Chapter VI 

 THE INTERNATIONAL SETTING 



Many of the considerations which have led the 

 United States to its recently intensified interest in 

 the sea have similarly motivated other nations as 

 well, and in many cases for much longer. As each 

 has sought to learn more about the sea, it has 

 quickly come to realize that the sea is very large 

 and its own unaided efforts very small. As far 

 back as 1899, a conviction that effective explora- 

 tion of the sea based on sound scientific principles 

 demanded international cooperation led to the 

 formation of the International Council for the 

 Exploration of the Sea (ICES). Established by 

 eight nations* to conduct a joint exploration of 

 the North Atlantic, the North Sea, the Baltic Sea, 

 and the adjacent waters, the ICES raised and 

 tentatively settled such important issues as the 

 standardizing of techniques and instruments and 

 the exchange of data. 



The International Geophysical Year is the most 

 recent major manifestation of the tradition of in- 

 ternational cooperation in scientific exploration of 

 the oceans. It was both the result and the cause of 

 a great number of international organizations for 

 scientific cooperation, both governmental and 

 private. UNESCO, which had sponsored the devel- 

 opment of many intergovernmental associations, 

 established the Intergovernmental Oceanographic 

 Commission (IOC), in 1960, with a membership 

 list of 40 countries, including the United States. 

 The IOC held its First Session in October 1961, 

 with attendees from most member countries and 

 from many of the 26 international scientific organ- 

 izations which showed an interest in oceanographic 

 problems. Two other United Nations bodies, the 

 Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the 

 World Meteorological Organization (WMO), and 

 one nongovernmental organization, the Scientific 

 Committee on Oceanographic Research (SCOR) 

 of the International Council of Scientific Unions, 

 were the three most closely identified with the 

 IOC's purpose and have maintained close working 

 relationships with it ever since. 



The IOC's Second Session in September 1962 

 added four more nations to its membership list 



'Denmark, Finland. Germany, Great Britain. Netherlands, Norway, 

 Russia, and Sweden. 



and extended its already long list of proposed 

 projects for international cooperation. It assumed 

 coordinating responsibility for the International 

 Indian Ocean Expedition, originally organized 

 and coordinated by SCOR, with SCOR continuing 

 to act in an advisory capacity. It agreed to under- 

 take the International Cooperative Investigations 

 of the Tropical Atlantic Ocean, as suggested by 

 the United States, and is actively making plans to 

 start two closely related projects, both suggested 

 by the USSR. These are a standard section pro- 

 gram to study time changes in characteristics of 

 the oceans and a North Atlantic expedition for 

 studying fields of currents by dynamic techniques. 

 In addition, it concerns itself with the perennial 

 questions of standardization, intercalibration, and 

 the exchange of data as well as some of the more 

 particularly modern problems such as the legal 

 status of fixed buoys, frequency allocation for 

 telemetering and other communications, and the 

 availability of new aids to navigation such as Loran 

 C and the Transit satellite system under develop- 

 ment by the United States. 



Not the least important aspect of such activities 

 is the opportunity they provide for scientists and 

 technicians from nations without research ships 

 and facilities of their own to participate and to 

 further their own training while contributing to 

 the collection of knowledge which is itself of mu- 

 tual benefit. 



The United States, with 1 1 ships already com- 

 mitted to the Indian Ocean Expedition and five 

 more to the Tropical Atlantic Expedition, plans 

 to put somewhere between $70 million and $90 

 million into such cooperative programs during 

 the coming decade. The Interagency Committee 

 on Oceanography, at the request of the State 

 Department, is the United States point of contact 

 for activities related to the IOC. United States 

 participation in these programs is based on re- 

 quirements which we would otherwise have to pur- 

 sue alone. By joining our efforts with those of 

 other nations with similar needs, we not only 

 foster friendships and common interests among 

 the collaborators, but greatly increase the scien- 

 tific benefit which we, like the other participants, 

 realize for the effort which each has expended. 



It is not possible to determine with any great 

 accuracy the present size and scope of specific 



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