For environmental activists, the inauguration of Joe Biden held promise. The executive orders that he signed that day included one to rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement and another to revoke the Keystone XL Pipeline’s federal permit. This Keystone order also authorized federal agencies to review and, where appropriate, reverse Donald Trump’s many environmental rollbacks, such as fuel efficiency standards for cars and trucks, energy efficiency standards for appliances and buildings, and air pollution controls. In addition, Biden suspended oil and gas leasing in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
It was an encouraging start.
In November 2021, Biden reinforced these executive orders by negotiating the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that directs billions of dollars toward clean energy, remediation of Superfund and brownfield sites, and carbon reduction. After falling short on the ambitious Build Back Better plan, the president rallied with the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which will likely be remembered as his crowning achievement in domestic policy.
The IRA dedicates $369 billion to climate provisions that will affect every aspect of U.S. energy production. The legislation offers an array of tax credits, tax deductions, and loan guarantees variously to businesses, nonprofits, and educational institutions, as well as state, local, and tribal governments. The law also provides incentives for the purchase of electric and other clean energy vehicles, along with rebates for those who install energy efficient solutions at home. With a special commitment to environmental justice, the IRA introduces bonus tax credits for projects undertaken in communities that are inordinately affected by pollution and public health hazards. While the IRA includes compromises that support oil and gas producers, it is still the most consequential climate law in U.S. history and will shape the way the country uses energy for years to come.
With his signature barely dry on the IRA, Biden attended the COP27 climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, and described the climate crisis as of vital concern to “human security, economic security, environmental security, national security, and the very life of the planet.”
But the president’s words ring hollow when you consider his foreign policy, one decision after another. Geostrategic advantage is the guiding principle, with an unsettling reliance on military might. What’s more, his decisions wreak havoc with his own climate law, to say nothing of the considerable risks they pose. A 2019 Costs of War report described the U.S. Department of Defense as “the single largest institutional producer of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the world.” Not only is Biden increasing its carbon footprint, he’s also pressuring our allies to do the same.
The following actions, all under the direction of the White House, illustrate this idea:
- In June 2021, NATO issued a press release on the day of the Brussels summit that described Russia as “a threat to Euro-Atlantic security.” For the first time, the organization also added China to the agenda, to the dismay of numerous NATO members, and described the country as presenting “systemic challenges to the rules-based international order.” That same month, the Biden Administration notified Russia that it would not rejoin the Open Skies Treaty. Further, the United States and 31 allied countries conducted the largest-ever “Sea Breeze” military exercises in the Black Sea.
- In Oct. 2021, Biden, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced a new Indo-Pacific security pact called AUKUS (Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States). This announcement set off alarm bells in Beijing, largely due to the stated intention of adding nuclear-powered submarines to Australia’s military arsenal. The security pact also includes the sharing of defense-related technologies such as cyber capabilities, hypersonic weapons, and artificial intelligence.
- In November 2021, U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken signed the U.S.-Ukraine Charter on Strategic Partnership, which calls for “Ukraine’s integration into Euro-Atlantic institutions” and renews support for the country to join NATO. In addition, the Charter says that the United States will help Ukraine “to counter armed aggression, economic and energy disruptions, and malicious cyber activity by Russia.” With a buildup at this time of Russian forces as well as unusual military activity near the Ukrainian border, Kyiv and Western officials feared that an invasion may be imminent.
- In December 2021, Russia called for NATO to respect its security concerns, guarantee an end to its eastward expansion, and agree to Ukrainian neutrality. Biden dismissed the idea and contacted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to reassure him of U.S. support. Later that month, Biden authorized a $200 million weapons package to Ukraine, as the Russian troop count continued to rise.
- In February 2022, following Russia’s recognition of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, Biden imposed new sanctions on those two regions. Two days later, Russia launched an all-out assault on the country. NATO responded by imposing more sanctions on Russia and stepping up military support to Ukraine—support that has steadily escalated over the first year of the war to include weapons that were initially regarded as too provocative. Currently, long-range missiles and F-16 fighter jets are under consideration.
- In May 2022, Biden answered a journalist’s question about Taiwan, saying that the United States would defend the island if it came under attack from China. When asked a follow-up question about this in a 60 Minutes interview, the president went a step further and said that if Taiwan came under attack that he would send in U.S. troops. China quickly voiced its disapproval.
- In August 2022, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took an ill-advised trip to Taiwan to express the United States’ steadfast support. China condemned the visit, imposed sanctions on the island, and launched live-fire military drills. Several weeks later, the U.S. Senate passed the Taiwan Policy Act of 2022, which pledges regional stability and provides billions in military aid. Biden’s hands are not clean here: he could have shut down either move with a simple phone call. Not to be outdone, Pelosi’s successor, Kevin McCarthy, plans to give the hornet’s nest a kick of his own. He has announced that he will visit Taiwan sometime later this year.
- In September 2022, based on Seymour Hersh’s recent Substack article, the United States blew up three of the four Nord Stream Pipelines, an act of war. The operation triggered a methane discharge that was estimated to be five times the size of the 2015 Aliso Canyon gas leak in the Los Angeles area, the largest methane leak on record. While the sabotage was probably ordered above all to reduce German and European dependence on Russia, it was likewise a bonanza for the U.S. LNG industry that had already seen a surge in European demand from earlier in the year. If Hersh’s reporting holds up, it sheds light on the kind of tradeoff that the president is willing to make: in addition to the initial release of methane and the risk of a Russian reprisal, LNG produces considerably higher GHG emissions than pipeline gas due to the process of liquefaction, transport, and regasification.
- In December 2022, NATO countries announced that they will increase the organization’s 2023 budget by more than 25% over that of 2022. At the United States’ urging, Japan agreed to a similar increase in defense spending to counter perceived threats from both China and North Korea. Japan’s projected budget will make it the world’s third largest military after the United States and China, displacing India. South Korea also plans to step up its defense expenditures over the next five years to enhance its so-called three-axis defense system.
- In February 2023, the United States struck a deal with the Philippines that will increase its military presence on the island nation, adding four new bases to the five that are currently stationed there. China denounced the deal and accused Washington of escalating regional tension.
- Speaking in Poland on the first anniversary of the war, Biden dug in deep, stressing that NATO’s “support for Ukraine will not waver.” Together with a $2 billion military aid package to the country, Washington and its allies announced fresh sanctions targeting more than “200 individuals and entities, including both Russian and third-country actors across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East that are supporting Russia’s war effort.” The announcement singled out China and Iran.
While some of the cited actions addressed issues that required attention, there is scant evidence of any consideration given to their environmental impacts. Each action prompted a predictable counteraction, further compounding the GHG problem, further destabilizing an indefinite number of countries.
Global military expenditures for the first time exceeded $2 trillion in 2021, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, and there is little doubt that the totals will be higher in both 2022 and 2023. These expenditures represent current and future GHG emissions—emissions that are senselessly exempt from the Paris Climate Agreement.
A growing number of scholars and activists view this exemption as one of many concerns in their study of the broader impact of the military industry on the climate. In addition to a variety of recent publications, there are several noteworthy groups that conduct advocacy research on specific aspects of this topic: the Global Campaign on Military Spending (GCOMS), which raises awareness about excessive defense expenditures in an effort to redirect the money to social and environment needs; the Military Emissions Gap, which is concerned with gathering complete and accurate military data, an objective that many nations tend to resist; and the International Military Council on Climate and Security, a group of senior military leaders and security experts who focus on the security risks posed by climate change.
In April 2021, the Biden Administration’s Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, spoke at the 2021 Leaders’ Summit on Climate, a virtual meeting hosted by the White House. Haines told world leaders that climate change needs to be “fully integrated” into a country’s national security and foreign policy. Those words are conspicuously absent from the discussion now, they’ve become inconvenient, along with any mention of the pressing need for global cooperation. Instability is on the rise. So are GHG emissions. Washington is in a sobering showdown with the outcome anyone’s guess.
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