Foreign navies demanding U.S. act in accordance with UNCLOS before committing to cooperation

One year later, many of those same foreign CNOs were asked to respond to Admiral Mullen’s plan for a new US maritime strategy.⁷⁴ Once again, interna- tional law figured prominently in several of the responses. The Commandant of the Brazilian Navy urged that the new strategy “be guided by principles sanctioned by international law,” a viewed shared by the Secretary General of the Peruvian Navy and the Portuguese Navy Chief of Staff. Their counterpart in Colombia emphasized the need for an “international legal mechanism of cooper- ation.” Uruguay’s reply was also directly on point: “Multilateral cooperation among navies is legitimate activity when it is based on the law.” The Commander of the Lebanese Navy cited the 1982 LOS Convention and cautioned against the United States acting alone, while the new Chief of Staff for the Spanish Navy highlighted the need for the US Navy “to operate alongside its allies in accordance with international law.” The Australian Maritime Doctrine elegantly and forcefully captures the central importance of law and legitimacy for one of America’s most respected partners:

Australia’s use of armed force must be subject to the test of legitimacy, in that the Government must have the capacity to demonstrate to the Parliament and the electorate that there is adequate moral and legal justification for its actions . . . . [T]his adherence to legitimacy and the democratic nature of the Australian nation state is a particular strength. It is a historical fact that liberal democracies have been more successful in the development and operation of maritime forces than other forms of government, principally because the intensity and complexity of the sustained effort required for these capabilities places heavy demands upon a nation’s systems of state credit, its technological and industrial infrastructure, and its educated population. Sophisticated combat forces, in other words, depend directly upon the support of the people for their continued existence.⁷⁵