Does Our Military Know Something We Do Not About Global Warming

Climate Change, Anthropocene, & Associated Issues

Date posted: 11/14/14

Dr. Conca reports that every branch of the US military is worried about climate change. They have been since well before it became controversial. In the wake of an historic climate change agreement between President Obama and President Xi Jinping in China this week, the military perspective is significant in how it views climate effects on emerging military conflicts. Bill Pennell, former Director of the Atmospheric Sciences and Global Change Division at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, summed up the threat in recent discussions about climate and national security by writing that the environmental consequences of climate change are a significant threat multiplier, which by itself, can be a cause for future conflicts. Global warming will affect military operations as well as its theaters of operations. And it poses significant risks and costs to military and civilian infrastructure, especially those facilities located on the coastline Whether in Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, or North Korea, extreme weather events may not be perturbations of the weather but actual indications of climate change. Droughts and flooding and the food shortages and population dislocations that accompany them, have often destabilized governments causing conflict. For example, one trigger of the chaos in Syria has been the multi-year drought the country has experienced since 2006 and the Assad Regime ineptitude in dealing with it. The US Military Advisory Board concluded that coordinated and well-executed actions to limit heat-trapping gases and increase resilience to help prevent and protect against the worst projected climate change impacts are required now. This means, of course, that using nuclear power in place of burning coal, and eventually natural gas, has become more obvious than ever, and using solar energy in multiple, small-scale applications does make a sum-total difference....no grid required.