China And Japan in the South Seas

Have you wondered why you haven't seen a map of those pesky islands in the South China Seas? The ones that Japan is claiming?

Take a look at the map on the right. The red dot is the Diayoyu or Senkaku Islands. The yellow area is the Shirakaba/Chunxiao gas field, of which Japan claims half.

Without knowing any history, doesn't it look like those are China's?

Once you know the history, you'll see that there's really no serious argument, historically or legally, about ownership.

But since we've never even seen a map amidst all the press coverage, most folks will think what they're supposed to thing: that China is "sabre-rattling" and being "aggressive".

There's a good article from a very good website, The Oil Drum, about why the two countries are squabbling. Here's a taste:

"The recent post on Chinese claims to territory in the China Sea mentioned the rush to plant flags on different islands in the South China Sea portion as a sign of the ongoing nature of the disputes that continue to develop in the region. That status has continued with protests this last weekend in China over Japanese flag-wavingover an island in the East China Sea. The islands are called Diaoyu or Senkaku, depending on whether the report is Chinese or Japanese. 

CNOOC, the China National Offshore Oil Corporation, and the company designated to handle their offshore deals, has been producing oil and natural gas from the field since at least March of 2011. Back then:

"China has complete sovereignty over the Chunxiao oil and gas field and administrative authority," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told reporters at a regular news briefing.

The gas field is 7 minutes flying time for the new Chinese air base at Shuimen.
CNOOC has just released their Mid-year Review noting that they are on track to produce between 330 and 340 million barrels of oil equivalent (mboe) this year. They have 10 new discoveries and 18 successful appraisal wells, and have signed an agreement to co-operatively develop coalbed methane onshore in China. (Their realized gas price is $5.90/kcf, up from $4.92 over the same period last year.) However, they are running about 4.6% down in production y-o-y, which they blame partly on the production outage at the Penglai 19-3 oilfield, in Bohai Bay, due to the oil spill last year. The shut-down reduced overall company production by 40,000 bd, from a field which has been producing atsome 160 kbd. The field, the largest offshore discovery in China is run in partnership with ConocoPhillips, came on line in 2002 and was the site of another small spill this June. Production at Penglai 19-3 was restarted in March, with the intention of ramping up to close to the original flow volumes. 

 Read more at The Oil Drum...