Hi Delphine,

Both reviewers are in support of publishing your study pending minor revision. I agree. Please revise your manuscript following their review suggestions.

Thank you! Looking forward to seeing the revised manuscript.
Ran

Hi Delphine

Thanks for the revised manuscript. Reviewers find your study interesting and insightful for understanding the evolution of Asian Monsoon System. Well done! See below for a list of editorial comments that you may find useful when preparing the final version. Please make sure that the calculation in Fig. 5 is correct, and add the equation in your caption.

Line 44 – 45: “…From this definition, several broad monsoonal regions can be identified over the globe (Zhang and Wang, 2008; Zhisheng et al., 2015), amongst which the Asian Monsoon system, which is itself declined into smaller monsoonal regions (Wang and LinHo, 2002).”
This sentence is a bit awkward.
Suggested change: …can be identified over the globe (Zhang and Wang, 2008; Zhisheng et al., 2015). A prominent member is the Asian Monsoon System, which covers several smaller monsoonal regions (Wang and LinHo, 2002).

Line 55 – 56: … it is supposed to be enhanced by orographic insulation…
Please replace “supposed” with “thought”.

Line 74: The use of “doubthouse” is not that common. Please remove the word “often”.

Line 133 – 134: please keep the acronyms consistent. “IPSL-CM5A-LR’ was not used before.

Line 219 – 220: please also check for studies on changing sea water Uk37 and Mg/Ca values through time, e.g., Tierney & Tingley, (2018, PP) and Tierney et al., (2019 GRL).

Line 231 – 232: there were previous studies on the sensitivity of simulated Eocene temperature to western U.S. topography. Two examples are Sewall and Sloan (2006, Geology) and Feng et al., (2016 EPSL).

Line 238: moist adiabatic lapse rate is typically ~5 K/km. 6.5K/km is the global mean lapse rate of present-day. Please clarify.

Line 238 – 242: …Considering a moist adiabatic lapse rate of ∼6.5°C/km, this suggests the presence of a temperature bias in this region, regardless of the match with modeled values that may themselves be biased…
This sentence is confusing. The conveyed information is a repetition of the previous sentence. Please consider removing it.

Line 330: “...regimes, the amount of precipitations simulated is biased towards aridity, especially…”
Please replace “biased towards aridity” with “underestimated”.

Line 333: “…hampers a quantitative comparison to paleovegetation records, which mostly provide estimates of required precipitation amounts.”

It is unclear what “required precipitation amounts” meant. Please consider removing the whole “which mostly provide estimates of required precipitation amounts.”.

Line 351, Please consider replacing “experiments” with “experiences”.

Line 445: Please consider replacing “stress out” with “point out”.

Line 452: Consider replacing “probably intimately” with “closely”.

Line 458: Replace “rather recent specific” with “more recently developed”.

Line 462: …explain the measured patterns (Botsyun et al., 2019; Poulsen et al., 2010). Two additional references are recommended here: Shen et al., (2019, Clim. Past.) and Brady et al., (2019, JAMES)

Line 462 to 465: The discussion of proxy forward modeling of ice core is out of place. For Deep time, ice core is not an option. Please replace this discussion with something more deeptime appropriate (e.g., Schmidt 1999, PP; Zhou et al., Zhou et al., 2008 PP; Tindall et al. 2010, EPSL)

Fig 5: The units for the integrated moisture flux is typically m/s or kg m2/s, an example is Seager and Henderson (2013, J. Clim.). Please check your calculation and write down the equation used here in the figure caption.

Fig. 8: Please use uniform legend for both subplots given that they are plotting the same variable.

Fig. 10 The purple outline shows in magenta color in my screen. Please consider using a different color.