502 



Mr. Rogers. What is the position of our Government ? 



Mr. FuTTERMAN, We have not taken a position on the exact meaning 

 of the word "adjacent." 



Mr. Rogers. Is it so difficult? 



Mr. FuTTERMAN. It is, sir. 



Mr. Rogers. In line with the qualifying terms ? Is this causing dif- 

 ficulty with you? 



Mr. Futterman. Well, as Ambassador Goldberg's statement indi- 

 cated, and as Mr. Pollack has explained, we have taken the position 

 that the Continental Shelf does not extend to the mid point of the 

 ocean and that the oceans, so far as the floor is concerned, are not 

 national lakes. And, as indicated, the Convention on the Continental 

 Shelf specifies 200 meters as the minimum depth. Our problem now is 

 trying to determine what further definition there should be between 

 200 meters and mid point of the ocean. 



Mr. Rogers. I am not talking about that. I am sticking to the Geneva 

 Conference saying adjacent to the coast shall be exploitable. Can we 

 go out to a depth of 4,000 feet ? 



Mr. Futterman. I think that may depend to some extent on how 

 many miles it takes you from shore. 



Mr. Rogers. Suppose it is still off our coast but it is 4,000 feet deep ? 



Mr. Futterman. It might be 1,000 miles or only 10 miles off our 

 coast. The question of exploitability is not the only requirement. 



Mr. Rogers. Nor is adjacency. 



Mr. Futterman. Nor is adjacency the only requirement, but those 

 are two of the requirements. 



Mr. Rogers. Certainly, but you seem to want to split them. So there 

 is no way to tell what the governmental position is so far as the State 

 Department is concerned ? 



Mr. Futterman. There is no governmental position on precisely 

 where we would consider the Continental Shelf to end. 



Mr. Rogers. Why should we move in an international body until we 

 know what our position is under the present law? 



Mr. Pollack. We did not move into an international body. The 

 initiative was taken by someone else. 



Mr. Rogers. You say the U.S. Government really started this whole 

 movement, according to your statement on page 11 : 



You may recall that, under U.S. leadership, the Economic and Social Council 

 of the United Nations had asked the U.N. Secretary General in mid-1966 to make 

 a survey of the current state of knowledge of the resources of the sea beyond the 

 continental shelf, excluding fish, and of the techniques for exploiting them. 

 Building on this foundation, the U.N. General Assembly a year ago asked the 

 Secretary General to broaden this study, so as to survey also the activities of 

 member States and intergovernmental organizations in this field and to formulate 

 proposals for insuring the most effective arrangements for an expanded program 

 of international cooperation. The Secretary General was directed to report to 

 the U.N. General Assembly next fall. 



Then it is from that foundation that our own Government has 

 started in movement the Pardo resolution. It seems tome State has 

 taken on itself a ratlier formidable task of injecting us into the inter- 

 national field before the Government has made up its mind where we 

 stand imder existing law and existing international treaties. We do 

 not even have a position on how far we can go out. 



