State Department officials have directed the Coast Guard to work as if the unratified United Nations Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) were the law of the land.  The Coast Guard icebreaker cutter Healy (WAGB-20) has been cruising the Arctic Ocean so that the State Department can involve itself in the unratified LOST, including the so-called ownership of the North Pole.

            National Geographic revealed this corruption of the Coast Guard in its May 2009 article “Arctic Landgrab”.  Writer McKenzie Funk, who accompanied the State Department-commissioned sonar survey of the Arctic Ocean bottom last summer, commented, “Because of obstructionism by a few UN-wary senators, the U. S. is not yet among them [ratifying countries of the treaty], but it is acting as if it is.”

            The U.S. is not subject to anything in LOST.  On the contrary, the U.S. official position must oppose all foreign government claims under LOST for underwater territory beyond the currently legal 200-mile exclusive economic zones.   Closing off the open ocean by foreign governments under LOST damages the peaceful operations of American individuals and companies.

            Funk explains that the State Department is working on a claim under LOST to seabeds beyond the already-allowed 200 miles from shore.   “Because America’s claim will rely on [ocean bottom] features that appear not to extend past the 86^th parallel, it has no real shot at the [North] Pole.”

            The State Department has been proceeding surreptitiously for over five years.  “Since 2003 [Larry] Mayer’s State Department-directed missions have been charting around the Chukchi Plateau, an undersea ridge that extends nearly 600 miles from Barrow.”

            Under LOST, American individuals and companies would have no rights in this United Nations regime.  The 400 sections of LOST present innumerable problems for implementation, including the U. N. “tax” on ocean resources.  So far the State Department has refused to give Congress an analysis of these sections on many affected departments.  Maybe there is good reason that Senators are wary.

            It’s time for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to appear before the Senate and House to justify the department.  It’s also time for the Coast Guard to stop providing a platform for promoting the unratified LOST.  In fact, it should be doing the opposite and defend the rights of Americans in the Arctic Ocean and elsewhere from all foreign and United Nations interference