Political Quotes

“This amendment deals with additional funds for reporting on climate change impacts on our national security. I would point out that, in 2014, the Department of Defense issued a climate change adaptation roadmap that described the very serious and significant ways that climate change threatens the national security of the United States of America. {time} 1615 It found that rising global temperatures, changing precipitation patterns, climbing sea levels, and more extreme weather events will intensify the challenges of global instability, hunger, poverty, and conflict. It will likely lead to food and water shortages, pandemic disease, disputes over refugees and resources, and destruction by natural disasters in regions across the globe. Earlier this year, the department released another report that found that more than two-thirds of the military's operationally critical installations are threatened by climate change. It noted that the effects of a changing climate are a national security issue, with potential impacts to the Department of Defense's missions, operational plans, and installations. As an example, the Air Force currently oversees 15 radar sites in Alaska. Since the Cold War, they have monitored the airspace above much of the Bering Sea and the Arctic. When the radar sites were selected in the 1950s, along Alaska's coastlines and deep in its interior, melting permafrost and coastal erosion were not yet long-term strategic concerns for the department.…”