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A Marshall Plan to Combat Climate Change in the Asia-Pacific: The Missing Piece of the New U.S. Security Strategy
This article is cross-posted from e-International Relations
For the first time since the days of William Howard Taft, the United States is officially reorienting its security and defense strategy to the Asia-Pacific region, closing down military bases in Europe, redeploying soldiers to bases in Australia, and placing the region front and center in its strategic documents. As stated in the U.S. Department of Defense’s 2012 Defense Strategic Guidance note, “while the U.S. military will continue to contribute to security globally, we will of necessity re-balance toward the Asia-Pacific region.” But if this shift is to translate into leadership, the United States needs a complementary investment agenda for building the region’s resilience to key emerging threats – including climate change. (more…)
Defense Science Board Report on Climate Change and Security: List of Recommendations
In the 2012 U.S. State of the Union address, President Obama highlighted the role of the military in developing clean energy. This was a welcome mention. Building off of that, the military may also play a role in mitigating the risks of climate change. As we highlighted previously, late last year the Defense Science Board Task Force on Trends and Implications of Climate Change for National and International Security released a report outlining what the national security community could do to better prepare for and integrate the risks of climate change into operations and objectives. It’s a long, but very interesting list, which is likely to be reviewed by the U.S. Department of Defense in the coming months. Below is a summary of the recommendations, found on pages xvi – xxii. For the full report, click here.
Is a Cost-Free National Climate Service Too Much to Ask?
In its recently released report, the Defense Science Board Task Force on “Trends and Implications of Climate Change for National and International Security,” called for the U.S. government to institute “a scientifically robust, sustained, and actionable climate information system… (see page 14).” The rationale for the recommendation is that currently, climate information is collected by a “loose federation” of government, university, industry and NGO entities, and that U.S. climate “observational and model assets” do not “constitute a robust, sustained, or comprehensive resource for generating actionable climate forecasts.” (more…)
If Climate Change is a Security Threat, Who’s Qualified to Fight It? Hint: Everyone
A recent piece in AlertNet raises some fair questions about the “securitisation of climate change,” including the dangers of fear-based sensationalist messages and the need for additional research into the links between climate change and violent conflict. It also goes on to make a debatable assertion about the risks of linking climate change to security – one which assumes that framing climate change as a security issue risks overshadowing important social and environmental concerns. (more…)