A NEW CONCEPT AND CONCERN FOR NATIONAL AND GLOBAL SECURITY: ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY

 

 

 

 

 

Prof. Dr Firuz Demir Yasamis

 

American University in the Emirates

College of Mass Media and Communication

Director of Master of Arts Program in Diplomacy

 

 

 

 

 

November, 2012

Dubai, UAE

INTRODUCTION

When one begins to talk about security the first image and concept comes to the minds of so many people is the imminent danger of war, coercion, military clashes, belligerent activities or even a nuclear war. However, the days we are living in are witnessing several other formats of security concepts such as poverty, natural disasters, narcotics, genocides, ethnic cleansing, terrorism of anti-state or state based, energy deficit, food inadequacy (Canada 2005) even malnutrition and droughts which are quite different from the militaristic issues but, as far as the consequences are concerned, there is no difference between them at all. In this paper a very real and also very significant security issue will be analyzed: environmental and ecological security of the nations and even the Globe on which we are living.

This article is about the national security. Therefore, at the very beginning the meaning of the national security must be explained and defined. The national security is basically and traditionally tied to the concept of sovereignty and independence. Any act threatening the sovereignty and independence of any State is a national security issue for the concerned countries. Typically threats of war, belligerence, violence and assaults and use of coercion are in this category. These kinds of threats should be averted by the necessary steps to be taken otherwise large scale losses of lives, territory, economic and material wealth will be inevitable. When taken from this point of view, there are so many other activities in the real life other than the war that could cause same types of losses and even more than wars. Poverty, hunger, control over natural resources including oil and natural gas, hurricanes, melting polar caps, rising level of sea water, floods, nuclear accidents and so many others may cause the emergence of similar consequences. Since the consequences are similar to the threats against sovereignty and independence, these issues should also be accepted as national security concerns. Wherever the threats would come from either military or non-military sources the human security will be at stake. And, since the human beings are the most valuable item to be protected by the states against every kind of danger then the national security concept should also encompass the human security meaning that human welfare and well being is the ultimate objective of the national security concerns. This, if accepted, takes us to a new definition of national security concept. This paper aims at taking the attention of concerned circles to the non-military and basically environmental and ecological aspects of the national security.

 

There are dozens of case studies today in the World to prove the importance of scarce resources and environmental matters on security issues. In order to indicate the significance of the ecological and environmental security issues some of these cases will be briefly analyzed in the paper. These cases include the “Transboundary Water Problems between Turkey and Syria” which will also help to explain the current crisis between these two neighboring countries, the “Aral Sea” which explains the rivalry between the economic ambition and preservation of natural resources for future generations, the “Global Warming” and “Climate Change” which is currently being observed all over the World, the cases of “Chernobyl, Fukushima and Bhopal” which underlines the significance of nuclear and toxic chemicals and lastly “Biodiversity Loss and Desertification” which points out the extinctions of rare species including soil resources.

 

 

TRANSBOUNDARY WATERS: SYRIA AND TURKEY

Euphrates and Tigris are the major rivers in the south eastern Turkey. For centuries these rivers provided water and fertility to both Anatolia and further down to the territories of the Basra Gulf. In 70s, Turkey has decided to control the waters of these rivers and use them for hydro electric power generation and agricultural irrigation. Both objectives are logically in harmony with the overall esteems of a developing country to provide leverage for national and regional development. The expected outturn was great and Turkey has realized a big leap forward so far in terms of electricity production and diversifying and increasing the agricultural production in the region thus helping to alleviate the pains caused by high rate of unemployment and low level per capita income.

Since 1985, a very high rate of (56.4%) financial investment has been incurred for the Project called as “South Eastern Turkey Regional Development Plan” (GAP). This ratio has gone up to 83 percent for energy and 24.5 percent for agriculture. So far, eight hydroelectric power plants have been completed such as Karakaya, Ataturk, Dicle, Kralkizi, Birecik, Karkamis and Batman. This comprises 47 percent of total hydro electric power production in Turkey.  When thermo electric power and wind energy are taken into consideration the ratio of GAP Region electricity production is 11.6 per cent of the total production.

Although irrigation in the Harran Plain has begun in 1995, a lot more has to be done to complete the Project. Out of total 1.7 million hectare area to be irrigated, so far only 15 percent has been irrigated at the moment. Number of persons working in the agriculture is diminishing and the number of persons working in industry and service sector is increasing.

However, these economic and infrastructural developments in south eastern region of Turkey has culminated different reactions in the neighboring and adversely affected countries namely Iraq and especially Syria under the President Hafiz Asaad. Syria has claimed rights over the waters of incoming rivers and diplomatically complained that the developments in Turkey will be detrimental for the economic interest of Syria. These reactions did not create any favorable result for Syria and Turkey continued on her path for regional social and economic development for the south eastern part of the Country.

These years also coincide with the years of establishment of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) which aims at autonomy if not independence for the same region through armed struggle against the Government in Ankara. President Hafiz Asaad has decided to use PKK factor to defend his causes over the transboundary waters to further strengthen his position against Turkey and opened a refuge for and provided support to the Kurdish armed separatist in northern Syria and also established a base for them for their assaults to the targets in Turkey.

Turkey and Syria has a very long border of more than 1.100 kilometer which is very difficult to control in every segment of the border. The PKK has utilized this opportunity gifted by Hafiz Asaad and kept on aggressive activities against Turkey for decades.

Hafiz Assad’s strategy to use an insurgent group against Turkey has been labeled as a hostile, unfriendly and non-neighborly policy by the Turkish officials and as a final step a four star army general was sent to the Syrian border to warn Hafiz Asaad and threaten him with a large scale military operation to capture the PKK leader. Such a military action has been prevented by the expulsion of Abdullah Ocalan, the founder and the leader of PKK from Syria and his eventual capture by the US intelligence service and handing him over Turkey.

As has been explained above, the real reason of the tension between Turkey and Syria was the waters of both Tigris and Euphrates. This issue had brought these countries to the brinks of a war and may help to explain the current status of relations between these two neighboring countries despite a common religion and common cultural and historical past.  The conflict is still not resolved and relations between Turkey and Syria can be named as severe as possible. No prospective and good neighborly relation is expected for the near and medium term future.

So, it is possible to state that the water shortage or lack of water can become a very solid reason for animosities, rivalries and military confrontation amongst the States.

Since 1984, the date of serious PKK revolt in the region around 40.000 people died and billions of dollars has been spent for armament, military equipment and compensations of civilian losses. This has become the basic reason for the low level realization of GAP Project objectives.

Similar events are taking place all over the World simultaneously. According to the recent report prepared by UNEP (UNEP 1999) experts, 47 different cases of water related international disputes have been spotted in recent decades. The countries involved are numerous:  Angola, Argentina, Bangladesh, Botswana, Brazil, Cambodia, Chad, China, Czechoslovakia, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Ethiopia, Honduras, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya,  Laos, Libya, Mauritania, Mexico, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, Turkmenistan, United States,  Uzbekistan and Vietnam.

According to the same report the key environmental factors leading to crisis and their numbers are given below: agricultural pollution (2),  over pumping of aquifers (4), cropland scarcity, dam construction (2), deforestation (9), desertification (3), diversion (5), drainage, ecological degradation of land, flooding (4), inappropriate cultivation practices, Industrial pollution, irrigation, overfishing, over-grazing of bush,

pollution (3), pollution from oil exploration, mine tailings, resource extraction, salinity (3), scarcity, shrinking sea, water siltation (2), soil degradation and erosion (9), toxic contamination, water allocation, water flow (9), water pollution (2), water rights and water supply (3).

 

 Same report identifies the key social and economic factors causing international frictions as follows:  agricultural decline, agricultural land scarcity, competition for resources (2), declining agricultural output, ecological and social marginalization, economic decline (5), fundamentalism, health problems, increased competition for scarce resources (3), increased opportunities for uprising, increased relative deprivation of peasants, loss of legitimacy by Palestinian Authority, marginalization, mobilization of marginalized people (2), migration (9), perceived lack of economic benefits (2), poverty (3), reduction of agricultural land, relative deprivation, resentment for over pollution from mine (2), shifts in political power, uneven distribution of benefits from resource extraction.

 

The nature of the international conflict, according to the report, ranges from war to anti-government campaign (3), ethnic and group conflict (9), group rebellion and uprising (2), group-government conflict, group-state conflict, military confrontations (2), protracted confrontations and urban group conflicts.

The report, as an example, also indicates the logical flow of events leading to conflict as follows:

Water Pollution

 

Soil Erosion

 

Deforestation

 

Water Scarcity

 

Agricultural Land Scarcity

 

Uneven Distribution of Land Resources

 

Reduced Agricultural Output

 

Economic Decline

 

Decreased State Capacity

 

Rural-Urban Migration

 

Urban Decay

 

Appropriation of Remaining Fertile Land by Owning Classes

 

Appropriation of Urban Amenities by Wealthy Classes

 

Deepening of Ethnic Cleavages

 

CONFLICT

 

The case of water sufficiently proves that scarcity of ecological and environmental resources and their uneven distribution are the sources of security concerns for the people and for the states.

 

Even one more serious concern should be emphasized before ending this section: the possibility of contamination of water reservoirs with nuclear or toxic chemicals. (Parthemore 2010) It is largely feared that this possibility is always considered by terrorist organizations and the rival states during military confrontations. Such environmental and health problems are certainly national security issues which require and even mandate the armed forces of any State must be ready to deal with. (ENVSEC 2002)

 

It is quite visible that the military would be heavily dependent upon the cooperation and collaboration with the civilian institutions thus paving the way for a better cooperation (ENVSEC 2009) between the armed forces and civilian institutions in every country.

 

 

THE ARAL SEA CASE: A DISSAPPEARING GIANT SOURCE OF WEALTH AND LIFE SUPPORTING SYSTEM

 

Aslov, in his paper (Aslov 2004) to workshop in The Hague describes the situation of the Sea of Aral as follows: “Until 1960, Aral Sea covered an area of about 66,000 square km and had volume of more than 1,000 billion cubic meters (BCM). The inflow from Amy Darya and Syr Darya is about 120 BCM annually, precipitation is about 6 BCM and groundwater is about 5 BCM. Evaporation from the surface of the Aral Sea is about 63 BCM annually. With these inflows and outflows the level of Sea was stable between 50 to 53 m (Baltic Sea system). 1960-90 water use mostly for irrigation in the basin increased from 63 BCM to 117 BCM what leaded to declining of the inflow to 9 – 12 BCM by 1990 and 2-3 BCM by 2003. Sea level dropped by 23 m to current level of 31 m and lost more than 70 % of the sea’s area. Expansion of irrigation, associated with the diversion of river water from the Aral Sea, since the late 20th century and, in particular, in the years between 1950 and 1990 when the irrigated area almost doubled to 8 million ha, created serious environmental problems”.

 

Upon the dissolution of the Soviet Union (SU) the emerging lack of power to control the allocation of water rights amongst the newly independent states (NIS) has resulted in an environmental calamity. Since the main income sources of the region’s NIS is agriculture and productivity in agriculture depends on irrigation all these states were extremely eager to use the water of the Aral Sea for irrigation schemes especially for cotton production.  (ENVSEC 2009)

 

The Aral Sea Basin is a closed drainage system. The Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers are discharging their waters into the Aral Sea. Most of the irrigation water is pumped from these rivers and major portion of used water is not returning back to the reservoirs and the minimal amount of returning water is containing excessive amount of agricultural (fertilizers and insecticides) chemicals thus polluting the Aral Sea considerably. (Granit 2010)The resultant unsustainable use of water is causing ecological, hydrologic and environmental damages.

 

In addition to irrigation, several countries taking place in the region have constructed dams for hydro electric power thus further diminishing the water reaching the Aral Sea. (Gleick 1993)

 

These economic activities have caused detrimental and irretrievable impacts on the Aral Sea. Since the dissolution of the SU, the Aral Sea which was the fourth largest lake in the World has been downsized somewhat by 80 percent. Today this lake is virtually eradicated and disappeared as a result of harmful human activities.  

 

Another report (Bigas 2012) prepared for the Aral Sea concludes as follows: “The shrinking Aral Sea in Central Asia is one of the best recognized examples of this crisis and competition. Once the world’s fourth largest inland body of water, the Aral Sea has lost 80% of its water since the rivers that feed it, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, were diverted to provide irrigation water for a burgeoning cotton industry. Where there was once a thriving, productive ecosystem that supported prosperous fishing livelihoods, there is now a parched inland seabed dotted with rotting and rusting ships”.

 

The disappearance of the Aral Sea did not only create environmental and ecological losses but also caused economic losses for the people living around the Aral Sea. Before 1980, the Uzbekistan one of ex-Soviet state, taking place in the region, had a very large fishing fleet and industry providing a powerful economic base for the surrounding cities and industries in the region. As a result of the pollutants the chemical and physical characteristics of the water changed and fishing was not possible anymore in the Aral Sea. This caused then loss of 60.000 jobs in the region.

 

In addition to the economic losses, an incredible amount of ecologic and environmental degradation took place n the region such as loss of very big water reservoir as wetland and home for wild animals. (Schwartz 1999) Increasing level of drought and desertification and loss of some species should be added to the list of unwanted outcomes.

 

The Aral Sea case is described by Mosello (2006) very effectively: “The 2006 UNDP Human Development Report contends that ‘one problem with the polarized debate generated by the water war rhetoric is that it has diverted attention from more pressing and more relevant human security concerns’. Indeed, the human dimension is fundamental when speaking about water-related issues, as ‘water is not necessary for life, it is life. In this sense, water sharing should never be understood as a zero-sum game, in which one country’s gain is another’s loss. Just as interdependence through trade can expand the economic benefits for all, so can cooperative interdependence in water. However, the opposite is also true. Where cooperation fails to develop or breaks down, all countries stand to lose: social and ecological disasters are the inevitable consequences of this scenario. The case of the Aral Sea is the most visible and dramatic example of non-cooperation over water resource management”.

 

The tragedy of the Aral Sea certainly adds four new concepts into security literature: biodiversity security, water security, food security and human security.

 

GLOBAL WARMING AND CLIMATE CHANGE

 

Dr. Pumphrey (2008) summarizes the relation between global warming and the security as follows: “Interest in climate change as a national security issue developed even later. Although the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) did commission a study to look into the security implications of climate change in the late 1970s, the issue had little resonance until the late 1990s when the Senate Armed Services Committee declared that environmental destruction, including global warming, was ‘a growing national security threat’. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was created in 1995 in part to allay fears. And then, in 2003, the rather notorious report commissioned by the Pentagon, ‘An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and its Implications for United States National Security’, provided a worst-case scenario, which suggested that climate change might have a catastrophic impact, leading to rioting and nuclear war”.

 

However, despite this bare fact, the number of States which classifies the environment as a national security concern is rather limited. Even the USA has just begun to incorporate the environment as a national security issue in her legislation. (Chalecki 1988)

 

Another critical question remains here to be answered is whether the environment is a national security concern or not and, if it so, which organizations and/or institutions would be responsible to take remedial and mitigation actions to alleviate the pains of ecological and environmental harms. (Pumhtrey 2008). In other words would it be armed forces or other civilian organizations to be responsible in dealing with the problem and the consequences.

 

The second critical issue is related to the concept of environment. By definition environment is a very wide concept covering almost every aspect of the life. Then question becomes whether all the areas of environment will be accepted as national security concern or a restricted portion of it. Therefore, both of the concepts of `national security` and `environment` should be redefined taking into consideration the impacts of both on present and future generations.

 

Another issue to be resolved is where the environmental and ecological problem is taking place and where the people concerned with it are living in. In most of the cases the people living next to problem are not aware of the significance of impacts such as the case of South America tropical forests loss on climate change and the case of industrial pollution of Northern UK and the impact of acid rain in Scandinavian countries.  That further complicates the ways and means of dealing the problem and its consequences.

 

However, since these questions are related to the practicalities of the issue, redefinition of these concepts will not be attempted in this paper. Whatever the answers would be to the above mentioned issues there is no doubt that traditional security experts and advisors will have some new members in the team experienced in environmental and ecological matters. Parallel to this, the military will have to cooperate and collaborate with non-military organizations to avert the future environmental crisis.

 

People and societies are taking lessons from the disaster as in the case of 9/11 terrorist attack on twin towers in New York. Before 9/11, it was very difficult to include environmental and ecological concerns in the security legislation. Now it is observed that the US began to make alterations in several environmental legislations to include the national security issues. However, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the US while is becoming more responsible for national security issues it is not possible to say that US Department of Defense (DOD) is becoming more environmentally oriented in terms of legislations. “Although the needs of national security and aims of environmental regulation have often been at odds, the paradigm shift that occurred in the years since September 11 has changed the relationship between national defense and the environment. Environmental regulations may properly be considered part of the homeland security landscape, and lawmakers can look to past experiences with environmental regulation to create better homeland security policies.”

 

Although it has been theoretically discussed for more than 100 years now, the global warming has recently begun to be taken into consideration seriously. Briefly speaking, the global warming is a result of fossil fuels burned for heating, transportation and energy production. As a result of the combustion process in addition to the release of energy, several gaseous (COx, SOx, NOx, HC) and particulate materials known as greenhouse gases are released into the environment. These materials are forming an artificial barrier between the sun and the earth thus affecting the passage of x-rays from the sun onto the earth surface. Some portion of the x-rays is being absorbed by the terrain, some portion is reflected back into the atmosphere and some portion is being trapped by the artificial barrier created by the greenhouse gases. Consequently the temperature of the surface is increasing more than used to be leading the way for more evaporation, melting polar and mountain ice caps, increasing level of sea water, increasing amount of humidity, changing patterns of winds and so many other meteorological parameters.

 

Impacts are now visible as in the cases of Superstorm Sandy and Katrina in the USA, in Cuba and in Caribbean countries. Highest temperature records are all broken in the last decades in every country. The nature and characteristics of major meteorological events such as excessive and/or lack of precipitation, increasing velocity of storms, increasing episodes of floods, inundations and landslides are changing.

 

The irreversible and immitigable impacts of global warming can be seen on water resources, urban infrastructure, erosion, agricultural activities, sea level rise, electricity outage, demolished houses, biodiversity loss, air quality reduction, wetlands, human lives, human health, economy, public transportation and metro and all social services.  An example of this is lived in the hurricane Sandy in 2012 October in New York and New Jersey just 7 years after the tropical storm Katrina in New Orleans which took place in 2005.  Katrina has been labeled as the costliest natural disaster in history. The cost of Katrina was 81 billion US dollar and the cost of Superstorm Sandy is expected to be around 55 billion US dollars. As a result of Katrina 1.800 people died and Sandy cost 55 lives. These costs are comparable to the classic national security cases such as wars, rebellions, sabotages and suicides. The physical damage of 9/11 was 55 billion US dollar and over 3.000 people lost their lives in the biggest terrorist event seen in the history. Superstorm Sandy devastated the shore of the City of New York and had detrimental effects in public transportation including freeways, tunnels and subway systems. Same should be expected as an outcome of sea level rise in Manhattan if the level of sea increases by 1 meter caused by global warming, melting polar ices and increasing sea level. In Egypt, the fertile agricultural land in front of the Aswan Dam which produces almost all of agricultural output will surrender to the salty sea water thus causing an alarming economic devastation. Furthermore, more than half of the World population of 7 billion which is currently living in coastal areas will be affected socially and economically to a very large extent.

 

However, as a final evaluation, it is generally accepted that the climate which was slowly changed in the past, is now changing drastically and will be even more drastically changing in the future if necessary steps not to be taken in time by the human beings. Tackling the problem will require a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to curb the effects of climate change and also an increase in the use of alternative energy sources. The climate change can threaten national security of every State.  Katrina and Superstorm Sandy are good examples to indicate the size of the threats possible. However, the solution is not as easy as it seems to be. The cost of compliance is very heavy for those countries where the industry is old and outmoded and rehabilitation is beyond the capacity of concerned countries.

 

The armed forces should begin to take steps on its own to prevent climate change and mitigation measures. This may range from diminishing operational readiness to increasing the capacity for humanitarian assistance. However, the armed forces alone cannot resolve the problem. There is a need for accelerated cooperation and collaboration amongst the related institutions. There is no doubt that the armed forces should incorporate climate change issues to their strategic and tactical planning processes.

 

What is not comprehensively agreed upon yet is related to what constitutes the climate change and the boundaries, concepts and relationships amongst its subcomponents. The second issue related to disagreement is the level of urgency and priority of climate change compared to other issues of national security. Although it is generally accepted that the military forces and perhaps other security forces should collaborate on global warming and climate issues it is not known whether this is shared and committed by all segments of the armed forces or not.

 

To conclude this section I would like to refer to a very recent official document which has been published by the Defense Science Board of the USA on October 4, 2011 titled as “Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Trends and Implications of Climate Change on National and International Security”.  In his submission letter Dr. Paul G. Kaminski, the Chairman, summarizes the findings of the Committee as follows:  “…The report offers important considerations for the Department of Defense related to this subject. The task force examined the implications of climate change from a global perspective, with a special focus on the African continent, and makes recommendations that can improve the U.S. approach to addressing the many challenges of climate change. First, they identified a need for a strong climate information system database, managed by the Department of Defense. Second, the task force recommends a whole of government approach to mitigating the effects of climate change and highlights the importance of engaging with international leaders in identifying global solutions. Climate change will only grow in concern for the United States and its security interests. This report offers guidance to the Department of Defense on how to become a leader in mitigating and adapting to its growing effects…”

 

With this report the USA openly accepts that climate is a growing national and international security interest for all States in the World. According to the report, the challenges associated with the climate change can be classified as: “Population support system resiliency (water and food security, health, energy), human security (population dislocation, armed conflict), political continuity (continuity of governance), economic viability”. The report concludes that “…this is a challenge that cannot be ‘solved’. Instead, it must be managed for the long term”.  [1]

 

 

NATURAL RESOURCES, BIODIVERSITY AND NATIONAL SECURITY: NATURAL SECURITY

 

There are some distinct features of the natural life for the last several decades which are rather different from the previous life patterns in the nature. The extinction of rare species has gained continuity and therefore the Globe is under a big threat. As the losses in biodiversity increase some certain failures are observed in the ecological systems. Some of the extinction of species dates back to 500 million years on this Globe. The biological heritage of the mankind is rapidly decreasing. The rate of extinction is 10 times higher than the past. Even the present rate is halved the rate of extinction will be bigger than the rate at the beginning of the last Century. The population of rare species is continuously decreasing and several decades later it will be impossible to sustain these species.(Kirchner 1980)

 

However the human kind is dependent of the services provided by the ecosystems. According to the WHO the number of those without safe drinking water was 1.7 billion in the year 2000 comprising the 28 per cent of the World population. The number of people died because of polluted water, bad hygiene and non-descent housing conditions was 5 million. The rate of untreated discharged water into the water bodies such as rivers, lakes and shores in the developing countries at the same year calculated to be 90 percent causing widespread diseases such as diarrhea, ascariasis, dracunculiasis, hookworm, schistosomiasis and trachoma. (WHO 1996 and WRI et al. 1996:21) However, in 1997, the whole World spent 42 billion US dollar to bottled drinking water. (Beverage Industry 1999) Even in 1996 the US consumers spent 1.4 billion dollar for home water treatment systems.  (Trust for Public Land 1997:24) The people in Jakarta, Indonesia has spent 52 million US dollar (in 1987 prices) per year on kerosene to boil the unhygienic city water sterilization. (Bhatia and Falkenmark 1993:9) According to UNEP the cost of sea water treatment for domestic use is 1.00 - 1.50 US dollar/m3.  (UNEP 1999:166)

 

Despite these expenditures the ecosystems are providing so many amenities with no charge. Wetlands are treating the polluted waste water in urban areas. The value of this service provided by the 5.5 kilometer long wetland system in the USA (Alchovy River, Georgia) is calculated to be around 3 million US dollar per year. (Lerner and Poole 1999:41)

 

The basic results of ecosystem failures are reflecting themselves as floods, drought and desertification, loss of species, hunger and collapse of natural balance, local climate changes, degradation of forests and forest fires, single crop production, accumulation of chemicals, wind, water and coastal erosion.

 

So, what is needed is the definition of individual genetic code of organisms, protection of landscape diversity and establishing and maintaining the procedures for biodiversity management. (Philippe 2001)

 

Beginning with the 70s, several reports have been published for the World audience stating that if public policies unchanged through the end of the Century a number of serious World problems will become worse. The World population reached to 6.4 in 2000 and 7 billion in 2012 which was only 4 billion in the seventies. The GNP will still be low in developing countries in the near future. The food problem will be unsolved in developing countries, irrational distribution of fossil fuels will continue and there will be more pollution.

 

In 1980, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) has published a Report again stating that the Earth has a limited supply of natural resources and the decay of nature and environment is a great threat.

 

In 1987 a very famous UN Report, “Our Common Feature” was published. It is plainly stated in the Report that the wealth in the World increased but unequally distributed. The Report developed the concept of sustainable development which means to ensure that the development goals meet the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations’ to meet their own.

 

In 1976, another very striking Report has been published by the Club of Rome based upon dynamic systems theory titled as “The Limits to Growth”.  The Report announced the findings as follows: “Our conclusions are: If the present growth trends in world population, industrialization, pollution, food production, and resource depletion continue unchanged, the limits to growth on this planet will be reached sometime within the next one hundred years. The most probable result will be a rather sudden and uncontrollable decline in both population and industrial capacity.  It is possible to alter these growth trends and to establish a condition of ecological and economic stability that is sustainable far into the future. The state of global equilibrium could be designed so that the basic material needs of each person on earth are satisfied and each person has an equal opportunity to realize his individual human potential. The behavior mode of the system is that of overshoot and collapse. In this run the collapse occurs because of nonrenewable resource depletion. The industrial capital stock grows to a level that requires an enormous input of resources. In the very process of that growth it depletes a large fraction of the resource reserves available. As resource prices rise and mines are depleted, more and more capital must be used for obtaining resources, leaving less to be invested for future growth.  Finally investment cannot keep up with depreciation, and the industrial base collapses, taking with it the service and agricultural systems, which have become dependent on industrial inputs (such as fertilizers, pesticides, hospital laboratories, computers, and especially energy for mechanization). For a short time the situation is especially serious because population, with the delays inherent in the age structure and the process of social adjustment, keeps rising.  Population finally decreases when the death rate is driven upward by lack of food and health services.  The exact timing of these events is not meaningful, given the great uiaggregation and many uncertainties in the model. It is significant; however, that growth is stopped well before the year 2100. We have tried in every doubtful case to make the most optimistic estimate of unknown quantities, and we have also ignored discontinuous events such as wars or epidemics, which might act to bring an end to growth even sooner than our model would indicate.  In other words, the model is biased to allow growth to continue longer than it probably can continue in the real world. We can thus say with some confidence that, under the assumption of no major change in the present system, population and industrial growth will certainly stop within the next century, at the latest.”

 

The authors of “The Limits to Growth” have repeated their study almost 20 years later in 1991, and showed that “the world has already overshot some of its limits and, if present trends continue, we face the prospect of a global collapse –perhaps within the lifetimes of children alive today”. 

 

Therefore the natural security concept has found a very strong basis in the security literature. A recently published report titled as “Sustaining Security: How Natural Resources Influence National Security”  [2] explains the concept of natural security as follows: “The security of nations depends increasingly on the security of natural resources, or ‘natural security’. Local communities, as well as the economies of key nations and critical regions, rely on the availability of potable water, arable land, fish stocks, biodiversity, energy, minerals and other renewable and nonrenewable resources to meet the rising expectations of a growing world population. Natural resources contribute directly to the economic development and stability of countries; hundreds of millions of people depend directly on agriculture, fishing and other resources for their livelihoods. Reliable and sustainable supplies of natural resources are by no means assured. As population growth continues to rise and more nations continue down the path to development, natural resources are likely to come under increasingly severe strain, and this strain can harm economies and individuals. Much of the world’s population depends directly on natural resources for its livelihood. Today almost 70 percent of the world’s poor live in rural areas that depend on agriculture. About 30 percent of the world’s population uses fuel wood or other natural biomass as their main source of energy. These pressures can lead to instability and conflict if not addressed and abated… The national security community is not yet well attuned to these challenges.”

 

A similar concern has been voiced in another report by Jeffrey A. McNeely of IUCN for the tropical forests: “As one of the world’s last remaining strongholds of unexploited resources, tropical forests often serve as a point of contention as they become the focus of social, ecological, political and economic changes. Poor management of forest resources and the absence of an established set of equitable sharing principles among contending parties lead to shifts in resource access and control. Resulting tensions and grievances can lead to armed conflict and even war. Many governments have contributed to conflict by nationalizing their forests, so that traditional forest inhabitants have been disenfranchised while national governments sell trees to concessionaires to earn foreign exchange. Biodiversity-rich tropical forests in Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Indochina, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Central Africa, the Amazon, Colombia, Central America and New Caledonia have all been the sites of armed conflict, sometimes involving international forces. While these conflicts have frequently, even invariably, caused negative impacts on biodiversity, peace is often even worse, as it enables forest exploitation to operate with impunity. Because many of the remaining tropical forests are along international borders, international cooperation is required for their conservation; as a response, the concept of international “peace parks” is being promoted in many parts of the world as a way of linking biodiversity conservation with national security. The Convention on Biological Diversity, which entered into force at the end of 1993 and now has nearly 180 State Parties, offers a useful framework for such cooperation.” [3]

 

However it should not also be neglected that the armed forces can be a very serious source of pollution the following remarks of Wheeler [4] is of importance: “Pollution is another area in which environmental concerns and national security intersect. National defense is one of the largest causes of pollution in this country. Eighty percent of federal Superfund sites are controlled by the Department of Defense (DOD). The Navy alone produces thirty-five million pounds of hazardous wastes each year, and in 1981, the military produced 92,000 metric tons of hazardous waste. Environmental legislation designed to protect public health and safety is equally as critical when applied to these defense activities as it is when applied to private industry”.

 

It should also be elaborated that the natural richness is always very attractive to others who do not have it or for those who intend to have a share in it thus causing use of threat and even coercion, wars, political destabilization attempts, occupation and exploitation. Sudan is a good example of it. A very poor in terms of per capita income but rich in terms of oil and other natural resources such as aluminum and copper and strategically located in the Central Africa on the route of south to north and east to west trade routes of the Continent, Sudan, all of a sudden has been divided into two states -North and South- along the basis of religious differentiation. It is apparent that some powerful states have some intentions to control this richness and division of the state of Sudan would not have been possible without external interventions. The following is taken from a Report submitted to US Congress: [5] “Revenues from Sudan’s oil reserves, which were discovered in 1978 and are largely concentrated in the south, primarily benefitted the north, in particular state elites in Khartoum. Oil money also financed the government’s countering of domestic insurgencies with force—first in the south, and then also in the west and east. Sudan’s counter-insurgency campaigns did not discriminate between fighters and civilians and the government repeatedly questioned the neutrality of international aid agencies and restricted their access to affected populations. The rebel groups persisted, and among them the SPLA was the most successful in gaining ground against the more heavily armed Sudanese military. The SPLA faced internal divisions in the 1990s, largely along ethnic lines, that Khartoum fueled these splits by financing and arming from breakaway factions. Along the north-south border, Khartoum also used its oil revenues to finance local Arab militias, collectively referred to as the Popular Defense Forces (PDF), as a front line against the south. Civil war took the heaviest toll on the south—more than two million deaths; massive, long-term displacement; and decades of suspended development—but it also came at a significant cost to Khartoum. By 2002, as the government and the SPLM prepared to sign the first in a series of accords that would end the war three years later, another armed uprising was brewing, in Darfur. In response, as it had done with the PDF, Khartoum trained and armed local Arab militia, often referred to as the Janjaweed. The secession of South Sudan was a major financial blow to Sudan, which lost 75% of its five billion barrels of known oil reserves. Throughout the war, the south received little benefit from its oil resources, which were controlled by Khartoum. From 2005 to 2011 revenues derived from southern oil were to be split evenly between north and south. Prior to separation, when the revenue sharing arrangement expired, oil represented 90% of Sudan’s export earnings and 60% of government revenues. Once oil revenues began to accrue to Juba under the CPA, they comprised 98% of the south’s total revenues. When the land-locked south became independent, it remained reliant on northern infrastructure to export its oil, which was pumped through pipelines to the northern city of Port Sudan on the Red Sea for refining and export.”

 

This analysis reveals two important conclusions: natural resources can be very significant issue for the national security including the division of the country and natural resources can attract the ambition and desires of others thus paving the way of losing sovereignty and control over some parts of the territory.

Another very vivid example is the island dispute between China and Japan. The disputed islands known in Chinese as the ‘Diaoyu’ and as the ‘Senkaku’ in Japanese have rich fish stocks as well as gas-drilling projects. Therefore both countries like to control the area and claim sovereignty over the islands.  Furthermore, Japan is very much concerned with the military ambitions of China and her penetration into the new areas in the disputed waters where energy sources are seemingly rich. (Lohmeyer 2008) If China starts drilling activities in the region Japan will reciprocate immediately thus heightening the tension to a worrying level including the possibility of military clash. The relations between these two countries are suspended at the moment.  Japanese companies with huge investments in China are now considering moving out of China to other destinations in the region.

Natural gas issue is also a big source of conflict between Turkey and Greece including Israel. The Greek Cypriots have signed an agreement with Israel for the exploration and utilization of natural gas in the Mediterranean. The Turkish government immediately responded with a similar counter approach and sent a gas exploration ship to the same area. Israel, the third party in the dispute, offered military assistance to Greek Cypriots. Turkey has responded by sending aircrafts to monitor the same area. Once the restraint and control which is now prevailing in the area is lost Turkey, Greece, Israel, Greek side of Cyprus and the Turkish side of Cyprus will find themselves in the middle of military confrontations.

The international disputes over the natural resources are not only related to the sovereignty and/or property rights but also to the techniques applied for the harvesting as in the case between the USA and Mexico for tuna fishing. In the Pacific Ocean, tuna fish often swims under dolphins. Tuna is harvested with nets and most of the time so the dolphins. However, dolphins caught in the net die if they are not released by the fishermen. The US Marine Mammal Protection Act in order to protect dolphins has developed some standards (dolphin safe label) for their fleets which also apply to those countries which are exporting tuna fish to the USA.  The USA rejects through applying embargo the imported item if it is thought to be caught against the standards not to the country of export but also to the ‘intermediary’ countries. Same sanction has been applied to Mexico as the exporting country and to Costa Rica, Italy, Japan and several other countries as intermediary. Under the GATT system Mexico complained about the US attitude and filed a case against this county. Subsequently, a GATT panel was formed and panel decided that application of the embargo by the US is wrong. The panel decided that the US cannot apply embargo because the product is harvested against the US standards but is compatible with the catching countries’ standards. However, panel decided that it is legal for the US if she thinks that quality of the imported item is not acceptable according to the US standards. As it is seen clearly in the example, even the process of harvesting a natural resource can be an issue in international relations. In July 2011, this time the World Trade Organization once again concluded that Mexico is right in her case against the USA in the case which started in 1991.

 

NUCLEAR AND TOXIC CHEMICALS: CHERNOBYL, FUKUSHIMA AND BHOPAL

 

Chernobyl. Russian engineers and scientists began a test on the cooling capability of Chernobyl nuclear power plant reactor number 4 in a case of emergency from a controlling room in Moscow through remote controlling and directing system on April 25, 1986. Scientists in Moscow decided to measure the impacts of diesel generators for the coolant pumps in case of external power outage.  Experimentation was not successful and turned into a historical tragedy when the scientist in Moscow was not able to control the complex system in Chernobyl. The resulting temperature was more than 2000 degree Celsius and there is no material in the world that cannot melt at this temperature. Consequently, fuel rods melted and ignited and the roof destructed releasing considerable amount of radiation into the atmosphere.  Radioactive clouds reached to Finland, Scandinavia and Belgium between April 27-30, to eastern and central Europe, southern Germany, Italy, Yugoslavia, Ukraine and  Turkey (Black Sea) between28 April - 2 May, to the Balkans, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey (Thrace) between May 1-4 and to Turkey after May 2.  Almost 4.200 tons of lead and sand are dropped on the nuclear reactor till May 5 and on May 6 the fire is brought under control.

Many people died. Many people physically disabled. Many people exposed to radiation. Homes were disappeared. Families left their homes as new environmental refugees (Boano 2007) and Chernobyl and surrounding area turned into a ghost town. Children are exposed to radiation causing cancer and mutation.  A geographical area in a radius of 30 kilometer around the nuclear power plant was proclaimed to be a “death zone” and the surrounding territories (total 160.000 km2 area) of Belarus, Ukraine and European Russia as contaminated territory. Altogether 9 million people are affected and 400.000 people lost their houses and properties. Later, changing wind patterns spread the radioactive cloud all over Europe.

It is known that a high dose radiation will breakdown the immune system immediately causing uncontrollable bleeding and anemia, damaging gastrointestinal tract, harming internal organs and the central nervous system and producing tumors as a long-term effect. Even a low level radiation can cause cancer. Some newer studies also revealed that low level radiation can lead to genome instabilities, mutations of DNA, malformations and increased cell aging.  A working group of the WHO calculated 50.000 cases of thyroid cancer within the next 30-50 years amongst children 0-4 years of age at the time of the accident will take place. In some regions Belarus, cancer incidence rate rose by 56% doubling breast cancer rates, as well as a shift towards younger women. Three times more increase of childhood leukemia has been measured in the affected regions. Rise of brain tumors amongst small children in Ukraine reached to 580%. 5.000 additional deaths occurred amongst small children in Europe.

Increase in cardio-vascular diseases by 22%, a sharp rise in gastrointestinal and CNS-diseases, accelerated aging due to damage to antioxidant systems were observed in the adults and 70% of children of affected parents were registered as chronically ill. Additionally, 13 times rise in childhood diseases in Belarus are observed. These are very conservative numbers. The Russian Ministry of Environment estimated the number of people affected by Chernobyl is around 1.3 million.

 

Fukushima. A magnitude 9.0 earthquake in Richter scale stroked the area 370 kilometers in northeast of Tokyo on Friday, March 11, 2011 at 02.46 PM. The offshore quake, measured as the fifth largest worldwide sparked a major tsunami across the Pacific. In a very short notice sea water up to 9 meters hit the Japanese coast. The Fukushima Plant was designed for the earthquake of magnitude 8.2. An 8.9 magnitude earthquake is seven times greater than 8.2 magnitudes earthquakes. On the same day the Japanese government declared an emergency at Fukushima Daiichi power plant and authorities revealed that the cooling system at the plant is not working and admitted they are "bracing for the worst". The following day, the radiation level at Fukushima is reported to be rising and Trade Minister of Japan warned that a small radiation leak could occur at the plant. Later on the same day it is announced that radioactive substances may have been leaked at Fukushima. Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency reported that radiation near the plant's main gate was more than eight times more than the normal level.  The same agency later revealed that a small amount of radioactive material escaped from the power plant. On the same day a hydrogen explosion at Fukushima's blew the roof off the containment structure. The residents living within 20 kilometers of the plant were told to evacuate the area. Around 200,000 people left. Authorities insisted that no harmful gases were emitted as a result of the explosion at the Fukushima plant, blaming the blast on "water vapor that was part of the cooling process." On Monday, March 14, hydrogen explosion at the reactor damaged the cooling system. A wall at the plant collapsed. Officials said that the containment vessel surrounding the reactor remains intact. Authorities begin pumping a mixture of sea water and chemicals into reactor to cool its nuclear fuel rods. Those residents living within 20 kilometers of the plant who have so far ignored evacuation orders are warned to stay indoors.  Up to 2.7 meters of the No.2 reactor's control rods are left uncovered because the pump which keeps them cool has run low on fuel after being left unattended. It caused them to heat up generating radioactive steam. On Tuesday, March 15, a second "explosive impact" rocked the reactor.  Later, Chief Cabinet Secretary said that he cannot rule out the possibility of a meltdown at all three of the plant's damaged reactors. He said that radiation levels at the plant have increased to "levels that can impact human health" and warned those living 20 and 30 kilometers of the plant to remain indoors. Fire broke out in a cooling pond used for nuclear fuel at the No.4 reactor which had been shut down before the quake. Japanese Prime Minister warned that "there is still a very high risk of further radioactive material coming out" but urged the public to remain calm. The government imposed a no-fly zone within a 30-kilometer radius of the plant. The second fire in two days was discovered in the building of the No. 4 reactor at Fukushima Daiichi. A day later the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission recommends that U.S. residents within 80 kilometers of the Fukushima reactors evacuate the area. Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency raised the crisis level, putting it on a par with the 1979 nuclear incident at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania, the USA. The International Nuclear Events Scale says a level five incident means there is a likelihood of a release of radioactive material, several deaths from radiation and severe damage to the reactor core. On Saturday, March 19 Japan's National Police Agency said 7,348 people were confirmed dead and 10,947 were missing. The agency said 2,603 people have been injured.

Bhopal. On the 3^rd of December 1984, 20.000 people were killed and another 120.000 people was severely affected as a result of gas leakage (methyl isocyanate of 27 tons) from a fertilizer factory in Bhopal, India owned by Union Carbide Corporation. Roughly the 500.000 people exposed to the gas. Leakage caused respiratory disorders such as irritation to the lungs, causing coughing and shortness of breathing, building in pulmonary oedema and asthma in addition to sudden deaths. Other health impacts have been witnessed included cancer hazard, mutation, reproductive system hazards, fertility damages in men and women. Traces of many toxins were found in the breast milk of mothers which were transmitted to the recipient babies.

 

CONCLUSIONS AND PROPOSALS

Several cases of environmental and ecological disasters have been briefly analyzed above. The common denominator of all these cases is the tragedy of human security which is identical with all other security issues such as wars, belligerent activities, terrorist activities, human trafficking and child abuse and so on. It is quite clear that the threats coming from the conventional type security concerns and from the non-conventional ones are all destined to reduce the level of human security. (Levy 1995) Therefore, as the main conclusion, it should be firmly stated here that environment and ecology is an integral part of national security issues and should b treated accordingly.

In this regard, the following proposals are considered to be essential for the future management of national security and environmental matters.

First of all, since the overall task of the security services is to maintain and enhance the conditions related to human security, the environmental security systems should also be established, maintained and upgraded throughout the Globe by the security forces.

Secondly, it is obvious that the threats to human security from non-conventional sources are increasing in numbers and becoming more diversified. Therefore, both the civilian experts on environmental and ecological issues and the experts in armed forces including police forces who have expertise is security issues should combine their efforts to establish a more secure living condition for human beings and for the flora and the fauna taking place in the surrounding environment. Environmentalists should learn insights from the security officials how to deal with the security aspects of the  potential environmental tragedies and catastrophes and the security officials should learn the environmental and ecological aspects of the security issues from the experts of the environment and ecology.

Thirdly, it is quite important that both the experts of the environment and the security should learn the essential techniques and methods of environmental management. These include command-and-control strategies of environmental management, voluntary compliance with the environmental rules and regulation and finally the economic, financial or market tools of environmental management ranging from green taxes to marketable pollution quotas.

 

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[1] Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Trends and Implications of Climate Change for

National and International Security. October 2011. p.11.

[2] Sustaining Security: How Natural Resources Influence National Security

[3] Jeffrey A. McNeel. Biodiversity, Conflict and Tropical Forests. Conserving the Peace: Resources, Livelihoods and Security Edited by: Richard Matthew Mark Halle, Jason Switzer.  2002 by the International Institute for Sustainable Development and IUCN, the World Conservation Union.

[4] Kristen D. Wheeler. Homeland Security and Environmental Regulation: Balancing Long-Term Environmental Goals with Immediate Security Needs

 

[5]Lauren Ploch Blanchard. Sudan and South Sudan: Current Issues for Congress and U.S. Policy. October 5, 2012 CRS Report for Congress. Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress.