National security and the accelerating risk of climate change

Since 2006, retired U.S. admirals and generals have been examining our changing physical world and assessing the impact of those changes on the security of the nation. A Military Advisory Board (MAB, convened by the CNA Corporation, a non-profit research and analysis institution that operates the Center for Naval Analyses and Institute for Public Research) has issued two reports on the changing climate’s national security implications. The first report, published in 2007, stated that the changing climate would be destabilizing in many parts of the world. Climate change, in fact, would be a “threat multiplier”, the report claimed, and result in new and more urgent calls for the American military to provide humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) as well as help sustain order and ensure conditions that would permit trade and prosperity worldwide. The MAB recommended urgent action by the Defense Department to prepare for new missions in new places; and that the Defense Department explicitly recognize missions stemming from the changing climate. CNA’s MAB then published three reports on energy, relating to climate change, one each on: the coming age of renewables, the nation’s energy dependence, and the future of energy in terms of America’s international competitiveness (CNA-MAB, 2009; CNA-MAB, 2010; CNA-MAB, 2011). In 2014, the Military Advisory Board noted that the climate was changing more quickly than had been forecast in 2007. Undertaking a new climate study, the board concluded that more needed to be done, and done quickly, to prepare for and confront the “catalyst for conflict” that the board now saw in climate change. Guest Editors’ Note: The following commentary derives from a presentation by Vice Admiral Lee Gunn, U.S. Navy (Ret.), delivered by invitation at the American Association for the Advancement of Science Meeting, San Jose, California, February 13, 2015. Prior to his advisory role for the U.S. Military and national security community with the CNA Corporation (https://www.cna.org), he served for 35 years in the U.S. Navy. His last active duty assignment was Inspector General of the Department of the Navy where he was responsible for the Department’s overall inspection program and its assessments of readiness, training, and quality of service. Serving in the Surface Navy in a variety of theaters, Gunn rose through the cruiser/destroyer force to command the Frigate USS Barbey, then commanded the Navy’s anti-submarine warfare tactical and technical evaluation Destroyer squadron, DESRON 31. He later commanded Amphibious Group Three. As Commander of PHIBGRU THREE, he served as the Combined Naval Forces Commander and Deputy Task Force Commander of Combined Task Force United Shield, which conducted the withdrawal of U.N. peacekeeping forces from Somalia. Since retiring from active duty in the Navy, Gunn has been President of The Institute for Public Research at CNA Corporation. Gunn holds a Bachelor’s degree in Experimental and Physiological Psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles and a Master of Science in Operations Research from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. His commentary addresses why members of the national security community regard climate change as a clear threat to national security now, and a threat that will only increase if climate change continues unchecked.