Twin Threats

No American Institution in the United States takes climate change more seriously than the Pentagon. To compound the strategic planning headaches of climate change, the treaties which reduced the world peak of 64,000 nuclear warheads in the 80s down to the current 8,000 warheads, are dissolving. We are drifting back to MAD. PhD Michael Klare, Professor at Hampshire College, addresses the compounding problems of climate and nukes in his new book, “All Hell Breaking Loose”.

MAD is the acronym formed from the term used to deter potential adversaries from attacking the United States. MAD is short for Mutually Assured Destruction. It is a game of fear. Basically, if we fall victim to nuclear attack, any aggressor nation will be guaranteed obliteration by a revenge strike. I was introduced to this game at the USAF Academy in the early 70’s.

Classmates and I were divided into a Red Team and a Blue team. Each team had nuclear bomb delivery systems consisting of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles in hardened and buried silos, and bombers. Both teams had fighters to intercept the enemy bombers.

The game referees, our instructors, gave the teams a budget to buy  ICBMs, Bombers, and Interceptors. With the money came a calculated success rate of intercepting a bomber with an interceptor. Note, the bomber commands could also buy cheap decoys to deceive enemy interceptors.

I was assigned to play the Blue Team Air Defense Commander and given F-106 interceptors to engage the Red Bear Bombers. My counterpart on the Red Team had similar fighter assets to intercept our B-52, “Buffs”. As a hockey defenseman, I stationed my fighters in locations where I could cut the angles the Bears had to attack our cities.

MAD relies on logic. It assumes no-one would ever be stupid enough to attack us or Russia. To attack means annihilation in the counterattack.  In theory, the highly trained aircrews on both sides are never supposed to do anything but train to intimidating perfection. If war broke out, both sides lose.

No man-made system is perfect. There have been many “glitches” and if you go to the Union of Concerned Scientists web site you will find them. I cannot remember the, “glitch” that set off the classroom imaginary WWIII, but I will never forget how we methodically played out each fighter to bomber encounter. The dice rolled.

Despite the slim odds of success, my fighters won every early encounter. The F-106 heat seeking infra-red missiles found their Bear targets. I had enough resources spread about to engage nearly every Bear and decoy.  The dice were literally rolling my way.

On the other side of the world, the B-52’s were evading the Russian fighters and penetrating Russian airspace. The Buffs delivered their nukes. Russian airfields and major cities were obliterated one by one.

Over Canada our ADC fighters continued to smoke the Bears with their infra-red heat seeking missiles. But, as I ran out of fighters to engage decoys and Bears, a couple Bears got through. We ended up losing a few major metropolitan areas and millions of our citizens.

When tallying up the results, our Blue team had won decisively and my fighter and bomber pilots where imaginary heroes.

The game saddened me.  Most cadets upon graduation went on to fixed wing training (jets). Many of my buds chose flight school for airplanes and after fulfilling their military commitment landed lucrative airline jobs.

Upon graduation, I chose helicopters. One of the many reasons I chose helicopters is there was no chance of flying a B-52 after helicopter flight school. 

Today, strategic planners at the Pentagon have a much more complex game of MAD. The bombs are 80 times more powerful than the Hiroshima Bomb. Modern missiles are faster and more evasive. Decision times to launch counter attacks are minimal for the 400 ICBM warheads we have on hair trigger alert. The time to launch a successful counterstrike is so short many planners fear human reaction times are obsolete. The MAD system of deterrence may, one day, be handed over to a computer.

But today’s wild card increasing nuclear war danger is climate change. While some leaders, to include President Trump, refuse to acknowledge the science, DOD planners do not have the luxury of living in a fake universe. There are nine nuclear nations. Climate change makes it likely one of them will destabilize due to food or water shortages. Climate change destabilization is a nuclear war threat multiplier.

Paradoxically, our military leaders know the science making heat seeking missiles effective, is the same science describing global warming.

The tragedy of refusing to address climate change is each day we do nothing, the worse the threat becomes. The costs to rebuild infrastructure, both military and civilian, will sky-rocket. FEMA funds will not meet the demand. Additionally, the cost of fighting climate induced wars will go up.

Today’s commitment to modernizing our nuclear weapons to deter hostile nations is 1.7 trillion dollars. To meet the threat multiplier, climate change, our country has committed zero dollars.

It is time we grit our teeth and deal with global warming. While we old folks will miss the worst, our kids will not need a pair of dice to forecast their chances with climate disruption. It is already here with a 100% chance it will, if unchallenged by us, rain havoc on them.

Further reading: www.climateandsecurity.org                                             

The Nation Magazine 27JAN2020 “Twin Threats”

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