Office of the Historian

118. Memorandum From the Executive Secretary of the Department of State (Bremer) to Multiple Recipients1

Washington, March 4, 1981

SUBJECT

  • Summary of Discussion of Senior Interagency Group Meeting on Law of the Sea

The Senior Interagency Group meeting on March 2 decided that, in light of the fact that the Administration has not had an opportunity to fully consider the Law of the Sea, we should try to ensure that informal negotiations are not concluded at the forthcoming Tenth Session of the Conference (March 9–April 17).2 Studies should begin immediately to bring new personnel in the interested Departments and Agencies up to date, and a thorough review of the Draft Convention, particularly the deep seabed mining provisions, should be made by the Interagency Group on the Law of the Sea. The review should be concluded in time to permit the Administration to determine its position toward the negotiations and issue instructions to the Delegation in advance of the next session of the Conference.

The Group also decided that the Delegation should make clear to other delegations that the review will cover all matters of concern to the Administration and that no issue is necessarily excluded from it so that there can be no question about our continuing good faith in the negotiations as we seek further improvements in the seabed texts at this session. At the same time, the Group recognized that we must keep in mind the need to prevent retaliatory changes in the non-seabeds texts, and we should avoid public statements implying that this review is likely to result in rejection of the Draft Convention and statements stressing the value to the United States of the non-seabeds provisions.

L. Paul Bremer, III
  1. Source: Reagan Library, Meese Files, Law of the Sea—Convention. Confidential. Sent to the Department of Defense, Office of the Secretary; the Joint Chiefs of Staff; the National Security Council; the Department of the Treasury, Office of the Secretary; the Department of Interior, Office of the Secretary; the Department of Commerce, Office of the Secretary; the Department of Energy, Office of the Secretary; the Department of Transportation, Office of the Secretary; the Central Intelligence Agency; the Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Administrator; the Office of Management and Budget, Office of Director.↩
  2. No record of this meeting has been found.↩