National Intelligence Director: Global Warming = Security Threat
by David Sassoon - Jan 15th, 2008
There's a long and informative profile of National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell in the current issue of the New Yorker, in which he makes an awfully unintelligent whopper of a comment about waterboarding: that for him, because he has a deviated septum, waterboarding might qualify as torture, but not necessarily for other people. Ouch.
But more to the point of this blog, it seems he didn't get the memo about global warming from the White House. He lets the cat out of the bag with this equally notable comment:
There are national security ramifications to global warming.
The comment may seem like a no-brainer coming from a national intelligence chief, but please notice something very important.
Those eight words uttered by the man in charge of the entire US intelligence community acknowledge that global warming is a fact; that it is a fact of great significance; of so great significance that it affects national security.
The author of the profile, Lawrence Wright, asked McConnell if he believed that Al Qaeda was really the greatest threat America faces. Here's his answer, which ends with the eight words about global warming:
No, no, no, not at all. Terrorism can kill a lot of people, but it can't fundamentally challenge the ability of the nation to exist. Fascism could have done that. Communism could have. I think our issue going forward is more engagement with the world in terms of keeping it on a reasonable path, so another ism doesn't come along and drive it to one extreme or another.
And we have to have some balance in terms of equitable distribution of wealth, containment of contagious disease, access to energy supplies, and development of free markets. There are national security ramifications to global warming.
Awfully interesting, isn't it? Global warming ranks right up there with Al Qaeda in the mind of the national intelligence chief.
It would be great if he would elaborate why he thinks so. I spent some time on the web site of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and I couldn't find a single mention of global warming. You'd think it would have its own heading.
Last year, a group of retired three- and four-star generals and admirals issued a report: National Security and the Threat of Climate Change. The very first recommendation from this group of distinguished former Cold Warriors? Integrate the national security consequences of climate change into national security and national defense strategies.
Mike McConnell is in an awfully privileged position to do so. Six mornings a week, he climbs into a dark, armoured Suburban at 6 a.m. and rides to the White House. Sometime between 7:30 and 8:00 am, he provides a briefing that can last up to an hour. In attendance? Usually, it's Bush, Cheney, Joshua Bolten (chief of staff) and Stephen Hadley (national security advisor).
By 9:30, McConnell is on his way to his office at Bolling Air Force Base. What are the chances that he discussed global warming this morning?
Last December, McConnell published an op-ed in the New York Times, pleading for broad powers of unchecked surveillance unprecedented in American history. His piece is headlined Help Me Spy on Al Qaeda.
We've got a better idea, Mr. McConnell.
Help us solve climate.
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