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Environment Is Worth Fighting For But Not the Way You Think

© Kenneth Friedman

Some time in the 1980s a series of chemical spills occurred along the Rhine River in Europe. The Rhine winds its way alongside several countries. Naturally what went in upriver contaminated the water supply of nations downriver. Downriver nations weren't very pleased.

Halfway around the globe, in the South Asian nation of Bangladesh, the capital, Dhaka, suffers serious floods each year. The floods come in part because of land and water management upriver in neighboring India. The same type of transcountry flooding occurs elsewhere, as does its opposite, reduction of water flow. (Siltation--soil from erosion--is another transboundary river problem.)

Off the northeast coast of America, Canadian fishermen have angrily and violently confronted fishermen from Europe. Off the U.S. west coast, the Coast Guard has seized foreign fishing vessels because they were fishing in U.S. territorial waters.

In several African nations, refugees of famine and drought walk across borders to find relief. On their way, they poach wildlife and anything else they can eat and drink in order to survive. African herdsmen are already driving their flocks across borders in search of grazing land.

All of these environmental situations have the potential to flare into regonal wars. Is this farfetched? No. The use of force to obtain resources is nothing new. Colonialism was all about nations seeking natural resources from other nations and still is. Some people believe that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait is an excellent example of a modern use of force to gain resources--a port and perhaps more oil.

If Iraq's invasion of Kuwait was to obtain oil resources and access to a port, why can't other countries use force to obtain fish, forest products, minerals and water? Similarly, why can't countries use force to protect themselves against flooding, drought, acid rain or greenhouse gases? Why couldn't countries go to war to protect transnational biodiversity--wildlife such as sea turtles, fish, birds, butterflies and other creatures that migrate and spend parts of their lives in more than one country? What happens when resources don't belong to any one country? Can countries go to war to protect their interests in those resources?

Is war for environmental reasons farfetched? The U.S. government apparently doesn't think so either. Agencies such as the State Department, Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Intelligence Agency take seriously the possibility that various forms and levels of turmoil can have roots in environmental issues. Such issues have as much potential as any others for influencing internal politics. Transboundary acid rain and other industrial air pollution that kills forests or diversion of transboundary river water for agricultural irrigation and industrial and human consumption could easily find their way into political platforms.

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