Irregular Warfare Podcast - Adapting to the Unpredictable: Climate’s Impact on Irregular Warfare

Episode Date: October 31, 2024

Episode 117 examines the intersection of climate change, national security, and irregular warfare, with a particular focus on how environmental changes are reshaping global security challenges from the Arctic to the Pacific Islands. Our guests begin by exploring pivotal moments in the evolution of environmental security and its impact on national defense policy. They then discuss how climate-related changes affect military operations and strategic partnerships, particularly in the Pacific region. The conversation continues with an analysis of how both state and non-state actors leverage environmental crises in irregular warfare tactics. They conclude by offering policy recommendations for addressing climate security challenges and building resilient international partnerships. Sherri Goodman is a Senior Fellow at the Wilson Center's Environmental Change and Security Program and Polar Institute. As the former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Environmental Security, she coined the term "threat multiplier" to describe climate change's impact on national security. She has served on numerous advisory boards and is the author of "Threat Multiplier: Climate, Military Leadership, and the Fight for Global Security." Ambassador John Hennessey-Niland is a Professor of Practice at the Bush School of Government and Public Service. As the former U.S. Ambassador to Palau, he brings extensive experience in Pacific region affairs. His previous roles include serving as the foreign policy advisor to the Commander of U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific, and he has held various diplomatic positions across Europe and the Pacific, providing him with unique insights into the intersection of environmental security and irregular warfare.

If we want to look at a regular warfare and where the friction is taking place currently in the Indo-Pacific at least, but probably globally as well, it's in the maritime domain. You just have to pick up a newspaper, look online, think about what's going on in the South China Sea with the Philippines and the People's Republic of China. We may look out at the vast region of the Pacific and see an increasingly aggressive and influential China, but our allies and partners that are key to our security in the region, not only are they seeing growing Chinese influence, but they're seeing loss of their own territory. Welcome to the Regularregular Warfare podcast. I'm your host, Don Edwards, and my co-host today is Katherine Michelson.

In today's episode, we examine the intersection of climate change, national security, and irregular warfare. Our guests begin by exploring how environmental changes create new security challenges across the globe, from the Arctic to the Pacific Islands. They then discuss how both state and non-state actors leverage climate-related crises in their irregular warfare tactics. Finally, our guests offer insights into building resilient partnerships and developing strategic responses to these evolving threats.

Sherry Goodman is a senior fellow at the Wilson Center and is a former deputy undersecretary of defense. She has served on numerous advisory boards and recently published her book, Threat Multiplier, Climate, Military Leadership, and the Fight for Global Security. Her book serves as the anchor for this episode. Ambassador John Hennessy Nyland is a professor of practice at the Bush School of Government and Public Service. As the former U.S. Ambassador to Palau, he has extensive experience in the Pacific region. Previously, he served as the foreign policy advisor to the commander of U.S. Marine Corps Forces Pacific, and has held positions at various posts across Europe and the Pacific. You are listening to the Regular Warfare Podcast, a joint production of the Princeton Empirical Studies of Conflict Project and the Modern Warfare Institute at West Point, dedicated

to bridging the gap between scholars and practitioners to support the community of irregular warfare professionals. Here's our conversation with Sherry Goodman and John Hennessy Nylund. Sherry and John, it's a pleasure to have you on their regular warfare podcast. It's great to be here with you. Don, it's great to be with you. It's an honor to join Sherry on this podcast, regular warfare, and I'm going to have to get a signed copy of Threat Multiplier after this. I hear it's a fantastic book. I can't wait to read it. Thank you, John. Sherry, your book, Threat Multiplier, represents a culmination of decades of work at the intersection

of national security and environmental issues. Can you walk us through the pivotal moments or key insights in your career that compelled you to write this book? And how did your understanding of emerging security challenges evolve during this process? Well, thank you so much, Catherine. And for all of your listeners, I'm going to just tell you three quick stories here on those pivotal moments. The first is when my career, I'd say,

went from weapons to waste. Early in my career, I worked on the Senate Armed Services Committee for then Chairman Senator Sam Nunn. I was overseeing the vast nuclear weapons complex led by the Department of Energy where we produced nuclear fissile materials for nuclear weapons. And during my time on the committee, all those plants, the reactors of the processing facilities failed for environment safety and health lapses in the 1980s.

And so we went from producing fissile materials to constructing an environmental management and cleanup program. So hence, my career went from nuclear weapons, where I started into oversight of cleanup. Second chapter on that thread is the first era of environmental security in the 1990s at the end of the Cold War, when in the Department of Defense, we were using our

forces both to clean up and improve environmental stewardship for our own forces and at our own bases in the US, but working with allies and partners, even in that era of the former Soviet Union, to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons and nuclear fissile materials, and also to advance environmental practices as part of our preventive defense strategy. Third is the climate era, which really began about 20 years ago now when the national security implications of climate change came into view and I organized the first group of generals and admirals to assess the national security implications of climate change at the Center

for Naval Analysis and coined the phrase threat multiplier to characterize the national security implications of climate change at the Center for Naval Analysis and coined the phrase threat multiplier to characterize the national security implications of climate change and how it will destabilize fragile regions and even affect us in the more stable regions of the world. Thank you Sherry. John, I want to turn to you. So the book actually discusses the strategic importance of the Pacific in the context of great power competition. From your perspective, how does Palau's position factor into this, especially considering climate change impacts?

Sure. Thank you, Don. And thank you, Sherry, for that table setting of the topic we're going to be talking about today. From my experience in the Pacific, and I've had the great opportunity to serve in a number of locations there in Fiji, in Australia, in Hawaii with the U.S. Marine Corps when I was the foreign policy advisor to the commander and my most recent

and final assignment as the ambassador in Palau. You know, I'll just tell a little story as well, Sherry. When I arrived at the Marine Corps headquarters there in Camp Smith in Hawaii, and I went to my first commander's brief, they started off talking about the weather. And I was sort of surprised that that would be the number one item for the commander's attention and for all the senior staff. At every single time we had a commander's brief, it was about the weather. And so I think that was for me an eye opener in terms of the consequence of climate and

our ability to secure the Pacific, and also obviously the impact on the nations that make up the Indo-Pacific. And so I've been a believer in the importance of understanding the consequence of climate, not just on the United States, but on all of our partners across that vast region. Obviously I'm a latecomer. I did some research this morning. There was a study by the US Department of State back in 1990. I joined the Foreign Service in 1988.

So this isn't a new concept, but I think what is new is a greater understanding of the interplay between climate and security, not just for the United States, but for all our partners across the Indo-Pacific. John, thank you so much for saying that because as we know, and yesterday I was with the Secretary of the Navy in Newport at a global security forum addressing climate and national security, and Secretary of the Navy Del Toro made clear that for our Pacific allies and partners, climate change is indeed an existential risk. So we may look out at the vast region of the Pacific as you did from Camp Smith and see an increasingly aggressive and influential China. What are allies and partners that are key to our security in the region?

Not only are they seeing growing Chinese influence, but they're seeing loss of their own territory from rising sea levels, loss of fresh water, and dramatic changes in their entire way of life. So if we're going to have security and stability in that region, we have to be attentive to their needs. And that's what the stepped-up engagement with our allies and partners to provide, for example, the center of the Navy talks about providing climate dashboards to our allies and partners in the Pacific, better to understand those changing weather patterns, to move from reliable weather forecasts, which take you out about one week, to improved short-term climate predictions at regional scales, regional and local scales.

That's the frontier that we're on now is stepping down the global climate models to local and regional scales that are actionable for the decision-maker, whether it's the defense decision-maker or the planner on a small Pacific island that needs to know when to move people out of the way or what the fishing season is going to look like next year. Sherry, you're so right. And I'm glad you mentioned the Secretary of Navy. He actually visited Palau on a swing not so long ago, and he's been often in the Indo-Pacific. And you're exactly right.

Last week, the Pacific Island Forum held its annual meeting in Tonga, another island that is dramatically impacted by adverse weather events. It's recovering from a recent typhoon. But the PIF, the Pacific Island Forum, which is the preeminent political organization for all Pacific Islands, and the U.S. is a dialogue partner with that organization, along with the People's Republic of China. Their mission statement says this, and I brought it up on my screen because it is so important, climate change is the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and wellbeing of the peoples of the Pacific. And if they have identified that as the number one challenge, you know, I think

it's in our national interest to fully understand that. And I think we are getting there. As ambassador in Palau, one of my greatest privileges was to host the special presidential envoy for climate, Secretary Kerry, for the Our Oceans Conference, which is a recognition by the US government that we are getting it. We still have a way to go, but we understand the importance of environment and climate, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, you know, which is sometimes regarded as the ring of fire, obviously, because of the various environmental challenges. I think you're right. If we can begin a process to prepare ourselves for operating in any climate and place, we can certainly do

that in partnership with those most affected by these events. And that partnership will help us in any irregular conflict by building that trust that we need, by offering small-scale assistance that goes a long way, working in ways that benefit the islands and help them prepare for adverse weather and climate events, but also enable us to operate in these areas more effectively. You know, I hate the expression, but this can be a win-win. It doesn't have to be something we throw our hands up about. You know, I had the privilege of working for Rahm Emanuel at the White House, and his view was, you know, the world is full of challenges.

We have to find ways in those challenges to move forward nonetheless. And he was a believer in finding ways to assist us in pursuing our goals and objectives, our national security, but in partnership with others. And that's exactly what he's doing right now, including on climate, in a key partner in the region, in Japan. I appreciate the remarks from both of you. Actually, Sherry, I'll go to you. So, you discussed some of the remarks from Secretary del Toro and John discussed the Pacific Island Forum. So, in your book, you talked about the military's role of environmental stewardship.

How might this evolving responsibility influence this approach to winning the so-called hearts and minds in contested areas? Great. Well, thank you for saying that. So let's start with where we ended at the last question, sort of winning hearts and minds and building secure relationships with our allies and partners. We all know that it's based on trust and that we can't surge trust. You have to build trust over many years. That is in many ways where the US has comparative advantage over China.

Not necessarily in building ports and infrastructure, because they're right there with those low interest loans that then result in debt, laid burdens for those countries. But the trust factor and the endurance of the relationship, and I think that we have to remember is one of the strengths. It's a non-kinetic asset that is a key part of what the women and men of our armed forces bring to the relationships in many remote regions.

So we want to build on that. In the 1990s, I established the first Defense International Environmental Cooperation Program, and that program has had its most enduring impact in funding something called the Pacific Environmental Security Forum, which is a version of the Pacific Environmental Forum you refer to, but for security forces. And it's been ongoing for several decades now, supported by now Indo-Pacom and others to share environmental stewardship practices with our allies and partners to build that trust, engagement, and cooperation. So we can, through those types of partnerships, address everything from endangered species,

natural resource protection, managing in coastal marine areas, sea level rise, climate, cleanup of contaminated sites. I mean, there's a whole range of broadly based stewardship issues. And let's also recognize that our soldier, sailor, airman, and marine today, when you go through your basic training by the time you've entered into service, you've had a level of environmental training because it's required in the United States. You can't just dump the oil out of your vehicle anymore, right? We used to say a tank is an oil spill waiting to happen, okay? But that's

not true anymore. So we've already baked into our own education and training a high level of environmental competence and in growing ways climate literacy as well because it's become an increasing mandate for our forces. Those are assets that we could share constructively with our allies and partners, particularly because their needs are so great. I'd just like to add to Sherry's list, the Coast Guard, you know, I think they play an essential role as well, particularly in the gray zone of irregular warfare and what they're focused on is certainly one of the

key issues that she mentioned, which environmental stewardship. I can't tell you how many times I've been in the Pacific where the U S Coast Guard has stepped in, particularly after environmental disaster, even before to help islands prepare for an oncoming typhoon or super typhoon. Search and rescue in the aftermath of climate events. Building trust takes time. Saving a life of a fishing person is immensely important to these islands.

They are small, the populations are small, but simply by using what we have, the capability that we have in the Coast Guard and across our military services makes a significant difference in winning those hearts and minds of people across the region. And also, in addition, the training role that we can provide to the governments and the agencies in these locations, sharing some of our experience, good and bad, as well as our expertise so that they can develop their own integral capacity to respond to what they regard as the single greatest threat to their security is not just good for us, it's good for them.

And that's the basis of a sustainable partnership that will continue. It's the quality, not necessarily the quantity that matters. And thank you, John, for bringing up the Coast Guard. If I could just underscore, and this really came through yesterday in Newport with both John Kerry, who was there, the Secretary of the Navy, Senators Whitehouse and Reid of Rhode Island, Senator Reid is the chairman of the Navy, Senators Whitehouse and Reid of Rhode Island. Senator Reid is the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and Senator Whitehouse has long been a champion on oceans and climate issues.

But one of the major threats, and the Coast Guard was present at this conference too, the commandant of the US Coast Guard Academy was present. And one of the major threats we face in the Pacific is illegal fishing, illegal, unreported. And that is changing the livelihoods of the people of the Pacific because the exclusive economic zones of many of the small Pacific Island nations that have vast EZs and whose economies depend on the fishing is being encroached on by illegal fishing. And then when you add the climate impacts onto that, fish populations are migrating towards the poles.

So you have in certain areas changing fish stocks, depleted fish stocks, and then you have a lot of illegal fishermen who turn off their AIS systems, their systems to be, they're supposed to be able to be detected, but then they turn them off so they can illegally fish. And it's such a vast region, the Coast Guard alone can't possibly patrol the whole region. But it's constantly out there on behalf of America's national interests and the interests of our allies and partners. Maritime statecraft concept that the Secretary of the Navy is now talking about, maritime statecraft is increasingly important part of our outreach

to allies and partners. And that includes, to me, a very strong component of climate and environmental security, engagement, and cooperation. Sherry, I agree with you. If we want to look at a regular warfare and where the friction is taking place currently in the Indo-Pacific at least, but perhaps globally as well, it's in the maritime domain. You just have to pick up a newspaper, look online, think about what's going on in the

South China Sea with the Philippines and the People's Republic of China, but not just there. My experience in Fiji and in Palau, even believe it or not in Australia, unreported, unregistered illegal fishing is an economic issue for these countries. It's an environmental issue because they not only are vacuuming up all the fish stocks and sea cucumbers they can find, they are polluting the waters, the riverine areas of these islands and nations. They're stealing essentially the livelihoods of people living there.

And if you live on an island, being able to fish is difficult enough because of the climate and environmental challenges that they face. If you add rising sea temperature, the migration of fish stock, and then plus poaching and stealing and polluting by folks who are just not playing by the rules and, as you said, turning off their transponders in the hope that no one can catch them. You know, that is a challenge that's bigger than the islands can manage. As you mentioned, our resources are stretched. The tyranny of distance is real. But I'll tell you, there are concrete steps that we can take and we are taking.

I'll give you one specific example. In the maritime domain, we talk a lot about awareness. So in Palau, for example, we've set up five local radars with video and radar capability that assist the host government in knowing what's going on in the exclusive economic zone. It allows for better targeting of their few resources to go after these illegal activities. It feeds into a larger network so that we, the United States government and our military, have a better sense of the operating picture

across that archipelago. And it's a smart, small, and wise investment that meets the needs and concerns of the island nations and also enables us to operate more effectively in that gray zone of irregular warfare. And those activities that, not to mix metaphors, are just below the waterline that would engage big Navy versus US Coast Guard and the maritime services of the respective nations across the Indo-Pacific. So there are very discrete concrete steps that we can take and are taking that matter and make a difference.

And perhaps, as you've said, Sherry, enable us to be the preferred partner with these nations across the region. Sherry, I want to go back to something that you briefly mentioned before, which is resource scarcity in the Pacific Islands caused by the People's Republic of China. How do actions similar to this impact the rise of non-state actors or unconventional forces in vulnerable areas outside of the Pacific? Resource scarcity can take a variety of forms. We've just been talking about the Pacific and we've talked about increasingly depleted or illegally fished stocks. But when we move

to continental Africa or the Middle East, what we see is growing water and food scarcity, some of that aggravated by climate-induced drought, some of it by mismanagement of water resources, some of it by political unrest and weak governance. And what's happened in places like Somalia, Mali, even in Syria some years ago is that farmers and herders who live peaceably then find that the land doesn't support both farming and herding and there's either conflict or certain populations move to urban areas, often with inadequate jobs. Then that allows terrorist groups, al-Qaeda and ISIS offshoots to take advantage, particularly of young male youth who don't have enough jobs in their traditional livelihoods.

They get recruited into terrorist organizations. And they come back and offer some form of mafia-like security to the population, or we can give you water, food, et cetera, et cetera, but you have to pledge allegiance to us. And so we see this vicious cycle continually repeated around the world, and it's made worse by the fact that climate-induced drought in particular and growing heat and just changing conditions, particularly in the equatorial regions of the world, are just putting huge amount of stress on traditional local livelihoods and ways of life. Not to mention certain regions just have

enormous demographic stress as well, countries like Mali, Niger, where most of the population is under 25. So in other words, education and training is also going to be a huge part of the solution in these regions. And finally, let's just be frank about the empowerment of women, because when women are educated, birth rates go down. And that also is going to make a huge difference. Yeah, I just want to foot stomp Sherry's comments. Access to water is vital to life. It's as simple as that. If people cannot have access to fish stocks and water, we are in a catastrophe.

And that is the reality that unfortunately too many places around the globe are facing. And even in the Pacific, surrounded by water, these islands face real difficulty in access to fresh, clean drinking water. And that is unfortunately repeated far too often around the globe. And it's probably something the U.S. government and our military need to focus more on. I totally agree with Sherry on that point. John, that's important to talk about kind of the military's role and the question I have for you is how do environmental pressures and nations like those in

Oceania actually complicate the US's efforts to maintain influence and partnerships in the region? For instance, how has the United States legacy towards environment provided the United States challenges but also opportunities regarding influence in those areas. Yeah, it's a tough question, Don. It's not an easy one to answer. To be honest, we've had a checkered past, at least in the Pacific.

Sherry talked about building trust. There's still a number, I think, of concerns and questions about US nuclear testing in the region that we have to manage about environmental damage in terms of storage facilities in Hawaii, for example, and Guam. That's part of our legacy, our history, and I think we have to face it, address it, and mitigate where we can those impacts. So we do have a credibility issue in part regarding this issue across the region. Sometimes even in my role as a foreign policy advisor at Marfa PAC and then as ambassador, you know, talking to the commander of Indo-Pacom or the secretary of Navy, or even the secretary of defense, we

had the secretary of defense come through when I was in Palau. You know, this twin challenge of keeping the warfighters focused on their primary mission and my trying to explain to the same commanders, yes, get it Roger, but the primary challenge for these countries is climate, is environment. And we have to find solutions that enable us to operate, particularly in this phase of peacetime contest, not conflict, and yet at the same time, assist our host countries. That's viable for access, for areas to exercise geographically, strategically in terms of location for our war plans.

And so I always stress that on the issue of climate, we can find ways, partnerships that enable us to do what we need to do in terms of security of the homeland and our security responsibilities globally. And at the same time, build that trust, build that partnership by using the great capacity of our military to assist our partner nations. That's wonderful training, but it's more than just that. It enables our military to operate, to access, to maneuver in areas that otherwise would be more difficult.

And by assisting island nations or nations anywhere, we have that partnership that is the basis of trust, that is the difference between us and potential adversaries. I'll just give you a real simple, small example again, of a concrete investment that works for both us and our friends and partners around the world. It's gonna sound strange, but I'll throw it out there. Navigation aids.

If we can assist fishing men and women to get to where they need to go by repairing and installing navigation aids, you know, if you want something that's really popular and really inexpensive and something that both our Navy and Coast Guard can do, that is one example. And it benefits us for what our Navy needs

to access these ports where the Coast Guard is operating in these areas, those navigation aids make a difference. And that's a very visible symbol, if you will, signal of our commitment and a role in these regions. There's nothing more reassuring to someone going out at night in a small fishing vessel to be able to be guided by those navigation aids, those blinking red and green lights that have been put there by the U.S. That is a specific example that really truly matters for the islands and for the region and also

helps us do what our military needs to do across a very strategic region. John, thank you for that. Sherry, I actually want to turn to you and for our listeners who might remember, Sherry, you were actually a guest on episode 69 of the Arrengo Warfare podcast, which that episode actually focused on the Arctic. And in your new book, you actually discuss the Arctic again, and it's changing landscape. So the question I have is how might melting ice and newly accessible resources transform the nature of competition and conflict in the strategically important region?

As many of your listeners may already know, temperatures are rising even faster at the poles than they are the rest of the planet, over four degrees centigrade now on average, and we have rising temperatures, retreating sea ice, thawing and collapsing permafrost that has opened a new ocean in our lifetime, making the Arctic Ocean more navigable. Now Putin has ambitious goals to transform the northern sea route that hugs the shallow Russian coastline, the longest in the Arctic, into a toll road for transportation from ports in Asia to ports in Europe.

Now he hasn't moved as quickly on that goal since his forces have been pressed out in Ukraine, but nonetheless, he's modernized military bases along the Arctic, both for economic opportunity and for military purposes. They operate many nuclear-capable icebreakers, floating nuclear power plants, many nuclear vessels in that region. And oh, by the way, China has Arctic ambitions itself, declaring in a 2018 Arctic policy that China is a near Arctic stakeholder with access and reasons to access resources in the Arctic has invested with Russia both to extract energy at Yamal because China's heavily dependent on oil and gas imports, but also to gain access to shorter transportation routes. China's own Arctic policy says that Arctic shipping can help with its climate goals because

it saves several weeks on shipping versus current routes through the Straits of Malacca. That's still several decades away, but the Arctic itself is predicted to be potentially ice-free for several months in the summer as soon as 10 to 15 years from now. And that's within a planning cycle, particularly the Chinese, which have a long strategic planning approach. And, oh, by the way, with fish stocks moving north, countries like China and others are also eyeing increased fishing opportunities in the high north and eventually in the poles.

Some of the fish stocks between Norway in the poles. Some of the fish stocks between Norway and Russia now are some of the most productive in the world as arctic cod and other species move northward. With the increased resources available, energy, fish, minerals, subsea bed mining in the future, there is a potential for a region that during the Cold War, in fact, was more characterized by cooperation. Even though, of course, you think of the hunt for Red October and you think of Russian and US subs sort of quietly patrolling each other, there was at the same time a lot of science cooperation going on between the US, Russia, and all of our Arctic allies and partners. And much of that

cooperation, well, Russia's participation in it has lapsed since its invasion of Ukraine, and even earlier. So there's a science gap there. And science diplomacy has been, as we've talked about in the Indo-Pacific, science diplomacy in the Arctic has served some of the same soft power engagement purposes, while engagement on climate and environmental issues has served in the Pacific. In other words, these were ways in which countries that were not always allied, in particular Russia, could continue to cooperate because we had shared interests in understanding changing environmental and other conditions in the Arctic, changing natural resource conditions,

for example. Now that Russia's no longer part of the engagement, that creates a different dynamic. On the other hand, the good news is that Finland and Sweden are now part of NATO, so we have greater strength in our Arctic allies, among the Arctic eight coastal countries now, all but Russia, our NATO allies. That in itself is important. But it also bears when we get down to gray zone, hybrid, and irregular warfare, the fact that the region is more accessible

means that we have more open borders. And so now we have more opportunities for access on our northern border, which wasn't there before. Sometimes you even have off the coast of Alaska in the summertime, more foreign vessels than American vessels. So we have to be mindful of what the risks and the threats are. And then the type of gray zone and hybrid tactics that Russia has used in Ukraine and elsewhere in Europe certainly could be used, and there have been signs of those certainly in the high north.

Our Nordic neighbors, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland are highly alert to the misinformation campaigns, to other types of encroachments and campaigns that the little green men could perpetrate in that region. So we have to be on alert both from a soft power in gray zone kind of engagement sense, but we also have to be mindful that there's been a buildup of forces in the region and the US has to up its game in the Arctic. Some think former Secretary of Defense Mattis said some years ago and the US military has been working on how to increase its surface operating capabilities in that region. We've long of course had space-based and air-based

and submarine-based forces. Now we have to be able to operate in a more open Arctic. In and through the Arctic, as we say, we have to operate in and through an increasingly open Arctic region. Yeah, I'd just love to follow up on Sherry's comments. Earlier in my career, I was the Denmark-Norway desk officer, and I had the great honor of organizing the first visit by Secretary of State General Powell to Greenland.

And this was a while ago. Fortunately, we continue to step up in that region and now have a consulate in Greenland, in addition to the embassy in Copenhagen. But Greenland and the Arctic, I think, is a very good example of where the United States is trying to use all of the tools of statecraft. We're all familiar with dime and even midfield, the tools of state, hard and soft power. I think Sheri's right.

Maybe we should add science and technology to that mix. And certain science diplomacy is real. It's part of the great strengths of the united states and cooperating with our arctic nations on those issues that matter to them again is another example of how we can have that partnership that matters to both united states and the nations in the arctic region. It is i think another place where we're trying to cooperate where we can contest when adversaries are up to no good in order to avoid conflict. But the environment, the changing environment, the changing climate, you know, is adding stresses and that will complicate our ability militarily to operate in those areas.

I think we're getting better at understanding that, but the Arctic is another one of those areas like the Pacific where we face significant climate challenges that potential adversaries are trying to take advantage of. Right. And what's common in both regions, let's underscore, is the tyranny of distance. We often talk about that in the Pacific, but it's also true across parts of the Arctic. It's vast and remote and a challenging theater in which to operate. And let me tell a little story about Greenland, John. Thank you for bringing it up and that you went with Secretary of State Powell so many years ago.

I made my first visit there this summer to see the melting of the vast Greenland ice sheet, which is melting at really somewhat of an alarming rate, that combined with the melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet in Antarctica, those two alone could raise global sea levels dramatically in coming decades by feet. Today we experience inches of sea level rise, and already we're having to build sea walls around the Naval Academy and Norfolk and other places along the East Coast. But the melting of those glaciers could raise sea levels even more. And then geostrategically, it's important for listeners to keep in mind, look at a map

and look where Greenland is. It's actually part of North America. It's not part of Europe in terms of its geography. So it's closer to Canada than it is to Denmark. The population of Greenland is less than 50,000. I visited the third largest town in Greenland this summer, Illulissat, with a population of less than 5,000. Now, when the new runway opens there and they nuke the capital, it will be more accessible to Americans. It's a very short flight from the US if you could fly directly, but you can't. Now you could fly through Iceland. Previously, you had to fly through Denmark, so it was actually a couple of stops. Now you fly to Reykjavik and then directly to Greenland. But it's only a three-hour time change

and there's a lot of challenges there. On the one hand, the economy, which is primarily a fishing economy and has been supported by Denmark with heavy investment and small population in vast area, is subject to encroachment for direct investment by the Chinese. We're trying to build a fort not far from America's military base in the Northwest, Tule. And fortunately, the US stepped in on that. But there are going to be similar plays by Russia, China, and others to tap into the vast resources as Greenland becomes increasingly independent and wants to, as the indigenous people, the Inuit become more capable of self-governance, which they

already have, but still the foreign policy and military affairs provided by the Danes. But it's important to wrap this into a whole NATO framework and consider the importance there and understand the important strategic and economic partnerships and economic engagement and the security context of that as the economy of Greenland will inevitably grow and diversify, but should be protected at the same time. I would just like to stress the interconnectedness of these issues and these regions, the interdependence, if you will. Rising sea levels due to Arctic melt means that an island in the Pacific may no longer exist. Tuvalu, a country most people have never heard of, a tiny, tiny

dot, even if it's on many maps. John, I'd like to turn to you and expand on the conversation we're having surrounding the changing physical landscape up north in the Arctic and Also add the landscape is changing in the human domain as well. Sherry talked about some remote communities with smaller populations So based on your experience working with remote areas such as Kai Angle or Hattobi How might climate driven migration in the Pacific region reshape local power structures and allegiances as populations move out of their traditional? region reshape local power structures and allegiances as populations move out of their traditional homelands? It's a great question. As a diplomat, 35 years, I'm always amazed at the interconnectedness of these issues

and the impact on populations, the interdependence of the globe. If you have rising sea levels because of Arctic melt, it may result in populations essentially losing their islands, losing their homeland, having to move. And I'm not exaggerating. There is a tiny place called Tuvalu. It's an independent sovereign nation, has a vote in the United Nations as a member of the Pacific Island Forum.

Only a few thousand people live there. They live around the airstrip because the airstrip takes up most of the island. Their government has already bought land in Australia, which is the closest largest landmass to Tavalu because by all predictions, by all metrics, rising sea levels will in our lifetime inundate that island to the point that it's uninhabitable. People will no longer be able to call it home. I hope that's dramatic enough for people to realize the impact of climate, the human domain,

the human dimension across the Pacific, but not just in the Pacific. But if we just talk about Palau, one again, very small part of the Pacific, 20,000 people live in Palau. Palau, though, is 300 islands. In the southernmost islands, and the southernmost is actually Helen Reef, you're closer to Jakarta than you are to Kurore, which is the largest city in Palau. These islands often have just a few families living on them, and yet they are being impacted by the same

challenges that the region is facing and what we've talked about already on the podcast. Climate change that's impacting access to fresh drinking water, which is vital for life. Illegal, unregistered, unreported fishing that's taking away their food stocks. Pollution of their pristine environment, and perhaps the only other money earner that they have is occasional tourism.

Shifting sands, because of adverse weather events, that means it's hard to build a wharf or a pier and make it therefore even more difficult to access these islands. And yet, because of where they sit in the second island chain, like Greenland and the Greenland-Iceland gap in Europe, these are highly strategic locations. If you know your history a little bit, even if you can't find them on a map, because unfortunately

some of these places are so small, they're not really printed on most maps. But if you know your history and World War II history and the Battle of Peleliu in the island of Angar and Peleliu, you will understand just how strategic these locations are. And they would be, again, in the event of conflict. And so our military needs to be able to be there, know the lay of the land and the lay of the sea, operate there, practice there, train there, exercise there. But it's challenging in the best of times.

But adding climate and environmental effects really does make our lives more difficult, obviously. And in some instances, it may make life impossible in these locations. So this really is, you know, I mentioned the mission statement from the Pacific Island Forum before, the single greatest threat to these people, but it is also a threat to the United States. And I think that's what we have to get our hands around, particularly our commanders and our political leaders, that it is in our national interest to assist these nations in regards to the environmental and climate impacts that they are facing. Because by so doing, we enable ourselves to maneuver, operate, exercise, and defend the

homeland. And we can do that by taking small steps to mitigate, to prepare for, and to build that resiliency in these small locations so that they are better prepared for future adverse climate events, which we know are coming. And so now is the time to work on this, to prepare for it. And that is in the national interest and the interest of our partners. And that cooperation will build the trust and the relationships that we need to depend on now and in the future in the event of any contingency or conflict.

Sheri, so closing on this topic centered around your book, I'd like to look to the future and ask what policy recommendations you would make to U.S. policymakers and senior military leaders for effectively addressing the effects of climate change as it relates to irregular warfare. Well, thank you, Catherine. My recommendations fall into four buckets, and I'll quickly go through each of them as it relates to irregular warfare. So first, and we've talked about it already, is improving our predictive capability for

short-term climate. And that takes the form of, I referred to earlier, like the climate dashboard that the Navy is now providing to allies and partners. And we're also sharing tools like the Defense Climate Assessment Tool that we developed in the U.S. to assess climate risks in military bases. We're also now sharing that with our allies and partners in the Pacific. So these improved climate tools, or I call it precision climate prediction, are increasingly important because just like we rely on the weather the first thing in the morning most people turn to the first thing i look at when i get to my phone in the morning what's the weather gonna be today right how do i dress how do i get ready for my day right show people need to know now not just the short term, but the near-term climate. And they need to know that whether they're fishing or farming or transportation, whatever

field you're in, and we need to know it as the military as well. So those tools are important for decision-makers at every level, and we can help with that. Second is we've got to become resilient. We're doing that on our own military bases and for our own troops in the US, but resilient to the effects of climate that's already baked in with our allies and partners. That means resilient infrastructure, also using the natural infrastructure where possible, for example, shoring up reefs, using mangroves, using nature-based solutions wherever possible, but resilience for people and infrastructure. That leads to really the third bucket, which is mitigating, okay?

We know we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions globally to deal with the climate threat, and that translates into how we use energy, okay? So when we're talking the vast Pacific region, we know that today most of the energy is still provided at fossil energy barges of probing, diesel, and other fossil fuel sources brought in by barges. But we can increasingly move to small-scale renewables, wind, solar, with better batteries across the region.

And as we provision our forces to operate that way in a contested logistics environment, we should be thinking about what are the solution sets for our allies and partners as well. And then finally, it's all about the allies and partners. It's the engagement on climate and security. So when we're thinking about what are our strategic plans, what's a tactical engagement strategy, theater engagement strategy, for example, in the Indo-Pacific. Using those engagement tools we have in the partnerships, in the J9s, for example, the partnership engagement strategies, but across all the J codes and the N codes, for example,

in the Navy, we should be thinking about what are those climate security engagement tools that we can use to strengthen our relationships with our allies in support of our joint mutual security interests. Sherry, thank you. John, in this conversation, we discuss how state and non-state actors leverage climate-related crises in their regular warfare tactics. And with that, what policies or strategies would you recommend to counter these current and future threats? Great question, Don. And it's a real challenge we see being played out in every region

of the world, particularly in the region I knew best, which is the Indo-Pacific. I'd like to build on Sherry's comments. We all know the expression that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I'm going to twist this a little bit and focus on preparedness. Preparing the ground is a well-known expression. And we have to invest. You know, we have to invest in people, in our capabilities, and most of all, in our partnerships, particularly in those nations and with those nations that are being most

directly impacted by climate and environmental change. I saw in the Pacific what works, and there's no magic solution, but there are, I think, some formula, some steps that we are taking and can continue to take to respond to this challenge. Sherry has mentioned some of them. I just want to repeat a few of them. Resilience, working on resilience in terms of our ability militarily to operate in these areas.

That means investment in our equipment and our people and our knowledge of these areas. Resilience also means, though, investing in the capability of our partners to focus on the second issue, which is mitigate. We may not be able to prevent every adverse weather event in that vast region known as the Rim of Fire or anywhere globally. But certainly we can take steps to build resilience and preparedness so that we together, the

United States and our partners, have the capability to respond to weather and environmental crises. That's all part of building the partnership, the trust that we've talked about in today's Irregular Warfare podcast, which is crucial now because as Shaili said, you can't surge it in a time of conflict. We have to build it step by step now in this period of what I describe as gray zone activity. Lastly, it's about, believe it or not, things as simple as bricks and mortar, you know, seawalls, wharfs, effective access to drinking water. We have the technology to build, to assist on infrastructure that will benefit nations, not just in the Pacific, but globally that are facing these challenges, and will benefit nations, not just in the Pacific, but globally that are facing these challenges.

And it will benefit the United States, in part by building their trust, but also, importantly, for our military, by ensuring that they can operate in these areas, have the access that's required in case of a need to move there, operate there in time of conflict. That can't happen overnight. And so my call really is, and I've said this repeatedly to anyone who visited us in Palau, is that a small amount of attention,

a small amount of investment, a small increase in capability, bit by bit, will lead to a very large dividend, not just for the United States, but for the people and the nations of the Indo-Pacific. And so my plea really is for those underserved, sometimes neglected places on a map where this challenge is very, very real, it's the single greatest threat. We need to focus on that militarily.

And I would say for the entire whole of government, our statecraft needs to take these issues into account if we are going to be the preferred partner globally. John and Sherry, thank you for coming on the Irregular Warfare Podcast. Thank you for having us. Thank you both. Thank you again for joining us on the Irregular Warfare Podcast. We release a new episode every two weeks. Our next episode will explore the role of Special Operations Forces in conflict with

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