Climate Change and the Military

The Climate Change and The Military (CCTM) project initially consists of  two elements. The first  is the recent report Climate Change and The Military: The State of Debate.

"It  is  the belief  of  the  authors  of  this  text  that recent evidence of  abrupt climate  change  and threatening  tipping points has brought the challenge of  climate change into the urgent timescale of  military  contingency  planning. Climate  change  is  a common  security  problem  that  requires global co-operation in which the defence and security community have an important role to play.   It  is  our  fear  that  if  COP 15  fails  to  deliver  an effective, predictable  and  institutionally  robust climate  protection  system,  that preserving  security  and  stability  at  current  levels  will  become increasingly difficult. 

It is clear to us that on issues of  climate change and security,  the past is not an adequate guide to the future.   The broader climate policy making world needs to hear from the defence and security community  about  the  concerns  of  the military.    If  the military were  to be  excluded  from  the discussion at this stage on  the spurious grounds that they would be “securitising”  the debate,  we should  not  be  surprised  if  individual  national  militaries  developed  separate  and  potentially conflicting approaches to the subject. 

This  paper aims to describe the state of  the current debate on  climate  change and security, and provide  a framework  for discussion  in which the military can play  a clear  role  in  the debate on climate change mitigation and delivering sustainable human security, while starting  to address  the direct  impacts  of  climate  change  on  its  core  aims  of  national  security,  regional  and  global stability."
 

The full full report is available here.

 The second element, a statement by the Project Military Advisory Council calling for effective action at Copenhagen, is avaiable here.