NEWS

Hagel: Global warming threatens national security

05/11/2007

By Robert Pore

Grand Island Independent

As more and more scientists around the world confirm the growing impact of global warming, U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., said national security also needs to be factored into the climate change debate.
A number of retired military officials testified at a Senate hearing this week on how global warming could threaten national security, Hagel said on Thursday.

He said the hearing ties into a bill that he and U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., introduced last month requiring a National Intelligence Estimate of the security challenges the world's changing climate presents.

Hagel said global warming is having a wide-ranging impact, including economic, environmental and energy priorities.

He said these issues are "inextricably linked, and changes to one will affect the other two."

"These priorities are also an integral part of U.S. national security," Hagel said.

He said risk assessment is essential to putting national resources in the places where they will be most effective.

"This is even more important when assessing risk to national security," he said.

A National Intelligence Estimate is a comprehensive review of a potential security threat that combines, correlates and evaluates intelligence from all relevant agencies, Hagel said.

He said various intelligence agencies—the CIA, FBI, National Security Agency, Pentagon, etc.—pool data, share perspectives and work together to assemble an accurate picture of threats to U.S. security.

Hagel said environmental changes caused by global warming represent a potential threat multiplier for instability around the world.

For example, he said scarce water may exacerbate conflict along economic, ethnic or sectarian divisions.

Water shortages, food insecurity or flooding—all of which may occur as a result of rising global temperatures—could also displace people, forcing them to migrate.

"Water is going to be one of the scarcest commodities in the world," he said.

A lot of current political instability, such as in parts of Africa, is due to water scarcity, Hagel said.

"Drought has driven herders onto more fertile land that is occupied by farmers because people are looking for water," he said. "As the world warms and rain patterns change and shift, that is going to have an impact on people, who may be thrown out of work and become destitute. That creates instability."

According to the United Nations Food Agriculture Organization, global water use is growing at more than twice the rate of population growth in the last century.

Water scarcity already affects more than 40 percent of the people on the planet. By 2025, the FAO said, 1.8 billion people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity.

Warming

Two-thirds of the world's population could be living under water-stressed conditions.

"Water scarcity is being exacerbated by climate change, especially in the driest areas of the world, which are home to more than 2 billion people and to half of all poor people," the FAO said.

Hagel pointed to the president's 2006 National Security Strategy, which stated that problems caused by environmental destruction—whether by human behavior or cataclysmic mega-disasters such as floods, hurricanes, earthquakes or tsunamis—could overwhelm the capacity of local authorities to respond.

Hagel said it could also overtax national militaries, requiring a larger international response.

"These challenges are not traditional national security concerns, such as the conflict of arms or ideologies," he said. "But if left unaddressed, they can threaten national security."