Suchergebnisse

The maintenance of safe and secure sea lanes, particularly those that link the United States with its partners in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, is at the very core of US interests. Therefore, US maritime strategy seeks to sustain credible combat power in the Western Pacific and Arabian Gulf/Indian Ocean so as to preclude attempts at interrupting vital sea lines of communication (SLOCs) and commerce. Given these strategic imperatives and the capability of both state and non-state actors to disrupt the Indo-Pacific sea lanes critical to global prosperity, the United States has renewed its commitment to maritime security in Asia. In recent years, the United States has made significant adjustments to its defence posture in order to bring more maritime forces closer to Indo-Pacific sea lanes and defence officials have stated their intention to further enhance US posture in Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean while maintaining US presence in Northeast Asia. Recognizing that the expansive nature of Indo-Pacific maritime territory and the complexity of the region's maritime challenges prevent any one country from resourcing the operations necessary to provide sea lane security, the United States is also strengthening cooperation with its maritime partners by expanding relationships and trust-building efforts, contributing to the capacity of its partners and enhancing interoperability. At the same time, the United States is supporting the strengthening of maritime symposiums and regional organizations as the foundations for the security architectures necessary to ensure the security of Indo-Pacific sea lanes and sustain regional prosperity. (Contemp Southeast Asia/GIGA)

Despite the efforts of the past decade, maritime piracy remains of international concern today. Countries need to cooperate actively at both the regional and international levels to eradicate the problem effectively. In particular, the nature of the threat in the Asia-Pacific region suggests that coastal states - countries that possess sovereignty over the pirate-infested waters but lack the law-enforcement resources - have to turn to resource-rich extra-regional powers for assistance. Unfortunately, cooperation between such disparate countries has traditionally been impeded by sovereignty sensitivities, as best exemplified by Malaysia's and Indonesia's hostile responses to the United States' Regional Maritime Security Initiative in 2003. Faced with this apparent dilemma, a new phenomenon has emerged. National coast guard agencies, instead of their military naval counterparts, have become attractive alternatives for promoting international cooperation against non-traditional security threats, such as maritime piracy. Spearheaded by the Japanese Coast Guard (JCG), coast guards from various countries have imparted training expertise, conducted joint exercises, hosted low-publicity multilateral meetings, and even transferred security equipment across international borders. Together they have succeeded in promoting cooperation without arousing the sovereignty sensitivities often associated with such cooperation. This article analyzes the evolution of coast guard cooperation in Asia, highlighting in particular the Japanese Coast Guard's success in this endeavor. With the general alignment of regional and global power interests in Southeast Asia, coast guard agencies hold promise for extra-regional powers wishing to help eradicate maritime piracy in the region. (Pac Rev/GIGA)

Pt. 1: Sea view. - 44 (April 2007) 14. - S. 20-27; Pt. 2: Private eyes. - 44 (October 31, 2007) 44. - S. 22-30

WINNER OF THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2020 A SUNDAY TIMES, FINANCIAL TIMES, THE TIMES AND BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEARFor most of human history, the seas and oceans have been the main means of long-distance trade and communication between peoples - for the spread of ideas and religion as well as commerce. This book traces the history of human movement and interaction around and across the world's greatest bodies of water, charting our relationship with the oceans from the time of the first voyagers. David Abulafia begins with the earliest of seafaring societies - the Polynesians of the Pacific, the possessors of intuitive navigational skills long before the invention of the compass, who by the first century were trading between their far-flung islands. By the seventh century, trading routes stretched from the coasts of Arabia and Africa to southern China and Japan, bringing together the Indian Ocean and the western Pacific and linking half the world through the international spice trade. In the Atlantic, centuries before the little kingdom of Portugal carved out its powerful, seaborne empire, many peoples sought new lands across the sea - the Bretons, the Frisians and, most notably, the Vikings, now known to be the first Europeans to reach North America. As Portuguese supremacy dwindled in the late sixteenth century, the Spanish, the Dutch and then the British each successively ruled the waves.Following merchants, explorers, pirates, cartographers and travellers in their quests for spices, gold, ivory, slaves, lands for settlement and knowledge of what lay beyond, Abulafia has created an extraordinary narrative of humanity and the oceans. From the earliest forays of peoples in hand-hewn canoes through uncharted waters to the routes now taken daily by supertankers in their thousands, The Boundless Sea shows how maritime networks came to form a continuum of interaction and interconnection across the globe: 90 per cent of global trade is still conducted by sea. This is history of the grandest scale and scope, and from a bracingly different perspective - not, as in most global histories, from the land, but from the boundless seas.