Positive Use of Military Expertise

Both in our country and abroad, poor communities will suffer the most as climate change accelerates. Many people all over the world are already being displaced from their homes due to climate change and natural disasters, and the displacement is only going to get worse. 

In 2017, 18.8 million people had to relocate within their country due to natural disasters and climate change. Experts predict that soon, these displacements will not be able to stay internal. A recent UN Report predicts several regions where conflict and violence will be exacerbated by large numbers of refugees that need to cross borders due to climate change. Several Pacific Islands, including Fiji, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Vanuatu, and the Marshall Islands are predicted to go underwater within a few decades.

Most of these islands already have plans for relocating their entire population should a cyclone or catastrophic disaster hit tomorrow that submerges their entire island underwater. Small islands all over the world face the same threat. Most of these islands do not burn fossil fuels and have done nothing to contribute to climate change, yet they will soon be without a home country.

Climate change is a destabilizing force. The military considers it to be a threat multiplier. Over the past century, we’ve used our military to project our power abroad, and that’s often led us to engage in wars without a clear benefit to the US, or in regime change. Let’s change that. Let’s use our military to project our power abroad by stabilizing areas impacted by climate change, helping countries build or rebuild their infrastructure to be more sustainable, and ease the movements of climate refugees as areas become uninhabitable.