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“We believe, as many others do, that the most prolific remaining conventional oil and gas resources are in the Arctic or sub-Arctic, because we’ve pretty much developed the geologies south, whether that’s in the United States or whether that’s in Europe or Asia,” Shell's CEO john Hofmeister said recently.

The US Company, United Oil and Gas Consortium Management Corp. and its partners, including Arctic Oil and Gas Corp., (AOAG.PK) (30% interest) assert that they do.

Recent estimates have found the Arctic could contain the equivalent of more than 400 billion barrels of oil and gas and massive amounts of another potential energy source, crystallized methane.

"Imperial Oil Ltd and Exxon Mobil Corp turned heads in the oil industry in July with a nearly $600 million bid that won them a big exploration block in Canada's Beaufort Sea. (Only about 100th the size of United's Arctic Claim area)

The hefty sum surprised observers. After all, it's been 17 years since Imperial, Canada's biggest oil producer and refiner, drilled a well in the icy Arctic waters. In fact, only one other company, Oklahoma City-based Devon Energy Corp, has ventured back to Beaufort since the end of the Arctic exploration heyday in the 1970s and 1980s. "Obviously, we wouldn't have bid the work program that we did if we didn't see some long-term exploration potential," Imperial spokesman Pius Rolheiser said. "But it's highly exploratory in nature, high cost, high risk and lot of work needs to be done." Record oil prices and growing struggles securing reserves in traditional producing regions have the world's oil industry starting to gaze north once again."

if a little tenement in the Beaufort is worth $600 million in up front access fees, with onerous eventual heavy and ever-increasing Canadian Government taxes on any production, what is United's tax free 80 million acre arctic claim worth?

What we are witnessing is a full-blown propaganda campaign initiated by the Russians and joined by the U.N. and its apologists to force the U.S. Senate to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty and turn over our rightful and historical claims to the North Pole region to this “global authority.” The U.N. wants a role because some of the lucrative proceeds could be siphoned off for the benefit of the International Seabed Authority and “the Enterprise,” a U.N. project to transfer some of the profits from and technology used in seabed mining to the third world.

“Russian Arctic expectations exaggerated”
2007-08-24

Russian politicians say the country legitimately can claim 1,2 million square kilometres of the Arctic shelf. Now, researchers give another picture. -Russia has not the technology to determine the adherence of the shelf, and will hardly get more than 10-20 percent of the area, they say.

Russia diving to Arctic floor to claim oil?

The expedition, supported by the Kremlin, was dispatched to buttress Russia's claims to more than 460,000 square miles of the Arctic shelf — an area that by some estimates contains 10 billion tons of oil and gas deposits. Experts say the effort is part of Russia's long-range efforts to expand its energy empire. http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695195721,00.html

Denmark Calls Russia's Flag Planting at North Pole a `Joke'
By Christian Wienberg

Aug. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Denmark, one of five countries claiming control of North Pole waters and natural resources, called Russia's flag planting on the Arctic seabed a ``joke.''
``I see the Russian stunt as a summer joke,'' Danish Minister of Science and Technology Helge Sander said today in an e-mailed response to questions from Bloomberg News. ``It isn't connected with the otherwise serious work they do in collecting data from the North Pole.''

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=anLcS7RZgqk4&refer=canada

Russia Moves Closer In Arctic Oil Bid

An audacious Russian expedition to claim a large swathe of the Arctic's rich bounty of oil and gas has moved a step closer.

Moscow's claim is disputed by the four other Arctic nations - the United States, Canada, Norway and Denmark. And with energy politics continuing to top every country's agenda the stand-off between Russia and its adversaries could become as bitterly cold as the sub-zero temperatures which make the region one of the most inhospitable places on earth.

The mission is all part of a wider Kremlin strategy to rebuild Russia by converting it into an energy superpower. The Bear already has plentiful supplies of oil and gas and knows further reserves will not only make it richer but will also increase its clout on the international stage.

The Arctic is one of the last places on the planet not to have been exploited for its mineral resources. Underneath the ocean it is thought there are enormous deposits of oil and gas - some experts estimate as much as 25% of the world's resources.

But claiming the prize is not quite as simple as just planting a flag on the seabed. The Russians will have to convince the United Nations of their argument if they are to succeed.

The 1997 UN Convention On The Law Of The Sea - which Russia has ratified - states that coastal nations have an exclusive economic zone up to 200 miles off their shores. This though is complicated by underwater shelves. If the shelf is longer than 200 miles the state has the right to claim the mineral resources.

The Kremlin wants to demonstrate that the Lomonosov Ridge is geologically the same as the Eurasian continental shelf which extends outwards from Siberia.

THE NORTH POLE IS OURS, NOT RUSSIA'S

By Cliff Kincaid

August 8, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

The sensational headlines say, “Russian Arctic Team Reaches North Pole.” But the U.S. was there first—back in the early 1900s. America, not Russia, has a valid claim to the North Pole.

State Department officials, led by Condoleezza Rice’s top lawyer, John B. Bellinger III, are telling the press that the U.S. should immediately ratify the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in order to contest Russia’s claim to the seabed under the North Pole. They seem to have forgotten that the U.S. Navy’s first nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus, passed under the North Pole on August 3, 1958, and its second Commanding Officer, Commander William R. Anderson, claimed the region “For the world, our country, and the Navy.”

........Russian claims in this area are so flimsy that they were rejected before—by the U.N. itself. The proceedings of the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf demonstrate that Russian claims about the outer limits of the continental shelf in the Arctic and Pacific oceans were considered during a series of meetings in 2002 and they were told to make “revised” submissions. That is, the Russian case was weak. .......

The USS Nautilus crossed the North Pole on August 3, 1958. Commanding Officer, CDR William R. Anderson, announced to the crew: "For the world, our country, and the Navy - the North Pole."

With tens of billions of barrels of oil and gas at stake in this ”new Cold War,” as NBC’s Brian Williams called it, the American people and the Senate, which may vote on the treaty in September, are entitled to the facts, not Russian and U.N. propaganda.

As long as the U.S. remains a non-party to the treaty, our rights are enforceable by the U.S. Navy. But once ratification takes place, we are at the mercy of foreign interests and international lawyers. This is the big story that NBC News and the rest of the major media won’t tell.

It is a replay of the Panama Canal Treaty debate. This time, however, our media are not even telling the public that there is a debate and that the stakes are even higher.

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org

http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff168.htm http://www.usasurvival.org/ck08.05.07.shtml

The North Pole Heats Up

As global warming melts the Arctic pack ice, one of the world's most remote and potentially energy-rich regions is becoming more accessible. And the race to stake a claim to the icy wastes is picking up speed.

Published: August 12, 2007

For a brief moment it seemed that Admiral Robert Peary and Dr. Frederick Cook had risen from the mists to renew their race to the North Pole.

On Aug. 2, a couple of Moscow legislators in a small submersible vessel deposited a Russian flag on the seabed two miles under the polar ice cap - backing up Russia's claim to about half the floor of the Arctic Ocean. Canada's foreign minister, Peter McKay, dismissed the move, sniffing that "this isn't the 15th century." But just in case, Prime Minister Stephen Harper set off on a three-day tour of the region and announced plans to build two new military bases to reinforce Canada's territorial claims.

At stake is control of the Northwest Passage and, with it, what could be huge deposits of oil and natural gas in the seabed below.

Battle for Arctic oil hinges on UN panel
By Michael Peel and Daniel Dombey in London

Published: August 10 2007 18:44 | Last updated: August 10 2007 18:44

The international battle for Arctic territory may look like a Wild West brawl but the real fight for supremacy is more likely to revolve around legal arguments and seismic data than showdowns between ice-breakers or submarines.

As Canada unveils plans for a military base and Russia drops a titanium flag on the seabed, lawyers say the real centre of action is an obscure United Nations-hosted body known as the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.

The commission is the global authority that will determine how much territory the big five Arctic seabed claimants – Canada, Russia, the US, Denmark and Norway – will be able to bag for oil exploration and other uses.

Robert Volterra, a partner at Latham & Watkins, the law firm, says cases pleaded by states at the commission over the coming years are likely to have more impact on the Arctic’s future than “symbolic” flag-planting intended for Russian domestic political consumption.

"Despite a sudden flurry of activity late last year, the rush to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) appears to have slowed -- at least for now. With the support of the Bush Administration and a largely somnolent Senate, the Treaty seemed to be -- excuse the expression -- a “slam dunk” that was only stopped following the outcry of a few respected voices from outside government.......

........If the Joint Chiefs cannot appreciate the broader implications of LOST, they should only render judgments on the Treaty’s effects on the military. As so often, military men cannot get beyond the tunnel vision of their natural intellectual inclinations and sphere of expertise to understand a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.

However it comes about, rejecting LOST is crucial to maintaining America’s national security, wealth and independence; and, therefore, crucial to the peace and prosperity of the world....."

Douglas Stone is a lawyer with a background in American history and government. He is currently a Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy.

NEW YORK-In another grand Russian gesture toward securing oil deposits under the Arctic seabed, the Murmansk Shipping Company has announced it will outfit one of its nuclear powered icebreakers to become the world’s first atomic powered oil drilling vessel, company officials said this week.

United States to claim Arctic seabed ‘as large as they can’

A United States icebreaker leaves Seattle Monday for an Arctic research mission shortly after Russia's identical expedition designed to lay claim to a section of the resource-rich region, the Coast Guard said.

The great Arctic Circle oil rush
Melting icecaps are giving way to oil-rich waters -- that the U.S. can't claim, writes Fortune's Telis Demos.
By Telis Demos, Fortune reporter
August 8 2007: 10:31 AM EDT

(Fortune Magazine) -- It's an irony that even Al Gore might appreciate. As global warming causes the polar icecaps to recede, potentially oil-rich seabeds are being uncovered beneath the Arctic Circle in the suddenly navigable -- and drillable -- territory.

The area has long been thought to hold substantial reserves: Some say up to 25% of the world's undiscovered oil and natural gas may lie below the thawing ice.

FROZEN OUT: The U.S. isn't part of Arctic territory talks.

But as the countries bordering the Arctic hammer out who can lay claim to what parts of the ocean, one major player is missing: the U.S. Why? Because of an unlikely spat between Big Oil and a group of Republicans over the UN treaty that governs who can claim rights to those waters.

The next energy crisis
Back in 1982, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea went into effect, a treaty that defined ocean boundaries and set up regulations for ship traffic. The U.S. signed the treaty in 1994, but the Senate refused to ratify it, opposing the idea of UN sovereignty.

But what was then just a diplomatic absence is now seen as a lapse in judgment that could cost billions of dollars. Under Law of the Sea, countries are entitled to control any waters above landmasses that extend from their continental shelf.

If the U.S. were to claim that entitlement, it would gain Arctic territory roughly half the size of Alaska. But since the U.S. is not a party to the treaty, many worry that it won't have a say before the North Pole is sliced up for good.

What's in the way? A small but vocal group of Senate Republicans who are fiercely opposed to participation -- and the notion that UN panels could trump U.S. control over resources.

On the NBC Nightly News on Monday night, Brian Williams introduced a story about Russian claims to the North Pole that featured an image of what viewers were led to believe was a small Russian submarine under the polar ice. The image originally appeared on the Russian television channel Rossiya. But the image was not of a Russian sub under the Pole. It shows a min-sub at the scene of the wreckage of the Titanic. Similar images appeared in James Cameron’s 1997 movie Titanic.

By the time the report by correspondent Kerry Sanders was put up on the NBC News website, this controversial image and others had been taken off, leaving only a photo of a Russian flag allegedly having been planted on the ocean floor. Between the time of the broadcast and the posting of the Sanders piece on the website, it is apparent that somebody at NBC News became aware of the fact that the image had nothing to do with the Russian visit to the North Pole and was deceptive.

NBC News wasn’t the only media organ to fall for the scam. But it may have been the last to so do. Indeed, by the time the Sanders story aired on Monday night, several others had already focused on what the popular website “Regret the Error” called “Rossiya’s Titanic error.” Regret the Error, which documents errors by the media, had previously pointed out that the Russian TV image was also picked up by Reuters on its news wire and in video. The news organization admitted its mistake, sort of. “This story contains file shots of Russia’s MIR submersible. The story also contains video of a submersible which was shot during the search for the Titanic in the Atlantic,” Reuters said. Incredibly, a 13-year-old Finnish boy is being given credit for noticing how the Russian TV images, supposedly of the North Pole mission, were strikingly similar to images that Cameron used in the beginning of his movie.

In contrast to Reuters, which tried to explain the gaffe, NBC News simply eliminated the controversial image from one broadcast to another and hoped people wouldn’t notice. In discussions with NBC Nightly News personnel, they have not admitted to doing anything wrong.

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org

Norway calls for end to Arctic claims

Norway has called on countries with land bordering the Arctic region to stop the race to claim sovereignty over the region's vast mineral resources.

Two weeks ago, a Russian mission to the North Pole planted a Russian flag on the Arctic sea-bed, while Denmark and the United States have sent expeditions to the region.

But Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere says there are established procedures to deal with the issue.

"If anybody is under the belief that we solve this by racing up there with flags or other demonstrations of sovereignty, those who say that are wrong and they should be told they are wrong," he said.

"There's no need to see this as a race, it is not the way you settle these kind of issues."

The mad scramble for the Arctic

Dyer, Gwynne
Editorial - Thursday, August 16, 2007 @ 07:00

Among the headlines I never expected to see, the top three were "Pope Marries," "President Bush Admits Error," and "Canada Uses Military Might," but there it was, staring up at me from a British newspaper:

"Canada Uses Military Might in Arctic Scramble."

Read a little further into the story and the "military might" turns out to be some armed icebreakers and two small military bases in the high Arctic, neither of which will be operational for some time to come, but all the same....

..........There is a scramble for the Arctic, but it is not military.

It's about laying claim to potentially valuable resources on the basis of geographical and geological data, within the framework laid down by the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea.

The 1982 treaty, which now has 155 member-states, sets out the rules for claiming seabed rights, which is the only issue of real economic importance to the various Arctic players. It's all about mapping the seabed, doing the seismic work, and registering your claims within 10 years of ratifying the UNCLOS treaty. In Canada's case, that means by 2013, and it would do better to concentrate on that task, like the Russians and the Danes, rather than make meaningless military gestures.

http://www.thedailyobserver.ca/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentid=655488&catname=Editorial&classif=

Canadian troops conclude largest-ever Arctic exercise as dispute rumbles

The Associated Press
Friday, August 17, 2007
IQALUIT, Nunavut: Canadian soldiers, sailors, Inuit Rangers and air crew wrapped up their largest-ever Arctic exercise Friday, in a move to assert sovereignty in the recion amid a controversy over who owns what north of the Arctic Circle.

Approximately 600 Canadian Forces personnel along with members of the Canadian Coast Guard and RCMP were involved in Operation Nanook around Baffin Island and the Hudson Strait.

Activities included a counter-drug operation on Resolution Island. The Coast Guard and Canadian Forces personnel also simulated an environmental spill and cleanup effort near the Nunavut hamlet of Kimmirut.

Operation Nanook took place amid a race to secure subsurface rights to the Arctic seabed. The controversy heated up earlier this month when Russia sent two small submarines to plant a tiny national flag under the North Pole. The United States and Norway also have competing claims in the vast Arctic region, where a U.S. study suggests as much as 25 percent of the world's undiscovered oil and gas could be hidden.

Danish scientists are currently on the Arctic ice pack seeking evidence to position their country in the race to claim the potentially vast oil and other resources of the North Pole region.

Friday's exercise was designed to assert Canadian sovereignty in the region.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced last week that Canada will build a new army training center and a deep-water port within contested Arctic waters — part of an effort to bolster its claim to the fabled Northwest Passage.

........Reichert recalls the year 1867, when the United States purchased Alaska, an enormous territory, from the Russians for the paltry sum of $7.2 million. "At the time, even that didn't seem to be a good investment for the empty wilderness," says Reichert, "but who could have predicted how much Alaska, with its oil and gold riches, would be worth only a few decades later?"

The world government Law of the Sea treaty: it's baaaaack!

Wes Vernon
May 14, 2007

Those who scheme night and day to curb America's sovereignty never — never ever ever — give up. Possessed with something akin to the patience of the Asian mind, they brush off defeat as if it were some annoying flyspeck, and then redouble their efforts.

Such is the case with the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) — rejected in 1982 by President Reagan and stopped in its tracks in the Senate in 2004 and 2005. It is a Marxist-inspired document. (We'll get to that shortly, so stick with us.)

Now LOST supporters — reportedly led by Vice President Cheney — have moved the Bush administration toward putting it once again on the front burner. That word comes to me from Frank Gaffney — President of the Center for Security Policy and a longtime LOST opponent.

Bush used to be against the idea

What is frustrating is that President Bush — in his heart of hearts — is known to have been suspicious about this World Government scheme in the past.
Among its most egregious provisions, LOST creates an International Seabed Authority (ISA) with unprecedented powers.

The ISA could impose international taxes. If you don't like the idea of international bureaucrats levying taxes without your say-so, too bad. Your congressman or senator would have nothing to say about it. You may have this quaint idea that if anyone is to impose a federal tax on you, it would be your elected representatives who need your vote in the next election. But LOST would toss that into the ash heap. One-worlders have been dreaming of this for years.

And just to make certain that the LOST edicts are followed, the ISA would be empowered to create a multinational court system to enforce its judgments. ISA could also regulate seven-tenths of the world's surface area, impose production quotas for deep-sea mining, oil production etc., and regulate ocean research and exploration.

War on terrorists hindered by LOST

The treaty also mandates sharing information that could be used by our enemies to facilitate attacks on our country. And obligatory technology transfers would equip our enemies — real and potential — with useful equipment and know-how.

The Law of the Sea Treaty would prohibit any American effort to interdict and board vessels suspected of ties to terrorism or carrying weapons of mass destruction.

No wonder they want us to "sign up." Collecting intelligence in submerged transit of territorial waters would be prohibited under LOST. ...

U.S. Resistance to Sea Treaty Thaws

WASHINGTON -- What do the Nature Conservancy, Exxon Mobil Corp., offshore oil drillers, the fishing, shipping and diamond industries, President Bush and the U.S. Navy have in common?

Answer: They all support a little-known but highly contentious international treaty -- set to come before the U.S. Senate next month for ratification -- that governs nearly every aspect of ocean law, from underwater mineral rights to access to shipping lanes.

The 208-page Law of the Sea Convention, debated since the 1930s and sealed in 1982, has stirred passions for decades in Washington. Critics in the Senate have repeatedly blocked its ratification, saying the pact would undercut U.S. sovereignty. Supporters tout the treaty as a pillar of international law and key to long-term U.S. security. The U.S. is now one of fewer than 40 countries, and the only significant power, not to have joined.

That is now almost certain to change, for three reasons: scarce energy sources, the thawing Arctic ice cap and the U.S. Navy's desire for unfettered access to the world's seaways. These motivations have helped galvanize an odd coalition of environmentalists, oil interests and military brass to persuade enough senators to back the treaty.......

......Recent estimates have found the Arctic could contain the equivalent of more than 400 billion barrels of oil and gas and massive amounts of another potential energy source, crystallized methane. The U.S. Geological Survey has estimated the amount of carbon found in hydrate form world-wide is "conservatively" twice the amount found in all the world's fossil fuels....

Has America lost its way since the Boston Tea Party and the signing of the Declaration of Independence? Have we forgotten why those brave patriots rebelled against tyrannical taxation by a foreign government?

The US declared and controls its own 200 mile exclusive economic zone without the help of the UN and LOST.

The US can secure access to all the Oil and Gas, Titanium, Nickel, Cobalt, copper and Manganese it needs for 200 years, FROM THE WORLDS OCEAN SEAFLOOR, using the US Navy’s existing control of the oceans, the doctrine of discovery and other customary international laws, via existing oceanic resource rights Claims held by US companies, see: www.unoilgas.com and www.oceanicmetals.com. Signing on to LOST will put access to those vast oceanic minerals under the control of a stifling anti free-enterprise, hostile UN bureaucracy the International Seabed Authority (ISA).

Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas is a vital inviolable human right. Free enterprise is responsible for all the worlds shipping, cruise lines and fishing which moves 95% of the world’s products and feeds millions of people. The UN has no business interfering there.

The adoption (1982) of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and the establishment (1994) of the International Seabed Authority, (ISA) with responsibility for controlling all deep-sea mining in international areas. The ISA regime dominated by third-world states, lead to unrealistic taxes and imposts being created that are detrimental for potential commercial operators, hence the development of deep-sea mining has been paralyzed for over a decade.

LOST created the International Seabed Authority, which member nations agree will have complete jurisdiction over all the oceans and virtually everything that flows into them, including the power to tax and control everything that sails on them or is conducted in or beneath them.

The LOST treaty’s child, the International Seabed Authority should be disbanded as it’s regime is without customary legal foundation and plainly illegal.

“……bureaucracies established by multilateral treaties often lack the transparency and accountability necessary to ensure that they are untainted by corruption, mismanagement or inappropriate claims of authority. The LOST bureaucracy is called the International Seabed Authority Secretariat, which has a strong incentive to enhance its own authority at the expense of state sovereignty.

For example, this treaty would impose taxes on U.S. companies engaged in extracting resources from the ocean floor. This would give the treaty’s Secretariat an independent revenue stream that would remove a key check on its authority. After all, once a bureaucracy has its own source of funding, it needs answer only to itself….”

When international bureaucracies are unaccountable they seek to insulate themselves from scrutiny and become prone to corruption. The International Seabed Authority Secretariat is vulnerable to the same corrupt practices that have bedeviled the United Nations for decades.

The concept of paying taxes to the UN for activities in international waters is clearly wrong.

3. Cruise lines and pleasure yachts don’t pay taxes to the UN for operating in international waters.

4. Outer space is the common heritage of mankind, yet there is no tax paid to the UN for every TV program we watch from satellite networks.

The US has vital interests in oceanic minerals recovery and signing on to LOST will not strengthen the US position at all. The US would be better served by offering to sign LOST only if the ISA is abandoned.

The US has access to the Arctic Commons oil and gas via United's claim and has no need to sign on to LOST to secure the Arctic Commons estimated 400 billion barrels of oil and gas resources, unless of course it wants 50% of the oil and gas leases for its own company and 50% of commercial company's production off the top. As well as onerous taxes to go directly to the Seabed Authority...... These absurd imposts are what the Seabed Authority has proposed for the ocean metals mining industry.

“…….The Russian claim to the North Pole has started a panic among some politicians and the press, who think the U.S. response should be to dicker with the Russians over Arctic riches before a United Nations panel established by the Law of the Sea Treaty. The U.S. has to ratify the treaty quickly, they say, so we don’t get left out. Senator Joseph Biden, chairman of the Senate foreign Relations Committee, has reportedly scheduled a September 27 hearing designed to rush the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) through the Senate and to the floor for a quick vote.

In fact, the U.S. already has valid claims to the North Pole region, under the “Doctrine of Discovery” legal principle, and accession to the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) could sink any chance of America ever cashing in on the black gold……

Russian scientists have themselves conceded that the Americans were there first, back in 1908 and 1909, depending on which American team one believes actually physically reached the Pole. They even planted an American flag there. U.S. nuclear-powered Navy submarines traveled under the Pole in the 1950s, also claiming the territory for America. All of this is a matter of official and public record, although the U.S. State Department does not seem to recognize it.

But when Russia staked a claim there in August, the American explorations were quickly forgotten and supporters of UNCLOS suddenly declared that Russia would get the Arctic riches unless we quickly ratified the treaty. This claim is as bogus as the Russian expedition.

…………..Confusion is exactly what has occurred in the wake of the Russian arctic claim. Numerous papers, including the New York Times, have reacted by saying that we have to ratify UNCLOS in order to get in on the Arctic action. Never mind that the Times is even opposed to limited drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

But how exactly does passing UNCLOS cut us in on the action anyway? It would effectively undercut our historic claims to the region and would turn the matter over to the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS). This body, which was created by UNCLOS, has 21 members from various countries.

It's true that the CLCS rejected some Russian claims to the Arctic region in 2002. It did so with information provided by the United States, proving that we didn't need to be a treaty member to play a role. But if the Senate ratifies this treaty in September and then a decision goes against our interests, the pressure will be enormous for the U.S. Government to comply. Indeed, the U.S. would be accused of violating international law if we rejected an UNCLOS finding…..”

In 1978, Ronald Reagan declared, "No national interest of the United States can justify handing sovereign control of two-thirds of the Earth's surface over to the Third World."

There are many good reasons this treaty has not been ratified by the United States since it first became available for signatures in 1982 when President Ronald Reagan told the U.N. to get LOST! He was not about to give this corrupt, incompetent organization control over 70 percent of the earth's surface or limit our activities – military and otherwise – in international waters.

Who will oversee the potentially massive “fees” provided to the International Seabed Authority (ISA)? Who will oversee the ISA bureaucrats and employees to preclude another oil-for-food scandal? Who will set these “fees” and who decides on who pays them? And, who do you think will pay the most of these “fees”? Who pays the most in “dues” right now to keep the U.N. going? Yes, good old American taxpayers. Right now, there are members of the ISA who are not paying their “dues” to ISA.

The Law of the Sea Treaty is an utterly unnecessary transfer of authority from the United States and of the wealth of its citizens to global bureaucrats who have never had our interests at heart, and to Third World regimes that have never been reliable friends.

………the fundamental hostility to private enterprise and production underlying the treaty. If implemented, the treaty would assert United Nations control over all ocean resources and channel all mining and development through a vast new UN-created bureaucracy. "The Law of the Sea Treaty retains its coercive, collectivist philosophical underpinnings," says Smith.

….to regulate ocean resources the UNCLOS convention ‘creates a gobbledy-gook bureaucracy called the International Seabed Authority (ISA). The system is unique in its byzantine perversity.

The Enterprise, subsidized by private miners, is to mine the seabed for the ISA. Among the system’s formal objectives is redistributing the revenues collected to enrich the usual Third World regimes.

The ISA, with its nonsensical governing regime, and the Enterprise remain. Some provisions on mandatory technology transfer were cut, but other language remains that could lead to the same result.

The same problem exists with production controls. The U.S. possesses no veto, and land-based minerals exporting countries as well as developing states could block exploitation of the seabed, allowing them to demand expensive concessions in return for their support.

Most important, the terrible precedent remains: LOST turns over a vast amount of the earth’s wealth to a highly politicized international bureaucracy. This global regulatory system would restrict entrepreneurship.

In doing so it would do more than hinder seabed resource development. Such rules could deter the production of software, technology, and processes designed for seabed mining, as well as those with dual use capabilities. The treaty also would create a precedent for a LOST-like regime to govern other, currently unowned “resources,” ranging from the Internet to broadcast airwaves to space…..

The Arctic Ocean Commons; “It’s a trove of energy wealth that sits unowned and unexplored, a bonanza being readied for a rush of claims thanks to climate change,” wrote the Tribune’s Alex Rodriguez.

The carrot of US access to the estimated 400 billion barrels of arctic oil and gas being dangled in front of the senate is completely bogus. Article 76 of the law also allows countries to extend their submarine claims beyond the 200-mile limit only if they can provide solid scientific evidence that the continental shelf under their territory extends beneath the ocean beyond 200 miles and only to a maximum of 350 miles on any continental shelf extensions. If the US signs LOST it will not gain any of the arctic commons oil as LOST rules preclude any claim extension beyond the Alaska 200 mile zone as the US continental shelf only extends an average of 50-100 miles from shore and the Chukchi Plateau area beyond the US Chukchi sea is geologically a formar Canadian continental shelf that has rifted around.

A US company (see; www.unoilgas.com ) made a solid hydrocarbons rights claim to the Arctic Oceans Commons under customary international law on May 9th 2006. This claim gives the US priority over developing the Arctic oil and gas resources with or without LOST.

Russia diving to Arctic floor to claim oil?

Russia Moves Closer In Arctic Oil Bid

An audacious Russian expedition to claim a large swathe of the Arctic's rich bounty of oil and gas has moved a step closer.

With tens of billions of barrels of oil and gas at stake in this ”new Cold War,” as NBC’s Brian Williams called it, the American people and the Senate, which may vote on the treaty in September, are entitled to the facts, not Russian and U.N. propaganda.

As long as the U.S. remains a non-party to the treaty, our rights are enforceable by the U.S. Navy. But once ratification takes place, we are at the mercy of foreign interests and international lawyers. This is the big story that NBC News and the rest of the major media won’t tell.

It is a replay of the Panama Canal Treaty debate. This time, however, our media are not even telling the public that there is a debate and that the stakes are even higher.

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org

http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff168.htm http://www.usasurvival.org/ck08.05.07.shtml

The North Pole Heats Up

As global warming melts the Arctic pack ice, one of the world's most remote and potentially energy-rich regions is becoming more accessible. And the race to stake a claim to the icy wastes is picking up speed.

United States to claim Arctic seabed ‘as large as they can’

Norway calls for end to Arctic claims

RACE FOR THE NORTH POLE

Nations Vying for Arctic Treasures

U.S. Resistance to Sea Treaty Thaws

Russia diving to Arctic floor to claim oil?

Russia Moves Closer In Arctic Oil Bid

An audacious Russian expedition to claim a large swathe of the Arctic's rich bounty of oil and gas has moved a step closer.

With tens of billions of barrels of oil and gas at stake in this ”new Cold War,” as NBC’s Brian Williams called it, the American people and the Senate, which may vote on the treaty in September, are entitled to the facts, not Russian and U.N. propaganda.

As long as the U.S. remains a non-party to the treaty, our rights are enforceable by the U.S. Navy. But once ratification takes place, we are at the mercy of foreign interests and international lawyers. This is the big story that NBC News and the rest of the major media won’t tell.

It is a replay of the Panama Canal Treaty debate. This time, however, our media are not even telling the public that there is a debate and that the stakes are even higher.

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff168.htm http://www.usasurvival.org/ck08.05.07.shtml

The North Pole Heats Up

As global warming melts the Arctic pack ice, one of the world's most remote and potentially energy-rich regions is becoming more accessible. And the race to stake a claim to the icy wastes is picking up speed.

United States to claim Arctic seabed ‘as large as they can’

Norway calls for end to Arctic claims

RACE FOR THE NORTH POLE

Nations Vying for Arctic Treasures

U.S. Resistance to Sea Treaty Thaws

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org

http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff168.htm http://www.usasurvival.org/ck08.05.07.shtml