Military Falsely Posited As Solution To Climate Crisis When It Is Actually A Major Cause

Screenshot from this morning's weather check in

A young parent in my family shared an article yesterday from the I Fucking Love Science website. "New Report Warns 'High Likelihood Of Human Civilization Coming To An End' Within 30 Years" drew on findings in a report out of Australia last month, "Existential climate-related security risk: A scenario approach." 

It is impossible to read such reports without thinking of the dire future for 4 years old you love.

What struck me about the report, though, was the strong flavor of military "leadership" invoked to address climate catastrophe. The introduction by the now retired chief of the Australian Defense Force (1998-2002) set the tone:

In particular, our intelligence and security services have a vital role to play, and a fiduciary responsibility, in accepting this existential climate threat, and the need for a fundamentally different approach to its risk management, as central to their considerations and their advice to government. The implications far outweigh conventional geopolitical threats.

This did not surprise me as internet search terms "climate change Pentagon" turn up links to how the U.S. military is planning for mitigation of sea level rise on their many coastal bases. 

Such articles NEVER mention the key role of the U.S. military in accelerating carbon loading in the atmosphere.

Nor did the Australian report mention this.

So while the U.S. federal government rebrands fossil fuels as "freedom gas" and "freedom molecules" the carbon loading proceeds apace. Almost no one looks toward the Pentagon to find the solution to our worsening problems: stop waging wars for oil, stop burning highly polluting jet fuels, and stop exploding bombs which besides killing mostly civilians are also killing the atmosphere as a life support system.

On behalf of 4 year olds, it's time for us to get busy.

Educate:
You can read my collection of reports on the Pentagon's role in hastening climate catastrophe here on the Maine Natural Guard website.

Advocate:
Consider taking the MNG pledge to connect the dots between Pentagon funding and climate change.

Join us for the Conversion Campaign news conference if you're in still lovely, cool and wet Maine on June 21.

Join us at General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works shipyard on June 22 to protest the celebration of yet another carbon belching war ship. Call for BIW to build sustainable energy solutions instead.

Before it's too late.