Freedom of Navigation:
A Fundamental American
Policy
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The U.S. Pacific Fleet conducts both Freedom of Navigation Program and routine naval operations in around Southeast Asian Sea Lines of Communication (SLOCs) to assert established navigational rights which benefits the U.S. and all Asia-Pacific nations dependent on the free passage of maritime trade. The USS Blue Ridge (LCC 19) operates in the Pacific Ocean. |
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In 1812, the United States went to war with Great Britain, largely over British interference with American merchant shipping. In 1917, the United States entered World War I at least in part because of German attacks on merchant shipping in the Atlantic. In the peace negotiations after World War I, one of the Fourteen Points proposed by American President Woodrow Wilson was an assurance of freedom of navigation. In contemporary times, the policy of the United States has been to exercise and assert its navigation and overflight rights and freedoms on a worldwide basis in a manner that is consistent with the balance of interests reflected in the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
In
a 1983 Presidential oceans policy statement, the United States went
so far as to state that it "will not . . . acquiesce in unilateral
acts of other States designed to restrict the rights and freedoms of the
international community in navigation and overflight and other related
high seas uses." The United States has acted on these words.
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Fifteen percent of the world’s trade passes through three Pacific choke points: the Straits of Malacca, Sunda and Lompok. U.S. Navy ships at Sembawang Wharf in strategically located Singapore. |
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