Sustainability and National Security

508 Pages·2012·4.6 MB·English

Sustainability and
National Security

Sustainability and
National Security
Center for Strategic Leadership
United States Army War College
Carlisle, Pennsylvania
January 2012
The editors wish to thank Ms. Jennifer Nevil, desktop publisher,
for her fine work word processing the manuscript and Mr. Todd
Wheeler; COL David DeVoy, USAR; COL Ben Prescott, USAR;
and LTC Rob Farneth for reviewing various book chapters
The views expressed in this book are those of the authors and
do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the
United States Military Academy, the United States Army War
College, the Department of Defense, the Department of State,
USAID, or any other Department or Agency within the United
States Government. Further, these views do not reflect uniform
agreement among authors. This book is cleared for public release;
distribution is limited.
For additional copies of this book please contact Mr. Brent Bankus,
[phone] or [email protected].
ISBN: 978-0-9835110-1-4
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction ...................................................................vii
1. Sustainability and National Security .....................1
Jim Hartman
2. Sustainability: A Lens for National Security ......29
Kent Butts and Brent C. Bankus
3. The Department of Defense offers a Strong
Offense for Promoting Sustainability..................57
Kristan Cockerill

4. Sustainable Security and Fragile States...............85
Steve Hearne, Jeremey Alcorn, and
William Goran
5. Sustainability and Environmental Security......127
Odelia Funk
6. Building Resiliency into the National Military
Strategy ....................................................................177
David Carstens
7. The Consequential Challenges of Climate
Change ......................................................................201
Corry Juedeman
8. Sustainability and States: Climate Change and
Sovereignty..............................................................233
Rymn J. Parsons
9. Pursuing the Delta: Maximizing Opportunities
to Integrate Sustainability in the Funding
Process... ...................................................................263
Kimberly A. O’Keefe
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10. U.S. Nuclear Energy: National Security and
Sustainability ........................................................305
James J. Raftery, Jr.
11. Sustainability National Security Military Lands
Management: The Ecological Foundation of
Sustainability .......................................................367
William W. Doe III
12. Promoting a Sustainability Ethic in Future Army
Leaders at West Point ..........................................393
Marie C. Johnson and Mark A. Smith
13. Army National Guard Launches Sustainability
Initiatives ...............................................................417
Joseph Knott and Monica Slade
14. Building Green ....................................................447
William Goran, Thomas Napier,
Richard Schneider and Annette Stumpf
About the Authors .....................................................483
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INTRODUCTION
In a world that has finite resources and is increasingly
experiencing high competition for these resources, the
military has embraced sustainability as both a vital strate-
gic security element and as a mission enabler. This book
addresses how security organizations throughout the
world are or could be approaching sustainability. Mili-
tary forces must have the land, air, water, and energy/fuel
to train and operate today, and into the future. How can
these resources be assured, how can conflict over scarce
resources be avoided and when can cooperation over re-
sources issues be used to promote peace? Sustainability
is a powerful concept being readily applied by both the
business and international affairs communities. Many of
the sustainable practices the military is either currently
applying or seeking to institutionalize are modeled after
a growing number of corporations that aim for continual
improvement, to gain a competitive edge in globalized
markets, and ultimately long term success. Sustainability
is further providing a platform for multi-state coopera-
tion on transnational resource issues.
Mission accomplishment is the true determinant of
military success or failure. Corollary benefits of sustain-
ability include: reducing risk to our war fighters; readi-
ness enhancement and sustainment; increased efficiency;
reduced operational and total life cycle costs; a reduction
in environmental and logistics footprints; and, enhancing
the quality of life for soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines,
families, and surrounding communities.
This book explores the sustainability concept at the
strategic, operational and tactical levels. At the strategic
level the book explores the importance of focusing inter-
national and national priorities on identifying and pre-
serving the resource base necessary to maintain security
and stability and discusses the importance of proactively
mitigating threats to these resources. At the operational
level it examines the great savings that can be achieved
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by applying sustainable principles and practices through-
out military installations, systems, and operations; Op-
erational Energy is a fine example. At the tactical level
sustainability is reducing risks to military war fighters by
reducing the logistic burden of transporting fuel and wa-
ter to the tip of the fighting spear, and by minimizing the
overall logistics footprint at base camps. In the field, the
military is additionally a catalyst for the enhancement of
sustainable communities through its application of green
technologies and human capacity building.
Sustainability is simply a management approach ap-
plying a systematic framework with a focus on the wise
use of resources (economic and natural) while acting so-
cially responsible. Through the application of sustain-
able practices and principles demonstrated in this book
by various organizations the military is not only getting
stronger, but playing a vital role in driving new innova-
tion and technologies critical to the military’s future suc-
cess.
Unsustainable practices worldwide are increasingly
leading to adversely changing conditions in meteorology,
potable water availability, sea levels, crop and fish yields,
disease rates, and species survival rates. The aforemen-
tioned conditions have an aggregate effect of destabiliz-
ing weak nations. In essence unsustainable principles
and practices are a threat multiplier.
There are several examples throughout this book that
demonstrate the transformation of militaries to a sus-
tainability based approach has been a natural evolution
rather than a radical event. Doctrine, strategic planning,
decision making, acquisition and procurement processes,
building design and construction, facility and tactical
operations, and institutional behaviors are all aligning to
support sustainability. Although there is still much more
to do, it should be evident from this book that sustain-
ability offers a critical lens for examining national security
objectives at the strategic, operational and tactical levels.
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Dr. Jim Hartman’s chapter, “Sustainability and Na-
tional Security,” examines the evolution of the Army’s
sustainability program and its contributions to the nation-
al strategic security objectives. The growing world popu-
lation and imbalance of natural resources are expected
to affect US, as well as Army, interests. Dr. Hartman as-
serts sustainability is the nexus to ensure future security,
which can only be achieved through the development and
implementation of sound business practices. Dr. Hart-
man opines the Army, as a large institution, is well suited
to lead a whole of government approach to sustainability.
Dr. Kent Butts and Brent Bankus’ chapter, “Sustain-
ability: A Lens for National Security,” postulates sustain-
ability begins at the local level, but has strong implica-
tions at the strategic level. Dr. Butts and Mr. Bankus
argue the ambiguity of China’s motives to secure natural
resources in Africa and the Middle East in order to obtain
‘soft power’ to directly and negatively affect U.S. inter-
ests around the globe. Dr. Butts and Mr. Bankus address
maintaining the Bretton Woods Agreement, as well as the
1987 UN Brundtlant report to meet present needs without
compromising the needs to future generations” in the in-
terest of a U.S. sustainability strategy. This chapter takes
a view of U.S. interests at the national, as well as regional,
level and the implications for the future if sustainability
issues are not examined through a wider aperture by U.S.
leadership.
Dr. Kristan Cockerill’s “The Department of Defense
promotes a Strong Offense for Promoting Sustainability”
addresses the Army’s historical role in preserving the en-
vironment. In 1890, President Benjamin Harrison direct-
ed the U.S. Cavalry to secure and protect the recently de-
veloped Yosemite National Park. The Army maintained
control of Yosemite for 26 years until the establishment of
the National Park Service in 1916 and preserved its vast
wealth of natural resources. She argues the Army has a
long history, both good and bad, when it comes to envi-
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