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The Military's Latest Enemy: Climate Change
Lasrick writes A surprising report from the Pentagon last month places climate change squarely among the seemingly endless concerns of the US military. Although a Wall Street Journal editorial misrepresented the report in an editorial (subtitled 'Hagel wants to retool the military to stop glaciers from melting'), the report itself is straightforward and addresses practical military issues such as land management of bases and training facilities. "So, this plan is not really about mobilizing against melting glaciers; it's more like making sure our ships have viable facilities from which to launch bombs against ISIS. And the report doesn't just focus on home, though. It casts a wider eye towards how a changing climate will affect defense missions in the future."
Why are we spending so much money on satellites? We could have bought a couple Cold War fighter jets that will never be used and that explode on liftoff!
A Wall Street Journal editorial misrepresented the report in an editorial (subtitled 'Hagel wants to retool the military to stop glaciers from melting'),
The Wall Street Journal has become a tabloid. It is beyond ridiculous.
This was already posted when it came out last month
http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/10/13/2044217/pentagon-unveils-plan-for-militarys-response-to-climate-change
Nothing new here. Climate Change was identified as a global destabilization factor long ago by the US military. Crop failures, droughts, flooding, etc leading to mass migrations and the conflict and strife that will arise our of these migrations.
It was my sense that the military was examining several factors that can impact their mission and ability to meet that mission over the coming decades. This includes not only the recognized increase in regional conflicts due to displacement of people by flooding and/or changes in food supplies due to climatic changes in rainfall patterns. It also includes thinking about the predictions for ocean rising and that impact on the bases that support the military around the world - naval bases, and airfields near current sea levels aren't something that one moves in a couple of years.
And lastly, thinking about how the impact on troops and equipment might change - will there be more fighting in high heat locations? Heavy rain? What will be the impacts on availability of fuel sources and on supply chains?
The military is a huge "ship" that takes much time to turn. Looking out a few decades and postulating what might be needed is not a bad exercise. They would be soundly criticized later if they hadn't. But it is interesting that the main military supports on the right are also the main body of climate change deniers, which puts the military in a dicey political environment. They need to prepare, but carefully.
Is anyone surprised that a Rupert Murdoch owned paper decided to misrepresent what the military was doing about climate change?
You know that the current Secretary of Defense, top guy in the Pentagon, appointed by President Obama, is a Republican, having served as such as senator from Nebraska in the US Senate for two terms. Also being a former Army enlisted squad leader in Vietnam with two Purple Hearts, I doubt he would adjust his views much and sell out the armed forces for Democratic Party politics.
and that idiot just got re-elected to the senate, where he will now be in charge of the Environment and Public Works Committe, giving him direct oversight of the EPA, an agency he wants to kill.
he is the single worst science denier in the congress now that Broun is gone.
he thinks Michael Cricton is a climate expert. no seriously, he called him as a "expert" witness at a committee hearing.
he thinks the earth hasnt warmed. at all. in fact he says its the world's greatest hoax.
he thinks scientists are secretive liars engaged in a conspiracy and wants to "shine a light” on scientist’s activities.
he said that AGW is a myth because...the bible:
The Genesis 8:22 that I use in there is that ‘as long as the earth remains there will be seed time and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, day and night.’ My point is, God’s still up there. The arrogance of people to think that we, human beings, would be able to change what He is doing in the climate is to me outrageous."
The man is dangerous....who who is more foolish?
the fool? or the fools that all voted overwhelmingly for him?
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
He didn't say "immediate evacuation". Learn to read. At some stage in the future -- our children's future -- there will be ocean where Miami is. So there will be a permanent evacuation. Probably after some storm surge or king tide. Dummy.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
So the "ice age is coming" of the 1970s becomes "global warming" in the 1980s/90s and has now morphed into "climate change" because the warming stopped 14-18 years ago. So is the military prepared for colder weather? "Climate Change" is so nice because they won't have to change their scam's name every time the climate does something they don't expect .... like CHANGE! For goodness sake climate is always changing and humans for all their arrogance have very little to do with it. Urban heat island is proven and CO2 might have a 1 degree C change for each doubling.
A question for everyone who thinks that CO2 controls the climate. How long with rising CO2 and flat or falling temperatures before you admit your theory is wrong? 20 years? 30? Never?
All 5 of the major datasets (RSS, UAH, HadCRUT4, GISS, NCDC) show no warming for between 14 and almost 18 years. In that time CO2 has risen 8-10%.
Here are 2 predictions. First I predict that CO2 will continue to increase because China and other countries don't care about CO2. They don't even care about real pollutants much less CO2. Second I predict it will get colder over the next 20-30 years. Why?
Dr Libby in the 1970s said that "looking forward it will stay cold until the mid 80s (it did), then it will warm by about 1/4 degree F until the end of the century it did), then it gets cold". When asked how cold she was predicting a 1-2 degree F drop with an outside chance of a 3-4 degree drop.
Dr Easterbrook in 2001 said the PDO was done it's positive warm cycle and that we were in for 25-30 years of cold weather. How cold? We have his good, bad and ugly predictions based on previous negative cold phases of the PDO.
Why do I join with them and side with their predictions? While past performance is not a guarantee of future correctness it is a lot better record than the IPCC and their dozens of models of which none have been accurate. They are all based on CO2 controlling the climate and the other 3 are all cyclical
natural cycles. I'll go with those who have a good track record at predicting future climate. Dr Libby is the most impressive as her prediction is 30+ years going and still accurate.
If you want to read a great explanation of why the IPCC models are broken beyond belief there was a great article describing that and all the other problems with climate science by Dr Brown of Duke university
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/10/06/real-science-debates-are-not-rare/