Is Climate Change a National Security Issue? the Case for Linking Climate Change and National Security Is Robust But Imperfect, And Today There Is a Serious Debate About Whether It Makes Sense (Climate AND SECURITY‪)‬

A round the planet there is growing momentum to define climate change as a security issue and hence as an agenda-topping problem that deserves significant attention and resources. In December 2010, for example, while poised to start a two-year term on the United Nations Security Council, Germany announced its intention to push to have climate change considered as a security issue in the broadest sense of the term. Germany's objective captures a sentiment that has been expressed in many venues, including several recent high-level U.S. national security documents. The May 2010 version of the National Security Strategy repeatedly groups together violent extremism, nuclear weapons, climate change, pandemic disease, and economic instability as security threats that require strength at home and international cooperation to address adequately. The February 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review links climate change to future conflict and identifies it as one of four issues in which reform is "imperative" to ensure national security. This sentiment has met resistance, however, and today there is a serious debate about whether linking climate change to security, and especially to national security, makes sense. The case in support of this linkage integrates three strands of argument. The first builds on efforts to expand a very narrow definition of the term "national security" that was dominant during the 20th century. The narrow meaning was shaped by a specific set of events. After World Wars I and II, a third major war involving nuclear weapons was widely regarded as the single greatest threat to the survival of the United States and indeed to much of the world. In response to this perception, the National Security Act of 1947 sought "to provide for the establishment of integrated policies and procedures for the departments, agencies, and functions of the Government relating to the national security." Its focus was on strengthening the country's military and intelligence capabilities, and the government was supported in this effort through the rapid buildup of independent think tanks and security studies programs at colleges and universities throughout the country. National security was seen by most experts as a condition that depended on many factors, and hence the broadest goals of the national security community were to build and maintain good allies, a strong economy, social cohesion and trust in government, democratic processes, civil preparedness, a skilled diplomatic corps, and powerful, forward-looking military and intelligence agencies. For more than four decades after World War II, however, efforts to improve national security were assessed against estimates of the threats of nuclear war and communist expansion, and invariably emphasized the paramount importance of military and intelligence assets. National security was largely about the military and intelligence capabilities necessary for preventing or winning a major war.