US exclusive economic zones (circled with fish icons) in the Pacific. US OFFICE OF COAST SURVEY
Even if it did not ratify the Unclos (which “created” the EEZs), even the US claims that its microscopic Pacific atolls — Johnson Atoll, Jarvis Island and Palmyra and Kingman Reef — all have 370- kilometer EEZs which, combined, have an area a third of the South China Sea. That cleverly covers a third of the Pacific within American EEZs. Even France has a 430,000 sq km circular EEZ off the coast of Mexico, radiating from a 6 sq km uninhabited coral reef Île de Clipperton.
