CIA's Climate Change Center

For those of you still in doubt about the link between national security and climate change - natural security as some have dubbed it - the Central Intelligence Agency, not best known for cutting edge innovation, has opened a new Center on Climate Change and National Security. It seems to be mostly to predict when and where natural disasters or natural resource shortages will cause instability, but it's a start.

O'Hanlon Calls For an Armed Peace Corps

We've all heard how once a high percentage of Ivy League graduates served in the military, but now few liberal, well-off, and elite-educated (service academies aside) students want to or are willing to serve. Truman Project Fellow and Brooking Institute Senior Fellow Michael O'Hanlon may have come up with a solution (although he doesn't identify it as such) in a Washington Post op-ed: essentially a militarized Peace Corps.

O'Hanlon describes the current situation in the Congo and compares it to Darfur, where many in the United States wanted to do something and the best humanitarian assistance might have been troops on the ground providing security, but with the military stretched thin as it is by extended deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan even considering it was impossible.

He proposes creating a "peace operations division" of 15,000 soldiers, of which 3-4,000 or so would be deployed at any one time. The troops would be specifically recruited for this humanitarian division, would only serve two years, and would have more experienced officers and NCOs, including those driven away by the stupidity of "don't ask, don't tell." A more lovable, more liberal, military. The Peace Corps with guns.

It's an interesting concept, and I think encouraging a broader spectrum of young people to serve our country would benefit both the individuals and the military, but I also see some major flaws. Having a "special" force liberal interventionist troops with many gay leaders, and you want them to be less well trained and go on softer missions? Wouldn't that just reinforce stereotypes? Instead create specific training for humanitarian/peacekeeping/nation building missions for our current troops. Undertake those types of missions if they make sense to our national interest. Use various methods, including touting those missions, to recruit from a broader spectrum of young Americans. And repeal DADT. But don't create an alternative, wimpier, military for liberals and gays.

Natural Security: the Next Big Security Issue

Anyone still living in New Orleans doesn't have to be told that natural disasters can be as big a threat to their lives and well being as an attack by terrorists or another enemy. And you don't have to tell the president of the the island nation of the Maldives, who is saving a significant portion his country's tax revenue so that they can buy land elsewhere and relocate the country when it is covered by the rising sea. The journal Nature reports that this is the highest level of hurricanes in the Atlantic in the past 1,000 years.

Stephen Walt may be his usual contrarian self and say natural security is not a real threat, but the government disagrees, including climate change in the National Intelligence Council's "Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World" report on future threats.

Several organizations are noticing as well. Truman Project-affiliated Operation Free is working to promote understanding and action on climate change as a national security imperative. CNAS has launched their own natural security project as well. The Center for Naval Analysis has been rolling out lots of retired stars (admirals and generals) promoting their own report. Friend Of The Blog Nat Skinner writes frequently about the intersection of "Energy, Environment, and Security."

I'm quite convinced that natural security is an important component of the security threat debate. But I have yet to hear any significant answers from these groups. The CNA group talked about how DoD needs to become more energy efficient, but none of them seem to have done anything to make it happen when they were actually serving. What is it we should do? Is it just high level policy changes, and if so which ones? If we passed a cap-and-trade bill with some teeth would that do the trick? I'm convinced we have a problem, I'm still waiting for someone to think hard and come up with real solutions.