Climate security

The climate is America’s most pressing national security threat

When the newest U.S. National Security Strategy was released last month, many intelligence, military and foreign-policy professionals considered it a pleasant surprise.

It hits most of the mainstream concerns facing the U.S.: the significant challenges we face from China, Russia, North Korea and Iran; the necessity of better homeland security against terrorist attacks; the importance of working with allies, partners and friends; and the need to determine sensible levels of defense spending. I called it “shockingly normal” in a Bloomberg View column.

But it misses the mark in one particularly worrisome area: the threats related to climate change and global warming, which were all but ignored. Early reports indicate that a similar report expected to soon be released by the Pentagon, the National Defense Strategy, will make the same error of omission.