It occurs to me that it’s hard to see how an American, at least, can maintain a skeptic’s position in the face of these plans. Mablus, a former governor, stated these plans as unexceptional. They’re reviewed, and must be approved, by congressmen and senators of both parties. If any of them believe that climate change is not real, they are seriously derelict in approving Navy budgets of many tens of billions of dollar that are based on such considerations – and in not making these actions by the Navy a campaign issue.

The alternative explanation is that all these representatives believe what the Pentagon is telling them about climate change impacts, and their public skepticism or denial of it is simply pandering to voter segments whom they actually believe to be ignorant, and aggressively so. (Which is why the pandering is necessary.)

For myself, I find the realism (in supporting the budgets) reassuring, but the lack of public courage dismaying.

I also note that former skeptics in the UK are starting to come around. I’m hopeful that the same will begin to happen in the US in the next few years as well.

If you’re a skeptic, how do you square the rest of your political positions with the Navy’s planning? If not, try this on your skeptic friends; I’d love to hear any coherent responses.

(Full disclosure: I see the world as made up of a small number of my allies who correctly understand the situation now, and a large number of future allies who will understand it in time, and will then do all they can to help. To me, the only really evil action here is actively undermining the advancement and dissemination of scientific work in this area – a level to which, as with the tobacco wars, many who have economic interests in fossil fuel use etc. have already stooped.)

A plug: The Green Arcade is the first San Francisco bookshop to sell my new book, Runaway! Buy it from them, to encourage the others.

The shirt says "Rad", not "Bad"

Climate Wars is an exciting new book by Gwynne Dyer, journalist and author. Climate Wars describes potential military conflicts as climate change “heats up” issues of water sharing, food security, and border control for countries worldwide. The book also, though, offers a snapshot of the current understanding of climate change and our future in top military, government, and scientific circles worldwide. It’s not a pretty picture.

Stewart Brand, famous for the Whole Earth Catalog in the 1960s and 70s, is head of Global Business Network (GBN) and the Long Now Foundation. Dyer provides analysis and consulting for GBN. So Brand hosted Dyer’s Q&A and book signing at The Green Arcade, the famous green and sustainability bookshop on the central part of Market Street, southwest of the Civic Center.

Dyer dialed into climate change about 3 years ago because he started hearing about it as an issue through Pentagon contacts. The world’s militaries are pretty much over terrorism as a major threat and see climate change as their next big focus. In the short term, there will be loss of food production in the tropics and subtropics, where two thirds of the world’s population is.

Today, we live in a historically peaceful world, but that will change. Loss of food production will cause hunger, possibly famine, and lead to great floods of refugees. India has built a fence around Bangladesh to trap potential refugees inside. Turkey has taken advantage of the Iraq war to dam the headwaters of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, using it to water Anatolia, not central Iraq. Dyer anticipates the US-Mexico border being closed, hard, in 10-15 years, and unrest around the world.

He sees loss of control of warming at the widely described 2C barrier (we are at 0.8C already, with a further 0.6C of warming inevitable as of today.) Dyer sees emissions as out of control, and unable to be cut enough to stay under the barrier. The world got surprisingly close to agreement at Copenhagen, but must act before climate impacts make international cooperation impossible. Geoengineering will be needed to keep warming below 2C while emissions are cut.

Dyer sees the military as humanists and broad thinkers when they hang up their uniforms. He speculates that military influence is helping sell governments on the importance of holding warming to 2C.

Brand tends to emphasize positive scenarios. On nuclear power, they disagree, Dyer against and Brand for it.

While Dyer is a smart guy, as a journalist and analyst he will tend not get too far ahead of his sources. So it’s impressive, and depressing, that current top-level opinion seems to agree on the need to stay below 2C of warming, the unlikelihood of doing so without geoengineering, and the imminent dangers of both global instability and runaway climate change.

In my next posts I’ll review Climate Wars, which is a surprisingly (and frighteningly) right-on analysis of where the environment and the world political situation are today, and are likely to be tomorrow.

PS Monday, June 28th at The Green Arcade is a signing for Just Enough: Lessons in Living Green from Traditional Japan. Sounds fascinating!

The theme was the Evolution of Eco-Activism, “Following the compelling shift from conservation to environmentalism to environmental/social justice over the last half-century”, with Jerry Mander (International Forum on Globalization), Karen Pickett (Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters), and Carla Pérez (Movement Generation).

Chris showed an evocative new 10-minute film, then there was a valuable panel talk. Jerry Mander said that things have gone so far that we need systemic changes and worldview changes, but that localization and sufficiency will be crucial. Karen Pickett talked about the Headwaters campaign and the importance of direct action.

Carla Perez then answered a question of mine from the floor about where are the opportunities for near-term progress. She gave a very Transition-friendly answer – Resiliency; work with your neighbors, not your Facebook friends spread all over; understand that economy is local first. Her group, Movement Generation, refers to it as translocal solutions. Carla went on to say that the upcoming crises will see many lives lost – and an amazing outpouring of creativity.