Russia Apparently Declares the End of "International Waters," Joining China

Under the United Nations Convention on the the Law of the Sea, "international waters" means waters not part of the "territorial sea" of a nation and there is a 12-mile limit:

Every State has the right to establish the breadth of its territorial sea up to a limit not exceeding 12 nautical miles . . .

"High Seas" (what most of think of as "International Waters") are defined in Art.86 of UNCLOS:

all parts of the sea that are not included in the exclusive economic zone, in the territorial sea or in the internal waters of a State

As we have seen, China has taken a a more aggressive position on "territorial waters" apparently to include "historic waters we have once sailed in" or "historic fishing areas." See here, here, and here for examples.

It occurs to me that Russia, seeing how this unlawful but also virtually unanswerable (short of war) brute force approach has succeeded for China, is now playing the same game in both the Baltic and Black Sea. See here and here.

Take a look at this nice bit of political jujitsu which blames the U.S. and its allies of the "crime" of coming too close to Russian waters (not in them, but close) and provoking the latest incident of Russian planes low flying over a U.S. ship, as set out in

Russia sought to turn the tables on the United States on Wednesday, accusing the U.S. Navy of maneuvering aggressively near the Russian border in the Baltics and promising it would use “all necessary measures” to address future incidents.

According to the Russians, the incident in question occurred Apr. 11, when a U.S. destroyer drew near Kalingrad in the Russian territorial enclave between Lithuania and Poland.

“This is about attempts to exercise military pressure on Russia,” Russian envoy to NATO Alexander Grushko told reporters after a NATO-Russia council meeting on Wednesday, according to Reuters. “We will take all necessary measures, precautions, to compensate for these attempts to use military force.”

On the nearby map, I have circled the Russian territory of Kahlingrad Oblast, which is, as you see,

surrounded by independent countries, i.e. isolated from Russia, a situation I am sure Putin would like to change. But there are those pesky NATO countries in the way, Lithuania and Poland.

In any event, we are seeing the old bully ploy of "it's your fault that I will attack you." Picture Putin as "Biff," if you will.

Bullies will be bullies, of course, so long as they can get away with it.

Worse, though, is that the concept of some sort of international law governing where Russian (or Chinese, for that matter) right end and begin is very obviously broken.

Putin has pushed this with his "little green men" in Ukraine and with his prior incursion into Georgia. The Chinese have pushed it by just grabbing parts of the South China Sea and daring anyone to push them off their artificial islands.

If you think either one of these thug nations won't hesitate to play the 12-mile limit when it suits them as a means of expanding their territory, you are most naive. And just wait until we get to the Arctic.

Caspian Sea: Oil Issues and Iran, Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, and Kazakhstan

Click on map to enlarge

So on yesterday's Midrats Episode 286: A Restless Russia and its Near Abroad with Dr. Dmitry Gorenburg, we had a little discussion about the status of naval forces in the Caspian Sea (beginning about 44:37).

Claude Berube tweeted this morning about an article which described Azerbaijan's new Caspian Sea Naval Base.

Now, from the Oil and Gas Journal comes Iran yields to Russia in talks over Caspian resources:

Iranian acquiescence to Russia, to which the Islamic Repubic increasingly turns in response to pressure from the West, has become a standard feature of long-unresolved deliberations over jurisdiction and resource ownership in the Caspian Sea. Iran has surrendered its Soviet-era claim to half of the world's largest inland lake and has aligned itself with Russian insistence that countries lacking Caspian shorelines-especially from the West-stay out.
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The status of the Caspian Sea fell into question with the demise of the Soviet Union. The three littoral republics that emerged from that change demanded larger shares of the Caspian than allotted to them by treaties negotiated in 1921 and 1940, which granted the former Soviet Union half of the sea and Iran the remainder.

Much is at stake. The Caspian Sea, usually referred to as the boundary mark between Asia and Europe is not only rich in oil and gas; it also produces more than 80% of the world's sturgeon. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the large South Caspian Basin became available to investment by western oil companies seeking exploration and production opportunities.

Caspian border countries all produce and export oil and natural gas, and all claim shares of Caspian resources. Azerbaijan is the hub for export of Caspian gas to western markets. Access to Caspian gas has been central to efforts by the European Union (EU) to diversify its members' gas purchases away from Russia.

International oil companies have been developing oil and gas in the deep basin of the Caspian Sea since the region became accessible to outside investment about 2 decades ago. The formation of Azerbaijan International Operating Co. opened a new era for development. The 1994 signing of the contract known as the "Contract of the Century," as US Sec. of Energy Samuel Bodman called it, allowed Azerbaijan oil to reach global markets for the first time a decade later via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline.

Throughout this new era, Russia has tried to steer movement of Caspian oil and gas through its territory to keep control of the region's transport infrastructure. In 2005, more than two thirds of all crude oil exported from the Caspian moved through the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC), operated by Russia. By 2010, Russia's share of Caspian oil transport had fallen below 40%.

The whole article requires a subscription, but what I've put up does give a sense of why there is a naval build up in the area.

More from that article Claude referenced:

In Azerbaijan's case it is particularly worried about Iran, with whom it has had a number of minor incidents. In the longer term it is worried about Russia, which strongly opposes the construction of a trans-Caspian gas pipeline from Turkmenistan, which Baku in principle supports. Russia also has tried to get all the littoral states to restrict the militaries of outside powers (meaning, the U.S.) from getting involved on the Caspian, which Baku has pushed back on. Nevertheless, Russia and Azerbaijan are slated to carry out their first-ever joint naval exercises in September.

For a change, the U.S. probably won't send a fleet to the area . . .

Russia's Asia Pivot

Headline in the Moscow Times "Russia Wants Quicker Build-Up of Military Facilities on Disputed Islands". The disputants being, in this case, Japan and Russia:

Old map of "disputed islands"

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has ordered the speeding up of construction of military and civilian infrastructure on a chain of islands in the Pacific Ocean where Moscow and Tokyo have rival territorial claims.

Dispute over the islands, known as the Kurils in Russia and the Northern Territories in Japan, has strained relations between the two countries since World War II, when Soviet forces occupied four islands at the southern end of the chain.

Which, of course, ties in this Matthew Sussex article in The National Interest, Russia's Next Big Strategic Move (And It Has Nothing to Do with Ukraine):

But the Ukraine crisis—and the broader Russia-West tensions tat it has stoked—obscures the fact that Moscow has been quietly but rapidly re-orienting its strategic posture. And it is doing so to the east, not the west.

For Putin, the logic of an Asian pivot is threefold.

The first concerns consolidating Russia's prosperity as an energy and resource giant. He knows that Indo-Pacific appetites for oil and gas will increase massively over the next twenty years. Within the same time frame, European clients will diversify their energy sources once the U.S. shale gas and oil revolution brings American exports on-line. Russia therefore has a relatively small window of opportunity to begin crowding out competitors for Asia's energy demands.

Second, whereas Moscow's strategic posture has long stressed the need to look east, it has now begun increasing its Indo-Pacific trade and security footprint, including in Southeast Asia, in order to give its intended policy substance.

Third, Russia is betting that the 21st century will be an Asian one--and it is betting on China as the main driver of change in regional and global order. Until recently, the main question hanging over Sino-Russian relations was whether Moscow could live with being a junior partner to Beijing. It seems that question has now been answered in the affirmative, at least for the moment.

More fodder, from the Sputnik News Russia, China Hold Joint Naval Drills in the Far East:

The second stage of Russia-China "Joint Sea 2015" maritime exercises is underway in Russia’s Far Eastern Primorsky Territory, the Russian Defense Ministry’s Eastern Military District press service said in a Wednesday statement.

The joint exercise is taking place on June 8-11.

Upcoming drills will include troop landing practice that will take place at a Pacific Fleet range near Mys Klerk (Cape Klerk), the statement said.

On Tuesday, the Russian Defense Ministry said that officers from the Russian Eastern Military District, the Pacific Fleet Headquarters and representatives from the Chinese Navy held a reconnaissance mission at the Knevichi Airfield as part of the "Joint Sea 2015 (II)" naval exercise.

Russia is, in many ways, an Asian country (well, of course, especially given how much of it sits in Asia). You also have got to believe Putin is enjoying the heck out of tweaking the Obama administration with all this.

The pivot for Russia is not as long as that required by the U.S.

Japan is a strong U.S. ally.

Then there are the North Koreans.

Never a dull moment.

To paraphrase the movie Jaws, "We're going to need a bigger Navy"