Formation and evolution of Life in the Universe, a spiritual pathway to SoulLife. (26 MBs video)

Idlib ‘Chemical Attack’ Was False Flag to Set Assad Up, More May Come – Putin

Vladimir Putin believes the US strikes on Syria remind of its attack on Iraq when the US launched a military campaign under the unproven pretext of Baghdad’s alleged possession of chemical weapons.
MOSCOW, April 11. /TASS/. Russia has data that new provocations are planned in Syria with the goal of putting the blame on Damascus for allegedly using chemical weapons, Russian President Vladimir Putin told reporters after talks with his Italian counterpart Sergio Mattarella on Tuesday.

"We have information from different sources that these provocations - I cannot call them otherwise - are being prepared in other regions of Syria, including in the southern suburbs of Damascus where there are plans to throw some substance and accuse the official Syrian authorities," Putin said.

Putin believes that supporting US strikes on Syria, European countries seek to establish relations with the administration of Donald Trump, whom they criticized during the election campaign on the advice from the then President Barack Obama.

‘They want to restore relations with the Western community after many European countries had taken anti-Trump position during the election campaign in the US due to the former US administration," Putin said.

"A very good platform for consolidating - Syria, Russia, there is a common enemy," he noted. "Wonderful. We are ready to be patient. But we hope that this will get at a certain point to some positive trend of cooperation," he added.

Putin went on to say that US missile strike on Syria reminds of its attack against Iraq in 2003 that led to the emergence of the IS.

"This [the US strike on Syria] strongly reminds of the 2003 events when US representatives in the UN Security Council showed allegedly chemical weapons found in Iraq," the Russian president said.

"After that, a military campaign started in Iraq and it ended with the destruction of the country, the growth of the terrorist threat and the emergence of the ISIL [the former name of the Islamic State terrorist organization outlawed in Russia] on the international scene, no more and no less," Putin said.

"The same is happening now," the Russian president said.

"We believe that any incident of this kind should be officially investigated," Putin said. "We plan to turn to the United Nations bodies in The Hague and call on the global community to thoroughly investigate into this incident and make balanced decisions based on the investigation’s outcome," the Russian leader added.

The Trump administration officials dismissed the Russian claim that the Syrian airstrike had targeted a munitions warehouse controlled by Islamic extremists as an afterthought to cover up the Syrian government's culpability for the chemical attack. Moreover, the Trump officials claimed that US intelligence had located the site where the Syrian regime had dropped the chemical weapon.

However, two new revelations contradict the Trump administration's line on the April 4 attack. A former US official knowledgeable about the episode told Truthout that the Russians had actually informed their US counterparts in Syria of the Syrian military's plan to strike the warehouse in Khan Sheikhoun 24 hours before the strike. And a leading analyst on military technology, Dr. Theodore Postol of MIT, has concluded that the alleged device for a sarin attack could not have been delivered from the air but only from the ground, meaning that the chemical attack may not have been the result of the Syrian airstrike.

The Trump administration is pushing the accusation that the Assad regime was the force that carried out the highly lethal chemical attack on April 4 very hard, perhaps not so much to justify the already politically popular US strike against the Shayrat airbase on April 6, but rather to buttress a new hardline policy against the Syrian regime.

The two unnamed senior Trump officials who briefed journalists Tuesday sought to discredit the Russian claim that the Syrian airstrike had hit a warehouse in Khan Sheikhoun that was believed to hold weapons including toxic chemicals. One of the two unnamed officials said that a Syrian military source had "told Russian state media on April 4 that regime forces had not carried out any strike in Khan Sheikhoun, which contradicted Russia's claim directly." 

This Trump administration official appeared to be suggesting that there was no evidence that a weapons storage site had been hit by a Syrian airstrike. But an internal administration paper on the issue now circulating in Washington, a copy of which Truthout obtained, clearly refers to "a regime airstrike on a terrorist ammunition dump in the eastern suburbs of Khan Sheikhoun."

More importantly, the US military allegedly knew in advance that the strike was coming: Russian military officers informed their American counterparts of the Syrian military's plan to strike the warehouse in Khan Sheikhoun city 24 hours before the planned airstrike, according to the former US official who spoke with Truthout. The official is in direct contact with a US military intelligence officer with access to information about the US-Russian communications. The military intelligence officer reported to his associate that the Russians provided the information about the strike to the Americans through the normal US-Russian Syria deconfliction telephone line, which was established after the Russian intervention in 2015 to prevent any accidental clash between the two powers. The officer said that Russia communicated to the US the fact that the Syrians believed that the warehouse held toxic chemicals. 

That information was considered so politically sensitive that after its initial dissemination, it was available only to a few officials, the US military intelligence officer told his associate.

Despite the US denial of the Russian account of a Syrian strike on a warehouse in the city, an eyewitness account appears to confirm it. A 14-year-old resident told The New York Times she was walking only a few dozen yards away from a one-story building when she saw a plane drop a bomb on it.  The eyewitness reported the explosion created a "mushroom cloud" that stung her eyes. 

She added that she then hurried back home and watched as people began to arrive to help others in the neighborhood and were stricken by the toxic chemical in the air.

The airstrike she saw appears to be the one that was the objective of the Syrian operation in Khan Sheikhoun. The mushroom cloud she saw seems to be the widest of the three mushroom clouds shown in a video taken sometime after the explosion.

Two other strikes were apparently carried out after the initial strike on the building for which there is an eyewitness account. One was at a hospital in or near the city and the other was at a center of the White Helmets organization, built into a rock formation. The hospital strike was reported in an Associated Press story on Tuesday, which reported that a Russian drone was said to be hovering over a hospital as victims of the earlier attack were being brought in for treatment. The story said the hospital was later attacked. 

The hospital attack was cited by an anonymous AP source as evidence that the Russians knew in advance that a chemical weapons attack was going to be carried out. In fact it indicates that the hospital strike may well have been linked to the earlier airstrike on the one-story building.

When asked about the bombing at the hospital during the press briefing on Tuesday, one of the unnamed senior US officials would not confirm that the Syrians had carried out the attack or discuss the issue further, saying, "We don't have any comment right now on who may have been involved in bombing that hospital and why and how."

The senior US officials briefing the press insisted that a Syrian air strike delivering sarin was the only credible explanation for the dozens of deaths in Khan Sheikhoun. One of the officials cited a video showing a crater in the middle of a main road, which the Trump administration's key officials have determined was the site of the chemical weapon that reportedly killed 50 to 100 people. He implied that this was evidence that a Syrian airstrike had released what was believed to be sarin.

But Dr. Theodore Postol of MIT, who debunked the original official claims of the location of rockets that hit Syria's Ghouta area with what appeared to be sarin on August 21, 2013, has come to a different conclusion. Postol says that the carcass of the delivery vehicle -- shown in last week's video and in still photos of the small crater -- indicates that the chemical attack was not delivered via airstrike but from the spot on the road where it was found.

In an assessment completed on Tuesday, Postol called the collapsed metal tube shown in the crater, which he estimates to be about two and a half feet long, "an improvised dispersal device." He analyzes the device as having been assembled from a section of pipe from a 122 mm rocket with caps at both ends that was filled with sarin and with some kind of explosive placed on top of it. The explosive on top smashed in the pipe holding the sarin, and pushed the sarin out of its tube, according to Postol, "like toothpaste from a toothpaste tube."

Postol estimates that the device might have held eight to 10 liters of sarin. Was it actually used to emit the toxic chemical that killed dozens of residents? Postol doesn't claim to know, but he states that it did not resemble an air-delivered chemical weapon. "The administration attempted to use evidence that contradicted their own claim," Postol told Truthout.

One of the unnamed US officials briefing the press declared, "We are confident that terrorists or non-state actors did not commit this particular attack," and explained that non-state actors don't have the sarin required. But whether that assumption is well-founded or not, the universal assumption that the deaths could only have been caused by exposure to sarin is mistaken. Exposure to smoke munitions that create phosphine gas when in contact with moisture can cause neurological symptoms that mimic those of sarin, because they both damage the body's ability to produce the enzyme cholinesterase.

Both the Syrian Army and the Al-Nusra Front fighters in the Aleppo area, moreover, had abundant stocks of phosphine-producing smoke munitions in 2013, as was documented by German journalist Alfred Hackensberger of Die Welt. Furthermore, both ISIS (also known as Daesh) and al-Qaeda in Aleppo have been reported to have access to phosphine-based weapons.

These phosphine-producing munitions can be lethal if humans are exposed in confined space, and they have the smell of garlic or rotting food. That is precisely the smell that was reported by eyewitnesses in Khan Seikhoun. Sarin, on the other hand, is normally odorless.

Gareth Porter is an independent investigative journalist and historian writing on US national security policy. His latest book, Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare, was published in February of 2014. Follow him on Twitter: @GarethPorter.

The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House.

See also

Declassified U.S. Report Accusing “Assad Regime” of Using Chemical Weapons “ No proof whatsoever!

Theodore A. Postol is professor emeritus of science, technology and national security policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a specialist in weapons issue.

The Pentagon has formally asked the Trump White House to lift limited restrictions imposed by the Obama administration on US military aid to the Saudi Arabian monarchy’s near genocidal war against the impoverished people of Yemen.

The Washington Post reported Monday that Defense Secretary James “Mad Dog” Mattis, a recently-retired US Marine general, had submitted a memo earlier this month to Trump’s national security adviser H.R. McMaster, an active duty US Army lieutenant general, for the approval of stepped-up support for military operations being conducted in Yemen by both the Saudi regime and its principal Arab ally, the United Arab Emirates.

The memo, according to the Post, stressed that such US military aid would help to combat “a common threat.”

This supposed “threat” is posed by Iran, US imperialism’s principal regional rival for hegemony over the oil-rich Middle East. Both the Saudi monarchy and the Trump administration have repeatedly charged, without providing any significant supporting evidence, that Iran has armed, trained and directed the Houthi rebels who seized control of the Yemeni capital and much of the country, toppling the US-Saudi puppet regime of President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi in 2014.

A major escalation of the US intervention in Yemen will be directed principally at provoking a military confrontation with Tehran, with the aim of weakening Iranian influence throughout the region. Trump himself campaigned in the 2016 election denouncing the Obama administration for being too “soft” on Iran and for joining the other major powers in negotiating what he characterized as a “disastrous” nuclear agreement with Tehran. His advisers, including his ousted first national security adviser, Gen. Michael Flynn, and Defense Secretary Mattis, have all voiced bellicose hostility to Iran.

The immediate impetus for the call for increased US aid to the Saudi-led war is reportedly a proposed Emirati operation to seize control of the key Red Sea port of Hodeida. The effect of such an offensive would be to cut off the large portion of the country and its population under Houthi control from any lifeline to the outside world. Fully 70 percent of the country’s imports now come through the port. Even before the war, Yemen was dependent upon imports for 90 percent of its food. Aid agencies have warned that a military offensive on the port could tip the country into mass starvation.

The proposed US escalation in Yemen coincides with the second anniversary of the Saudi war on the country, launched on March 26, 2015 in the form of an unending bombing campaign directed largely against civilian targets, along with a halting offensive on the ground.

The anniversary was marked in the capital of Sanaa and other Yemeni cities by demonstrations of hundreds of thousands denouncing the murderous Saudi military campaign. The Houthis have won support that extends far beyond their base in the country’s Zaidi-Shia minority because of popular hatred for the Saudi monarchy and its crimes.

As the war enters its third year, Yemen is teetering on the brink of mass starvation, confronting one of the worst humanitarian crises anywhere on the planet. This war, waged by the obscenely wealthy royal families of the gulf oil sheikdoms against what was already the poorest nation in the Arab world, has killed some 12,000 Yemenis, the overwhelming majority of them civilians, and wounded at least 40,000 more.

Saudi airstrikes have targeted hospitals, schools, factories, food warehouses, fields and even livestock. Coupled with a de facto naval blockade, the aim of this total war against Yemen’s civilian population is to starve the Yemenis into submission. A US-backed campaign to seize the port of Hodeida would serve to tighten this deadly stranglehold.

In a statement issued Monday marking the beginning of the war’s third year, the United Nations emergency relief agency reported that “nearly 19 million Yemenis—over two-thirds of the population—need humanitarian assistance. Seven million Yemenis are facing starvation.”

UNICEF, the UN’s children’s agency, reported that roughly half a million children are suffering from acute malnutrition in Yemen, while 1,546 have been killed and 2,450 have been disabled by the fighting. The agency said that the rate of child deaths had increased by 70 percent over the past year, while the rate of acute malnutrition had increased by 200 percent since 2014.

The deliberate Saudi bombing of hospitals and clinics has left 15 million people without any access to health care, while the destruction of water and sanitation facilities has led to epidemics of cholera and diarrhea. It is estimated that as many as 10,000 children have lost their lives due to the lack of clean water and medical services since 2015.

Washington, under both the Obama and the Trump administrations, has been fully complicit in the war crimes being carried out by the Saudi regime and its allies against the Yemeni people. Washington poured a staggering $115 billion worth of arms into the Saudi kingdom under the Obama administration, resupplying bombs and missiles dropped on Yemeni homes, hospitals and schools. It set up a joint US-Saudi logistical and intelligence center to guide the war and provided aerial refueling by US planes to assure that the bombing could continue round the clock.

While a part of this decisive military aid was curtailed for public relations purposes following the horrific October 2016 Saudi bombing of a funeral ceremony in Sanaa that killed over 150 people, the US Navy entered directly into the conflict that same month, firing Tomahawk missiles at Houthi targets based on unsubstantiated charges that missiles had been fired at US ships.

Nonetheless, the request by Mattis would mark a qualitative escalation of the US intervention. While the Post reported that an Emirati request for US Special Operations troops to participate directly in the siege of the port of Hodeida was not part of Mattis’s proposal, it went on to warn that the Gulf sheikdom’s military “may not be capable of such a large operation, including holding and stabilizing any reclaimed area, without sucking in US forces.” Indeed, the Emirati army is in large measure a mercenary force, having recruited former members of the Colombian, Salvadoran and Chilean military to do the ruling royal family’s dirty work.

The Post goes on to report: “A plan developed by the U.S. Central Command to assist the operation includes other elements that are not part of Mattis’s request, officials said. While Marine Corps ships have been off the coast of Yemen for about a year, it was not clear what support role they might play.”

As numerous reports have indicated, the Trump White House has essentially given free rein to Mattis and the US military commanders to conduct armed operations as they see fit. The result has been the more than doubling of the number of US troops on the ground in Syria along with an escalation of the US intervention in Iraq, as well as a request for another 5,000 troops to be deployed in Afghanistan.

In Yemen, they are preparing to drag the American people into another criminal war against one of the world’s most vulnerable populations, threatening to hasten the deaths of millions of starving people. The strategic aims underlying this vast war crime are the imposition of US imperialist hegemony over the Middle East through a military confrontation with Iran and the preparation for a global conflict with Washington’s principal rivals, Russia and China.

First published in WSWS.org

In late 2015, the world agreed to limit the global temperature rise to “well below 2C”. Ever since the signing of the Paris Agreement on climate change, scientists, think tanks and policymakers have been scrambling to define exactly what meeting this temperature limit will mean in policy and investment terms.

A new report released this week by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) is the latest attempt to address this question.

Commissioned by the German government in its role this year as G20 president, the report sets out the “essential elements” needed to create an energy sector transition consistent with the Paris Agreement. The G20 is a group of 20 major economies, including China, India, Germany, the UK and US, which accounts for 63% of global population and 83% of emissions.

The IEA and IRENA each took a separate approach to modelling the most cost effective decarbonisation pathway, with the IEA using a so-called “technology-neutral” approach and IRENA putting a heavier emphasis on energy efficiency and renewable energy sources.

These produce significantly different results in areas such as remaining fossil fuel use and investment requirements. However, in combination, what emerges is a core message about the large changes needed in investment direction, clean energy supply and price support mechanisms, as well as the significant co-benefits – such as reduced air pollution – which could result from a low-carbon transition

Significantly, in both cases, clear economic benefits are expected from a transition to a low-carbon energy system.

Carbon Brief sets out seven of the report’s key findings…

1) Set a more stringent carbon budget

While the Paris Agreement clearly stipulates that global temperature rise since the pre-industrial era should be kept to “well below 2C” at the very most, defining what this means in practical terms of the remaining emissions has proven tricky.

The report chooses a scenario with 66% probability of keeping the average global surface temperature rise throughout the 21st century to below 2C. While some would argue this is still not compatible with the Paris Agreement, it has emerged as one way to attempt to address the raised ambition the deal represents. It is significantly more stringent than the 50% chance of staying below 2C which current UK climate law is based on.

The report calculates the remaining carbon budget for the energy sector between 2015 and 2100 to be 790 gigatonnes (Gt), once non-CO2 emissions and CO2 emissions from industry and land-use change have been accounted for. In contrast, under current national pledges under the Paris Agreement, the energy sector would emit almost 1,260 Gt by 2050 alone.

However, the carbon budget scenario chosen in the report also prevents a temporary overshoot of temperature at any time this century, making it more stringent compared to many International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scenarios which frequently rely on negative emissions technologies to compensate for today’s emissions later this century.

2) Speed up the transition

While most scenarios to limit temperature rise show a need to accelerate the rate of transition, unsurprisingly, the more stringent the carbon budget conditions, the faster the change is required. (A recent Shell scenario for below 2C is described as an “accelerated net-zero emissions scenario” for the same reason.)

The IEA scenario in line with the report’s carbon budget, for instance, would require energy-related CO2 emissions to peak before 2020 and fall by more than 70% from today’s levels by 2050.

This would require the share of fossil fuels in primary energy demand to halve between 2014 and 2050. Meanwhile, low-carbon sources – in which the IEA includes nuclear and fossil fuels with carbon capture and storage (CCS) – would more than triple to encompass 70% of worldwide energy demand in 2050.

Such an energy transition would require an “unparalleled ramp up of all low-carbon technologies in all countries”, with ambitious policies introduced “immediately and comprehensively” across all countries, the IEA says.

IRENA similarly says early action is “critical” – especially if the world is to maximise the benefits and reduce the risks (and the costs) of the energy transition, and to keep the possibility of limiting global temperature rise to 1.5C.

In its scenario of early action, IRENA says energy-related CO2 emissions could be reduced 70% by 2050 and completely phased-out by 2060. At the same time, global GDP would be boosted by around 0.8% in 2050 – a cumulative gain of $19 trillion (tn). It writes:

“It is hard to over emphasise the importance of early action. Early action is needed not only in the deployment of renewables and other enabling infrastructure and supporting technologies, but also in the development of solutions for sectors where no significant or economically attractive solution exists today. If action is delayed, total investment costs will rise, the chances of stranded assets will increase and costly negative emission technologies will be needed to limit planetary warming.”

3) Seriously increase investment

The level of investment needed to achieve such an ambitious energy transition is sizeable. The IEA scenario would require an average investment of $3.5tn per year in the energy sector up to 2050 – almost double the $1.8tn invested in 2015.

However, to put it in perspective, this additional investment would only add up to a maximum 0.3% of global GDP in 2050.

Nearly all this extra investment would need to go into low-carbon technologies on the end-use side of the transition – such as electric cars, heat supply and building renovations – with required investment increasing tenfold by 2050. This would need to be supported by policy signals to ensure such technologies become the “market norm”.

Investment in energy supply, meanwhile, would stay more or less level: fossil fuel investment would decline, but this would be offset by a 150% increase in renewable energy supply investment by 2050.

The IRENA analysis puts the required extra investment by 2050 slightly higher than the IEA at 0.4% of global GDP. This would add up to a total investment of $29tn by 2050, in addition to an expected $116tn from current and planned policies and expected market developments.

The analysis also projects net positive impacts on both employment and economic growth. For more on the economic impacts of climate policy, see this detailed Carbon Brief case study for the UK.

4) Focus on renewables and energy efficiency

Under the IEA scenario, the share of the global energy supply provided by low-carbon sources would more than triple to 70% in 2050.

The largest share of the emissions reduction potential would come from renewables and energy efficiency.

Wind and solar would together need to become the largest source of electricity by 2030, while nearly 95% of electricity would be low-carbon (including nuclear and CCS) by 2050.

Seventy per cent of new cars would be electric – up from 1 in 100 today – the CO2 intensity of the industrial sector would fall by 80%, and all of today’s buildings which still exist in 2050 would be retrofitted.

Overall, the energy intensity of the global economy would need to drop by a yearly average of 2.5% up to 2050 – three-and-a-half times greater than the rate over the past 15 years.

The IRENA analysis puts yet more emphasis on a rising deployment of renewable energy and energy efficiency measures as “the key elements” of the energy transition.

Under its scenario, these would together produce 90% of the needed emission reductions by 2050, driven largely by increasing operational efficiency of these technologies, such as a fall in solar costs of 65% by 2050.

Renewable energy’s share of the primary energy would increase from around 15% in 2015 to 65% in 2050, leading final renewable energy use to be four-times higher than it is today.

This would translate to an average increase of 1.2% per year in renewables’ share of the energy mix – a rate seven times higher than in recent years.

Similarly to the IEA, energy intensity improvements would double to around 2.5% per year by 2030 and continue at this level until 2050. Nuclear power would stay at 2016 levels, while CCS would be used only in the industrial sector.

In addition, all this would need to be accompanied by an enormous effort to redesign electricity markets so they are capable of integrating large shares of variable renewables, as well as rules and technologies to ensure flexibility, the report says.

5) Tackle stranded assets

Use of fossil fuels is an area where the IEA and IRENA analysis diverge to some extent.

In both scenarios, use of fossil fuels remains significant in 2050, although global coal use declines rapidly. Oil use would also fall. However, natural gas is kept as a transition fuel for difficult-to-manage sectors, such as heat and transport.

In the IEA analysis, fossil fuels, in particular natural gas, would still account for 40% of energy demand in 2050 – around half of today’s level. In the IRENA scenario, total fossil fuel use in 2050 would be lower, standing at a third of today’s level, though oil demand would still be at 45% of today’s level.

This can be compared to a recent set of scenarios from Imperial College, which suggested fossil fuel use could peak by 2020, with the power sector becoming virtually fossil-free by 2040.

CCS also plays a strong role in both power and industry in the IEA analysis by offering an important way to minimise “stranded assets” in a low-carbon transition. Stranded assets are assets which will not be able to earn their expected economic return in a climate constricted world.

The IRENA scenario only uses CCS in the industry sector. It also warns that the use of natural gas as a “bridge” to greater use of renewable energy should be limited, unless it is coupled with high levels of CCS. “There is a risk of path dependency and future stranded assets if natural gas deployment expands significantly without long-term emissions reduction goals in mind,” the report says.

Both the IEA and IRENA agree that exposure to stranded assets will only continue to increase.

Assuming a well managed transition, the IEA’s analysis puts the financial exposure for all companies worldwide at $320bn, with the vast majority of this from coal plants. However, it warns that delaying the transition by a decade would more than triple the amount of investment at risk of being stranded to more than $1.3tn, assuming the same carbon budget is kept. The IEA has already said China’s new coal investments make “no economic sense”, with the projects effectively stranded even before they are built.

IRENA puts these risks at a far higher level, with an estimated $10tn in assets at risk of being stranded under its energy transition scenario. This is equivalent to 4% of global wealth in 2015, though IRENA emphasises that these costs are more than offset by gains in other parts of the economy under its renewables-led transition.

According to IRENA’s analysis, the risk of stranded assets is highest for the building sector: in its assessment of stranded assets, IRENA includes the construction value that would be lost due to the needed future renovation of building stock to avoid it relying on fossil fuels.

An example of a stranded asset in this case would be installing single-glazed windows then replacing them with double-glazed windows, rather than installing double-glazed windows in the first place.

In IRENA’s scenario, the long lifetime of inefficient buildings being built now means much of the existing housing stock “would continue to rely on fossil fuels” in 2050 unless it is renovated: implementing the needed renovations would strand around $5tn of assets.

Meanwhile, IRENA estimates that the overall stranded asset risk doubles to more than $20tn if rapid decarbonisation of the energy sector is delayed to 2030 and fossil fuel investments continue to rise.

6) Use price mechanisms

Price mechanisms, such as subsidies and carbon pricing, are crucial ways to ensure that the energy sector is taking climate considerations into account, the report says.

The IEA report says:

“A dramatic energy sector transition would require steady, long-term price signals to be economically efficient, to allow timely adoption of low-carbon technologies and to minimise the amount of stranded energy assets. Delayed action would increase stranded assets and investment needs significantly.”

Meanwhile, IRENA notes that the ongoing subsidising of fossil fuels in many countries, combined with the failure so far for a carbon price to account for the true cost of burning fossil fuels, means “today’s markets are distorted”. It adds: “To unlock these benefits, the private sector needs clear and credible long-term policy frameworks that provide the right incentives.”

However, both organisations are clear that price signals would need to be complemented by other measures to meet the “well below 2C” objective. They also point to the importance of ensuring that the energy needs of the poorest members of society are considered and adequately taken into account.

7) Seize the benefits (and co-benefits)

IRENA says it’s more renewables-intensive approach to the energy transition results in a larger overall benefit than the IEA’s approach, which keeps more reliance on fossil fuels.

It’s worth adding that the agencies took a different approach to measuring the benefits of transition. Different economic models, based on different underlying economic worldviews, can have a dramatic impact on the size and direction of economic change due to climate policy.

IRENA’s assessment sees global GDP boosted by around 0.8%, or $1.6tn, by 2050, through economic growth and new employment opportunities. The cumulative GDP gain from now up to 2050 amounts to $19tn. Even in its worse-case scenario, GDP is boosted by 0.6% in 2050.

IRENA says:

“The energy sector (including energy efficiency) will create around six million additional jobs in 2050. Job losses in fossil fuel industry would be fully offset by new jobs in renewables, with more jobs being created by energy efficiency activities. The overall GDP improvement will induce further job creation in other economic sectors.”

In fact, when externalities such as reduced air pollution and other health benefits are considered, IRENA’s approach projects the overall benefits to be between two and six times greater than the system costs of decarbonisation. In its scenario, 20% of the decarbonisation options identified are economically viable without consideration of welfare benefits, while the remaining 80% are economically viable if benefits, such as reduced climate impacts, improved public health, and improved comfort and performance, are considered.

In absolute terms, IRENA estimates reduced externalities can bring benefits of up to $10tn annually by 2050.

The IEA also notes drastic improvements in air pollution, cuts in fossil fuel import bills and lower household energy expenditures would complement the decarbonisation achieved, if well designed policies are used.

Both also note other co-benefits, such as lower fossil fuel bills for importing countries and lower household energy expenditures.

Similarly, analyses consistently show the costs of the UK’s Climate Change Act will be more than offset by a combination of fuel savings, avoided climate impacts and reduced air and noise pollution, even before wider economic impacts in terms of jobs and growth are taken into account.

Conclusion

As a group, the report notes, the G20 accounts for around 80% of the world’s total primary energy demand – including almost 95% of its coal demand and nearly three-quarters of its gas and oil demand. Overall, it is responsible for more than 80% of total CO2 emissions.

However, G20 countries are also the key driver of low-carbon technology deployment, holding 98% of global installed wind power generation, 96% of solar PV and 94% of nuclear power capacity. Its passenger vehicle fleet represents almost 95% of all electric vehicles worldwide.

This means G20 governments will have to play a crucial role in meeting the obligations under the Paris Agreement.

 Jocelyn Timperley holds an undergraduate masters in environmental chemistry from the University of Edinburgh and a science journalism MA from City University London. She previously worked at BusinessGreen covering low carbon policy and the green economy.

Originally published by Carbon Brief

US President Donald Trump, Trumpist Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull and pro-oil sands Canadian PM Justin Trudeau are acutely threatening the world with unlimited greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution from unlimited fossil fuel exploitation.  For the  US Canada and Australia, full exploitation of presently recoverable fossil fuel reserves would generate GHG pollution vastly exceeding (37-fold) the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget that must not be exceeded for a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2C temperature rise.  This climate criminality invites urgent global action through Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) and Green Tariffs.

Just when we thought that the dangerous, anti-science idiocy of the climate change denialists (climate skeptics) had finally been overcome by the overwhelming, circa 97%  scientific consensus that global warming is happening and is man-made [1] , the variously  ignorant and stupid American “deplorables” elected an ignorant, anti-science  neoliberal extremist and climate change denialist, Donald Trump,  as president of the United States.

Donald Trump has the virtue of explicitly stating what he thinks in very few words, and just prior to being elected promised: “On the first day of my term of office… I will begin taking the following seven actions to protect American workers… Fifth, I will lift the restrictions on the production of $50 trillion dollars’ worth of job-producing American energy reserves, including shale, oil, natural gas and clean coal. Sixth, lift the Obama-Clinton roadblocks and allow vital energy infrastructure projects, like the Keystone Pipeline, to move forward. Seventh, cancel billions in payments to U.N. climate change programs and use the money to fix America’s water and environmental infrastructure” [2].

Immediately on being elected, Trump  clearly and succinctly enunciated his policy  on unlimited fossil fuel exploitation and “clean coal” (2016): “On energy I will cancel job killing restrictions on the production of shale energy and clean coal, creating many millions of high-paying jobs” [3]. (Note that “shale energy” means non-conventional gas from “fracking” of  gas-rich shale deposits and non-conventional oil  extracted from shale rock). Trumpist Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull and pro-oil sands, neo-Trumpist Canadian PM Justin Trudeau have made similar commitments to massive GHG pollution from unrestrained exploitation of fossil fuel reserves.

It is crucially important to attempt to quantitate the greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution consequences of the  pro-fossil fuel policies of climate change denier Trump and his effective climate change denialist  Australian and Canadian lackeys. A powerful way of doing this is to relate the expected gigantic Trumpist GHG pollution to the Terminal  Carbon Pollution  Budget of the world that must not be exceeded if we are to avoid a catastrophic plus 2 degree Centigrade (2C) temperature rise.

The 2009 Report of the German Scientific Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU, Wissenshaftlicher Beirat der Bundesregierung Globale Umweltveränderungen) entitled “Solving the climate dilemma: the budget approach” crucially stated: “The budget of CO2 emissions still available worldwide could be derived from the 2 degree C guard rail. By the middle of the 21st century a maximum of approximately 750 Gt CO2 (billion metric tons) may be released into the Earth’s atmosphere if the guard rail is to be adhered to with a probability of 67%. If we raise the probability to 75%, the cumulative emissions within this period would even have to remain below 600 Gt CO2. In any case, only a small amount of CO2 may be emitted worldwide after 2050. Thus, the era of an economy driven by fossil fuels will definitely have to come to an end within the first half of this century” [4].

World Bank analysts have revised annual greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution upwards by 50% to 64 billion tonnes CO2-e (CO2-equivalent, this including contributions from other  greenhouse gases, notably methane, CH4)  by properly accounting for methanogenic livestock and land use for animal husbandry. A key element of their analysis was to use a Global Warming Potential (GWP) of methane (CH4) relative  to that of carbon dioxide (CO2) of 72 in a 20-year time frame rather than the 25 on a 100 year time frame used by the FAO [5]. Indeed the World Bank analysis evidently still understates the GHG pollution because NASA scientists have re-evaluated the GWP of CH4 as 105 in a 20 year time frame with aerosol impacts considered [6]. The same approach has been used to properly re-calculate annual per capita GHG pollution for all countries, and hence the best targets for  global Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) to save the planet) [7]. One notes, however, that in scoring climate criminal countries for relative culpability, a fairer  measure is annual per capita GHG pollution weighted for annual per capita income  [8].

In the last 8 years (mid-2009- mid-2017) GHG pollution has totalled 8 years x 64 billion tonnes CO2-e per year = 512 tonnes CO2-e and thus the whole world’s Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget  is down to 600 – 512 = 88 billion tonnes CO2-e as of mid-2017 i.e. the whole world has only about 1 year left before it uses up the last of its Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget for a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2 degree Centigrade  temperature rise [7]. We can now consider the Trump, Turnbull and Trudeau GHG pollution promises in detail.

Trump America.

According to the American Shale Oil Company (AMSO):  “The oil shale resources in the United States are comparable in scope and in kind to the bituminous sands (or tar sands) found in Alberta, Canada. The deposits in Alberta contain about 85% of the world’s bitumen reserves, and it is estimated that they hold 173 billion barrels of recoverable oil” [9].   One barrel is about 159 litres or 135 kg of oil (assuming a density of 0.85g/ml for oil) that corresponds to 118 kg carbon (assuming the oil is 87% carbon). Carbon has an atomic weight of 12 and CO2 a molecular weight  of 44. Combustion of 1 kg of carbon (C) yields 44/12 = 3.67 kg CO2. Accordingly,  complete combustion of one barrel of oil would yield 118 kg carbon x 3.67 kg CO2/kg carbon = 433 kg CO2 [10]. The “173 billion barrels of recoverable oil” in the Alberta tar sands corresponds  to 173 billion barrels x 0.433 tonnes CO2/ barrel of oil = 75 billion tonnes CO2 or 85% of the world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget of 88 billion tonnes CO2-e.

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) estimates for the US that “the total technically recoverable oil shale resource estimate [is] 2.6 trillion barrels” [11]. On combustion this 2,600 billion barrels of oil would yield 2,600 billion barrels x 0.433 tonnes CO2/ barrel of oil = 1,126 billion tonnes CO2, this being 1,126/88 = 12.8 or about 13 times greater than the world’s present remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.

One can do similar  calculations in relation to the Trump promise of unlimited exploitation of all American fossil fuel reserves. Thus the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) states that: “As of January 1, 2016, EIA estimated that the remaining U.S. recoverable coal reserves totaled over 255 billion short tons [231 billion tonnes]” [12]. Assuming – for the purposes of getting a ball-park figure –   that  this recoverable coal  is thermal coal (80% carbon,  and generating 2.9 tonne CO2 per tonne coal on combustion), then this recoverable coal corresponds on combustion to 231 billion tonnes coal x 2.9 tonnes CO2/ tonne coal = 670 billion tonnes CO2 , this corresponding  to 670/88 = 7.6 or about 8 times  more than the world’s present Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.

US recoverable gas reserves are about 324.3 trillion cubic feet (6.66 billion tonnes gas) [13] and combustion of 16 tonnes CH4 (methane) yields 44 tonne CO2 . Assuming for simplicity that the gas is all methane (CH4),   the CO2 from combustion of these gas reserves would be 6.66 billion  tonnes CH4 x 44 tonnes CO2/16 tonne CH4 = 18.3 billion tonne CO2. However CH4 is a gas, leaks and has a Global Warming Potential (GWP) 105 times that of CO2 on a 20 year time frame and with aerosol impacts considered [6]. One can calculate that  a systemic gas  leakage of 2.6% would contribute  as much GHG pollution as generating CO2 by burning the remaining  97.4% of the gas [14], and thus  pollution  from exploitation of US gas reserves would total 37 billion tonnes CO2-e , equivalent to 42% of the world’s present remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.

Assuming for the purposes of argument that  Trump’s promise of “$50 trillion dollars’ worth of job-producing American energy reserves” is thermal coal (80% carbon,  generating 2.9 tonne CO2 per tonne coal on combustion,  and presently  selling for $100 per tonne), then this corresponds to $50,000 billion x tonne coal/$100 =  500 billion tonne coal or about 500 billion tonne coal x 2.9 tonne CO2/tonne coal = 1,450 billion tonnes CO2 on combustion. This generated CO2  is  1,450/88 = 16.47 or over 16 times greater than the  world’s present remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.

Pro-fossil fuels Trumpist Australia.

Climate criminal Australia ignores the German climate change scientists who estimated in 2009 that the world must emit no more than 600 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) before 2050 if it is to have a  75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise [4]. Australia’s annual domestic plus exported greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution is so high that it exceeded its “fair share” of this terminal GHG pollution budget by mid-2011 and since then has been stealing the entitlement  of all other nations. Australia ‘s commitment to unlimited gas, coal and iron ore exports (supported by both the extreme Right governing Coalition and the Right-dominated  Labor Opposition)   means that it is committed to polluting the atmosphere with over 3 times the world’s total Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget as of mid-2009 (600 billion tonnes CO2-e) or 20  times the whole world’s Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget  of 88 billion tonnes CO2-e as of mid-2017 [15].

Recent revised estimates taking land use into account indicate that Australia ‘s annual Domestic per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution (52.9 tonnes CO2-e per person per year ) is about 20 times greater than the annual per capita GHG pollution of acutely climate change-threatened Bangladesh (2.7 tonnes CO2-e per person per year). However, Australia ‘s annual Domestic plus Exported per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution (116 tonnes CO2-e per person per year ) is about 43 times greater than the annual per capita GHG pollution of acutely climate change-threatened Bangladesh (2.7 tonnes CO2-e per person per year) [7]. Look-the-other-way, climate criminal Australia remorselessly excludes from public discussion its huge Exported GHG pollution (1511 Mt CO2-e Exported GHG pollution in 2015 as compared to 600 Mt CO2-e Domestic GHG pollution) [16].

Neo-Trumpist Trudeau Canada.

An assertedly progressive, politically correct and “nice” politician but actually a two-faced, climate criminal, Trump-lite, neo-Trumpist,  Canadian PM Justin Trudeau has alarmed climate activists by welcoming Trump’s approval of the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline [17] and approving 2 further pipelines to carry oil from Alberta tar sands to global markets [18]. Trudeau recently back-tracked on comments about phasing out tar sands oil , declaring that he had “misspoken” and really meant that Canada would not be using fossil fuels in 100 years’ time [19].

Back in 2012 Professor James Hansen commented thus on the Keystone XL pipeline: “Global warming isn’t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama  in Rolling Stone in which he said that Canada would exploit the oil in its vast tar sands reserves “regardless of what we do.” If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate. Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable. Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction. Civilization would be at risk” [20].

Fortunately,  according to Wikipedia [21],  only 178 billion or about 10% of the 1,700 billion barrels of oil in the Canadian tar sands is presently economically recoverable. The 178 billion barrels of recoverable oil in the Alberta tar sands corresponds  to 178 billion barrels x 0.433 tonnes CO2/ barrel of oil = 78 billion tonnes CO2 or about 89% of the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget  of 88 billion tonnes CO2-e as of 2017. Game over for the climate.

However where there’s a will there’s a way, as well  illustrated by the present Gadarene Canadian  exploitation of tar sands oil. If neoliberal greed ensures that all the Canadian tars sands oil is exploited then the GHG pollution (ignoring  that from purifying the oil) would be 1,700 billion barrels x 0.433 tonnes CO2/ barrel of oil = 736 billion tonnes CO2 or 736/88 = 8.4 or over 8 times more than the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget  of 88 billion tonnes CO2-e as of 2017. Game well and truly over.

Final comments and conclusions.

Trump’s commitment to unlimited fossil fuel exploitation means a commitment to GHG pollution over 16 times greater than the world’s present remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget (88 billion tonnes CO2-e) that must not be exceeded of we are to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic 2C temperature rise. Climate criminal Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull, with the support of the Labor Party Opposition, is resolutely committed to unlimited fossil fuel and related exports that would see Australia exceed by 20-fold  the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.  Trudeau Canada’s commitment to exploitation of its huge oil sands deposits will use up 89% of the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget. Indeed if the enterprising Canadians found a way of economically exploiting all the tar sands oil then this would generate GHG pollution over 8 times greater than the whole world’s remaining Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget.

The greed and exceptionalism of climate criminal Trump America, Trumpist Australia and neo-Trumpist Canada is further evidenced by revised annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution (in tonnes per person per year) of 52.9 for Australia ( 116 if including its huge GHG-generating  exports), 50.1 for  Canada, and 41.0 for the United States as compared to an average of  8.9 for the world,  7.4 for China, 2.7 for Bangladesh, 2.6 for Egypt, 2.5 for  Pakistan and 2.1 for  India [7].

The 2015 Paris Climate Conference goal of ideally no more than 1.5C will be exceeded in 4-10 years and it is now too late to avoid a catastrophic 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise [22-25]. Thus, for example,  in 2017 UK scholar Dr Andrew Simms (co-director of the New Weather Institute,  author of “Cancel the Apocalypse” and a research fellow on rapid transition at the University of Sussex) asked a number of leading climate scientists and analysts for their views on whether we could avoid a 2C temperature rise: “In short, not a single one of the scientists polled thought the 2C target likely to be met. Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London, is most emphatic. “My personal view,” he says, “is that there is not a cat in hell’s chance” [26].

Global CO2 pollution is increasing at a record rate of 3 ppm CO2 per year and atmospheric CO2 is at a record level of about 406  ppm CO2 [27]. The evident failure to tackle climate change is contributing to a worsening climate genocide in which 10 billion people may perish this century if global warming is not requisitely  addressed [28]. Already 7.5 million people die each year from air pollution (7 million) or climate  change (0.5 million). [24]. However the latter figure may be an under-estimate because 17 million people presently die avoidably each year from deprivation in Developing Countries that already disproportionately  impacted by climate change [29].  Saleemul Huq (director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development in Bangladesh) (2017): “The consequences of failing to keep the temperature below 1.5C will be to wilfully condemn hundreds of millions of the poorest citizens of Earth to certain deaths from the severe impacts of climate change” [26].

Professor Michael E. Mann (Distinguished Professor of Meteorology at Pennsylvania State University) has stated (2014):  “If we are to limit global warming to below two degrees C forever … we would have to limit CO2 to below roughly 405 ppm…  To avoid breaching the 405-ppm threshold [already breached in 2016], fossil-fuel burning would essentially have to cease immediately” [30].

Yet the anti-science, anti-Humanity, neoliberal  and effective climate change denialist Trumpist leaderships of the US, Australia and Canada are wilfully committed to unlimited fossil fuel exploitation and huge, terracidal GHG pollution. Indeed US President Trump and Australian  PM Turnbull have decorated their climate criminality with the false, moronic and oxymoronic assertion of “clean coal” [3, 31] –  yet “clean coal” is akin to “consensual rape”.  The deadly,  immoral and unlimited GHG pollution by the US, Australia and Canada  invites urgent global retaliation through Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) and Green Tariffs.

D'après les estimations des scientifiques, la Voie lactée se déplace dans l'espace à la vitesse vertigineuse de 630 kilomètres par seconde, soit 2,3 millions de kilomètres par heure. Pour expliquer ce déplacement, les recherches se sont portées par le passé sur la possibilité d'un excès de galaxies situées dans la direction générale de ce mouvement.

Cette hypothèse a conduit à l'identification du Grand Attracteur, une région d'une demi-douzaine d'amas riches en galaxies et situé à une distance de 150 millions d'années-lumière de nous. Sauf que ce Grand Attracteur ne permettait pas totalement de résoudre le mystère. L'attention des spécialistes s'est alors tournée vers une entité plus importante.

Dans la même ligne de visée, directement derrière le Grand Attracteur, ils ont découvert ce qu'ils ont appelé la Concentration de Shapley, un superamas de galaxies située à 600 millions d'années-lumière de nous qui jouerait également le rôle d'attracteur. Néanmoins, là encore, l'énigme ne paraissait pas totalement résolue.  

... et repoussée

En effet, les deux attracteurs ne semblaient pas suffire pour expliquer notre mouvement. D'autant plus que le déplacement ne pointe pas exactement dans la direction de Shapley comme cela devrait être le cas. Pour faire avancer le problème, les spécialistes ont alors avancé l'intervention potentielle d'une autre structure qui agirait également sur notre galaxie.

C'est précisément l'existence de cette région que l'équipe internationale constituée notamment de scientifiques du Commissariat à l'énergie atomique (CEA), a réussi à confirmer. Concrètement, il s'agirait d'une région sous-dense, un "vide" extragalactique qui exercerait une force de répulsion sur notre galaxie. D'où son nom de Dipole Repeller. 

"En cartographiant le flot de galaxies à travers l'espace, nous avons découvert que la Voie lactée est accélérée par une vaste région de faible densité auparavant inconnue", a expliqué le Pr Yehuda Hoffman de l'Université hébraïque de Jérusalem. "En plus d'être attiré vers la Concentration de Shapley, nous sommes aussi repoussés par le nouvellement découvert Dipole Repeller". 

Percer les secrets du vide extragalactique

D'après l'étude menée, les forces répulsives et attractives provenant d'entités lointaines seraient d'importance comparable à l'emplacement de notre galaxie. L'équipe en a ainsi déduit que les influences majeures à l'origine du mouvement de la Voie lactée seraient d'une part, l'attracteur de Shapley et d'autre part, cette vaste région du Dipole Repeller.

Cette découverte va permettre aux astrophysiciens d'en apprendre davantage sur le mouvement de notre galaxie. Toutefois, ils doivent encore percer les secrets de cette étrange région faite de "vide" dont on ne connait presque rien à l'heure actuelle.

"C'est pourquoi les astrophysiciens préparent maintenant des relevés ultra-sensibles en optique, proche-infrarouge et radio qui permettront d'identifier les rares galaxies qui peuvent résider dans et autour d'un tel vide afin d'en approfondir notre connaissance", conclut le CEA dans un communiqué.

Current carbon dioxide levels are unprecedented in human history and could reach a level unseen in millennia if their rates continue at this pace, a new report out Tuesday warns.

Research published in Nature Communications finds that if fossil fuel use continues unabated, the atmosphere could revert “to values of CO2 not seen since the early Eocene (50 million years ago),” a time when humans did not exist, by the middle of the 21st century.

Dana L. Royer, a paleoclimate researcher at Wesleyan University and co-author of the study, told Climate Central, “The early Eocene was much warmer than today: global mean surface temperature was at least 10°C (18°F) warmer than today. There was little-to-no permanent ice. Palms and crocodiles inhabited the Canadian Arctic.”

Because carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere for centuries, climate change would continue to impact the planet even if humans miraculously dropped emissions to zero after hitting that mid-century peak, Royer said.

Indeed, global warming may have already locked in the Antarctic ice sheet for unstoppable melting—driving sea level rise and threatening coastal communities worldwide.

The authors continue, “If CO2 continues to rise further into the twenty-third century, then the associated large increase in radiative forcing, and how the Earth system would respond, would likely be without geological precedent in the last half a billion years.”

The report comes as the Trump administration turns its back on climate regulations, issuing an executive order last week that aims to undo Obama-era policies keeping a lid on greenhouse gas emissions.

“Aside from provoking a large-scale nuclear war, it is hard to imagine an American president taking an action more harmful to the U.S. than [President Donald] Trump’s effort to accelerate greenhouse gas emissions,” David J. Arkush, managing director of Public Citizen’s Climate Program, said at the time.

“This day may be remembered as a low point in human history—a time when the world’s preeminent power could have led the world to a better future but instead moved decisively toward catastrophe,” Arkush added.

Originally published by CommonDreams

Let’s start with what we don’t know. Experts remain uncertain what chemical(s) were involved in the horrific chemical attack, almost certainly from the air, on the village of Khan Sheikhun in Idlib province in Syria.  The nerve agent sarin, chlorine, and unknown combinations of chemicals have all been identified as possible, but in the first 48 hours nothing has been confirmed. We don’t know for sure yet what it was that killed more than 75 people, many of them children, and injured many more.

Crucially, we also don’t know who was responsible. Western governments, led by the United States, and much of the western press have asserted that the Syrian regime is responsible, but there is still no clear evidence. Certainly Damascus has an air force, has been known to use chemical, particularly chlorine, weapons in 2014 and 2015. So that’s certainly possible.

The Syrian military denies using chemical weapons.  Their international backer, Russia, claims that the Syrian military did drop bombs in the affected area but that the chemical effect was not in the bombs dropped but rather from the explosion of an alleged chemical warehouse under the control of unnamed rebel forces. The same report by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons that found Syrian government responsibility for chlorine attacks also found that ISIS had used another chemical weapon, mustard gas, and investigated at least three other chemical weapons attacks whose perpetrators could not be identified.  So that could be possible as well.

For a variety of reasons, some of these possibilities don’t hold up so well if the chemical used this week was the sarin nerve agent — but we don’t know yet what it was.

There are some other, perhaps even more important things, that we do know. We know that in 2013, at the time of an earlier, even more deadly chemical weapon attack, similar accusations against the Syrian regime were widely made, assumed to be true, and used as the basis for calls for direct US military intervention in the civil war.  And we know those accusations were never proved, and that it remains uncertain even now, almost four years later, who was actually responsible.

And we know that the bombing of Syria in 2013 was averted, despite President Obama’s “red line” being crossed, because an enormous US and global campaign against such a disastrous escalation made it politically too costly to launch a new US war.  This was a president willing but not eager, or driven, to go to war. When Obama turned decision-making over to Congress, hundreds of thousands of people across the United States called and wrote and emailed their representatives, urging them to prevent a new war. In some offices calls were running six or seven hundred to one against a new bombing campaign.

And we know that President Obama turned it over to Congress in the first place because the British parliament, facing massive public opposition, made clear that the UK would not join its US ally in going to war against Syria. And eventually, when Congressional opposition became undeniable, Russia provided the US with a way out, arranging for international collection and destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal. Chlorine was not included, and it is certainly possible that Syria didn’t declare all of its weapons, or perhaps the precursor chemicals to make them, and but that claim was never proven. Ultimately, though, a US attack was averted.

Much is different now from 2013. The state of the Syrian civil war is far different – in 2013, the war was still new and uncertain; today it is recognized as the world’s most devastating conflict.  There is little chance of UK involvement in a military attack on Syria this time around, so the sudden resistance of a key US ally isn’t going to happen. Congress is not being consulted, and it is very unclear whether Congressmembers of either party are prepared to take on challenging a military campaign dressed up as a campaign for justice.

At the United Nations, Trump’s Ambassador Nikki Haley seemed to be channeling George W. Bush even more than her actual boss. She threatened that if the Security Council did not act according to US demands—meaning if it resisted authorizing military escalation in Syria—that the US was prepared to go alone. International law, the UN Charter, diplomacy be damned.

And this is a president, a cabinet, a White House with no military or diplomatic experience, with no understanding of the complications of the roiling Middle East conflicts or the consequences of war, and with a personal eagerness to demonstrate power. This is not a president accountable to a political party, to Congress and its constitutional role in military decision-making, and certainly less accountable to international law.

Trump’s incoherent reaction on Wednesday showed the lack of any strategic understanding in his foreign policy. He blames former President Obama for the crisis in Syria, while Trump of course had urged Obama not to attack Syria after the chemical bombing of 2013, tweeting in all caps “DO NOT ATTACK SYRIA — IF YOU DO MANY VERY BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN.”  He continued that criticism of Obama, but then switched gears to brag about his “flexibility,” noting that “my attitude towards Syria and Assad have changed very much.” It was a clear implication he’s considering a military response, although he pulled back from any clarity on that as well. Asked what his message would be to the Iranian militias supporting the Syrian military, Trump first went off on an unrelated attack on the Iranian nuclear deal, eventually circling back to a threatening but vague “You will see what the message will be. They will have a message.”

And the anti-Trump resistance that rose so heroically from the first moments of this presidency faces new challenges on a daily, even hourly basis. The mobilizations—in the streets, at the airports, at the White House, at the Supreme Court and beyond—and the letters and petitions and sit-ins and teach-ins and more, have been incredibly powerful.  Remobilizing those exhausted millions around an anti-war message will be a huge challenge for anti-war and indeed the whole range of social movements. As usual, much remains unknown.

But we know two crucial things, things that were true then, and remain true today.  We know that using chemical weapons—of any sort, in any war, against any target—is a crime. And we know there must ultimately be accountability for those who use it, regardless of who they are. That will take time.

In the meantime we know another truth: that a US military escalation against Syria (because we must not forget that US Special Forces and US bombers are already fighting there) will not help the victims of this heinous chemical attack, it will not bring the devastating war in Syria to a quicker end, it will not bring back the dead children. It will not defeat ISIS or end terrorism, it will create more terrorists. It will almost certainly cause more casualties, more injuries, and more dead. Maybe dead children.  There is still no military solution. This is what we know.

There are contradictory opinions about who on last Tuesday April 4^th used chemical weapons, which killed more than 80 civilians including children in the rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhun in Syria. Some pundits impute the deadly Sarin gas attack to Bashar al-Assad, while others believe terrorists belonging to the al-Nusra Front, which is an al Qaeda surrogate and friends with pro-Western Saudi Arabia and Turkey, are behind the attacks. There’s, however, no ambiguity about America’s missile attacks on Syria’s Shayrat airbase in the early dawn of Friday April 7^th. US government sources have confirmed 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from US warships in the Mediterranean hit the air base, from where they claim Assad’s forces launched the deadly chemical attacks on Syrian civilians.

Trump’s missiles killed nine civilians including four children in villages near the base. Meanwhile, Republican and Democrat leaders, analysts, and media in the US are supportive of the attack, which seems to have boosted President Trump’s self-confidence as the “Leader of the Free World”, a hyperbolic expression Americans use in self-glorification. The illegal missile attack is likely to improve the President’s sinking popularity among Americans, which was around 35 per cent last week, one of the lowest in US history.

What’s surprising – and extremely sickening though – is the way Western governments, media, analysts, and some of their counterparts across the world are analyzing the short- and long-term effects of the missile attack, without outright condemning it as war crime. As if only the Assad regime is responsible for human rights violations and war crimes, while the US is just “defending democracy and freedom”, as Americans always claim before and after all major wars and invasions it makes across the world. Sadly, only a handful of US analysts and politicians are publicly criticizing the Trump administration for attacking Syria without a UN Security Council resolution, and without seeking any approval from the US Congress either. However, the Congress approval for invading a country by the US, doesn’t bring any stamp of legitimacy for the crime, in international law.

Damascus, Moscow, and Tehran are openly condemning the attack. NATO and EU countries in general, and Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, and Turkey in particular are seemingly very happy with Trump as he punished Assad for “crossing the redline”. Some even praise Trump for not behaving like another Obama, who despite his promise, didn’t retaliate against Assad for “crossing the redline” by allegedly using chemical weapons against his own people, in 2013. While China isn’t relishing the attack, Russia has announced retaliatory steps against such attacks. It’s also going to strengthen Syrian air defence capabilities. Iran and Hezbollah have also registered their strong protests against this unlawful attack.

So far so good! However, those who are happy about the so-called “retaliatory attack” against Assad for his alleged use of chemical weapon against his own people don’t know several anti-Assad rebel groups also have piles of chemical weapons, and some of them have already used it in the recent past. On several occasions, neutral UN observers pointed fingers at some Syrian rebel groups, backed by the US, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey in 2012-2013, for chemical weapon attacks.

Syrian civil war is a cumulative long-drawn effect of multiple proxy wars in the region, between Washington and Moscow, and Tehran and the Riyadh-Telaviv-Ankara triumvirate, backed by Washington. It’s time to understand, Russia and China along with Iran and Hezbollah aren’t going to give up their interests in Syria. They aren’t going to accept a pro-Western regime there. In Syria, Russia has its strategically very important and only military base in the region. It has more than 100,000 “advisers” in the country. So, Trump’s missile attack in Syria is going to become an episode without any fruit for Washington and its allies. It’s time to reflect on what former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan emphatically stated in June 2012 after the failure of the UN-sponsored peace plan in Syria: “Syria is not Libya, it will not implode; it will explode beyond its borders”

Now, is Syria only a “strategic issue” or a battlefield for multiple proxy wars? No. It’s a small country with very diverse population, who profess different faiths, and are racially multi-ethnic as well. It used to be a peaceful country. Thanks to the influence of the Israel Lobby, America has had a problematic relationship with Syria since 1948. In March 1949, CIA toppled the democratically elected President Shukri al-Quwatly through a military coup d’état, and installed Colonel Husni al-Zaim (the “American Boy”) to power. Zaim legitimized Israel by signing an armistice with it, and allowed the ARAMCO to pipe Saudi oil to go through Syria to the Mediterranean coast. Afterward, America staged multiple military coups in Syria. Eventually, Syria became a self-reliant, free, modern, and secular dictatorship under Hafez al-Assad, who ruled from 1971 to 2000. His son Bashar al-Assad is the President since 2000.

In view of the above, there’s no reason to assume that what America, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and their allies are doing in Syria is anything but promoting democracy, human rights, and secularism. Syria is possibly the most secular country where Shia, Sunni, Maronite, Druze, Christian, atheists, pagans, and women enjoy much more freedom and equal opportunities than anywhere else in the Muslim World. If promotion of democracy and freedom is the prime US objective in Syria, one wonders as to why it is teaming up with Saudi Arabia and its reactionary allies, the thuggish Jabhat al-Nusra, Free Syrian Army, and last but not least, ISIS! As Fareed Zakaria told CNN this Friday (April 7^th), ISIS is a bigger threat to the free world than the Assad regime. “The weaker Assad gets, ISIS becomes stronger”, he spelled out.

Despite the sound and fury about Trump’s missile attack in Syria – which amounts to war crime – it’s nothing more than a balderdash, so much so that it’s only going to boost Trump’s sinking popularity among Americans, who are historically great admirers of presidents who invade countries and kill tens of thousands of civilians, in the pursuit of democracy, freedom, and glory for the “Greatest Nation on Earth”. Since the attack has agitated and angered Putin a lot, it could work like a steroid shot for Trump. He can now defend himself better from those who think Putin’s hackers were somehow instrumental in his victory in the Presidential election.

Nevertheless, a war crime is a war crime! The US has no international mandate to work as the custodian of any world order. There’s nothing called “US exceptionalism” in any textbook on international law or diplomacy. Any unilateral invasion of another country, without prior approval from the UN Security Council, is a flagrant violation of international law, hence a war crime. Unfortunately, the US has been behaving like a bull in the china shop since its annexation of Mexican territories in the 1840s. It’s invading countries, almost non-stop and with impunity from Hawaii to the Philippines, Hiroshima to Honduras, Indo-China to Indonesia, Afghanistan to Iraq, Libya, and Syria – and in the process, has killed multiple millions of innocent civilians across the world. Instead of justifying the latest US aggression in Syria, it’s time to condemn it as war crime. The UN should ask US to apologise to Syria, and pay compensation for the illegal attack.

The writer teaches security studies at Austin Peay State University. He is the author of several books, including his latest, Global Jihad and America: The Hundred-Year War Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan (Sage, 2014). Email: tajhashmi@gmail.com

Shooting from the hip with unerring accuracy was the Wild West according to Hollywood.  As anyone who has ever fired a pistol will tell you it is improbable, and historically the West’s few gun duels were rather unremarkable.  The latest hip-shooter is of course Donald J. Trump whose foreign policy seems to turn on a dime — from not interested in removing Bashar al-Assad to his having no place in a future Syria, all within a week.

The U.S. has a powerful military and it is very good at breaking things, so it is no surprise that presidents are tempted to use it.  It doesn’t matter that the  problem requires shrewd diplomacy and difficult negotiations; the president is making a point.

In a ridiculous Kabuki drama 59 Tomahawk missiles were fired off at Shayrat Air Base … after the Russians had been forewarned and had promptly informed their Syrian allies, who were spotted removing equipment and personnel.  Damaging a few hardened aircraft shelters and a few of the less serviceable aircraft makes the episode a token rather than a serious military attack.  And costing the U.S. taxpayer $1.6 million a piece for a total close to $100 million, this missile show left the U.S. a likely loser financially.

Who knows what happened in Idlib when there hasn’t been time for a proper investigation.  Eyewitnesses report a plane dropping a bomb which is not much to go on.  But a conventional bomb does its damage through its explosive force and would show much greater physical destruction at the site than a chemical weapon using a small quantity of explosive as a means for dispersing the gas.  An examination of the site could prove or disprove the Russian assertion that a conventional weapon hitting a storage/manufacturing facility released organophosphates.

No such analysis from anyone, least of all Mr. Trump as he shed crocodile tears for the poisoned ‘babies’.  Instant death from gas is clearly more humane than shrapnel.  It is why you won’t see any pictures from Yemen (they are much too gruesome) where Mr. Trump’s allies are making mincemeat out of men, women and children alike, even using cluster bombs in civilian areas.  That does not cross Mr. Trump’s ‘many lines’.  The Convention on Cluster Munitions bans their use and has been ratified by a majority of the world’s nations.

It was another time but the same place, the UN, when Secretary of State Colin Powell accused the Iraqis of concealing WMDs.  The denials of the Iraqi Ambassador were brushed aside, and the subsequent war continues in one form or another.  A million plus dead and many millions displaced, an ISIS monster  born, war in Syria and a refugee crisis in Europe.  The latter tipping the scales in Britain’s narrow Brexit vote.  Who could have imagined the consequences or the ultimate cost — initially estimated at $64 billion, but nearly $5 trillion and counting according to a Sept 2016 report by the Watson Institute at Brown University.

Now we have UN Ambassador Nikki Haley’s undiplomatic language accusing Syria of using chemical weapons.  The question not being asked in this propaganda war is simple:  What in heaven’s name does Syria gain from using sarin gas on its own civilians?  Assad is not an idiot.  Syria does not need the extra firepower, it certainly does not need the opprobrium of the world, and, if one may recall, it surrendered all its chemical weapons (under international supervision) after the last such incident four years ago.

Quite frankly, this accusation makes as much sense as the one about Iraqi soldiers in Kuwait removing premature babies from hospital incubators leaving them to die, to steal the incubators.  That one by the Kuwaiti Ambassador’s daughter Nayirah al-Sabah was gospel at the time, even corroborated by Amnesty International, and helped propel the first Iraqi war under George Bush Senior.  It was absolutely false.

When President Trump now says he is changing his mind about Assad, the objective seems to have been achieved.  Whether it was a shot fired by intransigent rebels to disrupt the Russia-sponsored Syria peace talks in Astana, Kazakhstan, or an accident, the results are highly satisfactory for those who do not want peace.  Again, it points not to Assad but elsewhere.

While military analysts like Col. Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, consider the Russian account “unsustainable” and “very fanciful,” the idea that a storage/manufacturing facility could have partially damaged weapons leaking after the blast heat had dissipated may not be.  The Russians are not fools and would not make a claim so easily dismissed .  And as yet without forensic evidence, nobody can be certain what nerve agent is responsible.

Dan Kaszeta also a former military man concurs with Bretton-Gordon.  Yet in 2013, the hexamine in government storage prompted him to blame the Assad regime for a chemical attack.  However, hexamine has many uses.  It was also determined that the triggering devices used containers and explosive not in use by the Syrian army.  The experienced Swiss prosecutor Carla Del Ponte, a member of the then UN Independent Commission of Enquiry on Syria, expressed “strong concrete suspicions” of rebel culpability.  A former Swiss attorney general and respected prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, her conclusion was categorical:  “This was use on the part of the opposition, the rebels, not by the government authorities,” she had ascertained.  Are military analysts unconsciously biased?

Now we are being told this is the second time Syria has used chemical weapons.  The fake news never stops and neither do leaders or their representatives.  Their currency is never counterfeit … until it’s too late.  In the 2013 incident, the fake news would have had us believe that Assad invited UN inspectors and then exploded a chemical weapon 10km from their hotel.

It is important not to demonize Assad not only because it is unconscionable if he is innocent of these war crimes, but also because peace without him is at present unattainable.  As a British MP, George Galloway, not taken in by the hysteria at the time said, “he may be bad but is he mad?”  Here we are back again and it’s time to repeat his question.  Also one more — the elephant-in-the- room question: WHY?

‘Remember the Maine’ before the Spanish-American War; the Lusitania carrying weapons despite Germany’s strong warning before the First World War; the ‘Gulf of Tonkin’ before the Vietnam war; the ‘undeniable evidence’ of WMDs in Iraq; and now Syria — an unrepentant tarnished history of varnished mendacity costing millions of lives and tens of millions of refugees in a trail of horrendous human suffering.

Truth would be refreshing, but it comes at a tremendous cost.  Ask some recent purveyors.

Dr Arshad M Khan (http://ofthisandthat.org/index.html) is a former Professor based in the U.S. whose comments over several decades have appeared in a wide-ranging array of print and electronic media.  His work has been quoted in the U.S. Congress and published in the Congressional Record.

It’s war in the Gulf and the U.S. Navy is on hand to protect us. No, not that Gulf! I’m talking about the Gulf of Alaska and it’s actually mock war — if, that is, you don’t happen to be a fin whale or a wild salmon.

This May, the Navy will again sail its warships into the Gulf of Alaska.  There, they will engage in military maneuvers and possibly drop bombs, launch torpedoes and missiles, and engage in activities that stand a significant chance of poisoning those once-pristine waters, while it prepares for future battles elsewhere on the planet.  Think of it as a war against wildlife, an assault on the environment and local coastal communities.

And call it irony or call it American life in 2017, but the U.S. military’s Alaska Command has branded Emily Stolarcyk “a troublemaker” for insistently pointing this out.  In a state where such a phrase is the equivalent of an obscenity, some have bluntly called her “anti-military.” The office of Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski has termed her a “rabble-rouser,” while a Kodiak Assembly member labeled some of what she’s been saying about the Navy “just silly.”

As a resident of the tiny fishing town of Cordova, Alaska, the most radical rabble-rousing thing about Stolarcyk may be the passion with which she loves this region of the planet in all its majesty. It’s why she’s taken a fierce and unwavering stand for years now against the ongoing training exercises the Navy carries out in the Gulf of Alaska during one of the largest migrations of birds and marine life on Earth. These exercises, which inject tons of toxic materials into the Gulf and use significant explosive ordnance, are once again scheduled to take place just as Alaska’s commercial fishing season opens.

Located in the state’s massive Chugach National Forest, coastal Cordova is nestled between the glacial-clad Chugach Mountains, Prince William Sound, and the Copper River. Fishing is the heart and soul of the town, as well as the foundation of its economy. A rough and tumble place, it regularly lands on lists of the top 10 American fishing ports, whether measured in pounds of fish caught annually or their value. A fish tax pays for its schools and the upkeep of most of its infrastructure. At least a quarter of its jobs are connected to the commercial fishing industry. “Without fishing, the town wouldn’t even be here,” says Stolarcyk, who knows the intricacies of the Navy’s plans better than most people in the Navy do, as we tour Cordova’s harbor.

It is impossible to overstate how iconic salmon are here. “What we have in Cordova is one of the last wild places left in the world, and one of the last places on Earth where we still have healthy salmon runs,” she tells me.  She’s the program director for the Eyak Preservation Council, an environmental and social-justice-oriented nonprofit based in Cordova, whose primary mission is to protect wild salmon habitat.

Her partner is about to start his seventh season as a commercial fisherman. Their apartment building even has a fish smoker. “Salmon bring this town to life, you can feel the energy once the fish start returning, it’s palpable,” she explains, excitement in her voice. “You can hear the boats coming in and people go to stand on the shore to welcome them back.”

However, this year, as in 2015, the Navy plans to conduct its part of Northern Edge 2017 (NE 17), a training exercise, right in her neighborhood. These war games, which occur every other year, include ships, aircraft, ordnance, and the widespread use of sonar across more than 42,000 square nautical miles of the marine environment of the Gulf of Alaska. And it is well known that sonar causes injury and death to whales, dolphin, and other marine life.  It has been shown that whales will even beach themselves to escape the noise, which is more than 100 decibels louder underwater than even the loudest rock concert. Thanks to a major lawsuit against them, the Navy agreed to limit the use of certain kinds of sonar in Southern California and Hawaii, due to its impact on the endangered Blue Whale along with other species. But not in the Gulf of Alaska.

Fishing for an Answer

As in 2015, the Navy’s plans threaten an area of the Gulf that couldn’t be more biologically sensitive or rich in wildlife.  Their training area includes a State of Alaska Marine Protected Area, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Protected Area, and both the Gulf of Alaska Seamount Protected and Slope Habitat Conservation areas.

Nevertheless, the Navy is requesting permits to use live ordnance including bombs, missiles, and torpedoes, along with active and passive sonar in “realistic” war-training exercises that could release as much as 352,000 pounds of “expended materials” into those waters including, according to the Navy’s own Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), missiles, bombs, and torpedoes.

These waters support some of the most valuable fisheries left in the United States and the commercial fishing industry is the single largest private sector employer in the state of Alaska, providing over 63,000 jobs. Nevertheless, the Navy’s own EIS claims that fish in the area are at risk of chemical exposures of various sorts because the war games will introduce chromium, lead, tungsten, nickel, cadmium, cyanide, and ammonium perchlorate, along with numerous other heavy metals and toxic substances, into Alaskan waters.  According to the EIS, “Little is known about the very important issues of nonmortality damage in the short and long-term, and nothing is known about the effects on behaviour of fish.” It adds that “potential effects” include “death or damage” and that “fish not killed or driven from a location by an explosion might change their behavior, feeding pattern, or distribution.”

While the Navy itself is aware of some of the damaging impacts of its exercises, others remain unknown and that service is making no effort to learn what they might be. The precautionary principle of do no harm is clearly not operative here.

The Navy’s EIS does estimate that, during the years in which these war games are to be conducted, there will be more than 182,000 “takes” — direct deaths of marine mammals or disruptions of their essential behaviors like breeding, nursing, or surfacing. On fish deaths, it offers no estimates at all.

A partial list of affected species includes blue, fin, gray, humpback, minke, sei, sperm, and killer whales, the highly endangered North Pacific right whale (of which there are only about 30 left), as well as dolphins and sea lions. No fewer than a dozen native tribes including the Eskimo, Eyak, Athabascan, Tlingit, Sun’aq, and Aleut rely on the area for subsistence living, not to speak of their cultural and spiritual identities.

As the May 1st launching day for NE 17 looms, we already have at least some inkling of just what kinds of damage might result.  Immediately following Northern Edge 15, Alaska witnessed the single largest whale mortality event ever to occur in its waters.  Eighteen carcasses of endangered whales were found floating near Kodiak Island within the area in which the Navy had conducted its exercises, attracting national media attention.

Statewide, in the year that followed, Alaska had its worst pink salmon fishing season in four decades.  A federal disaster declaration was even issued to give salmon fishermen some relief, deferring the repayment of loans. That year also saw the biggest die off of Murres, a small seabird, ever recorded in the state.

Human-caused climate disruption impacts had long been noted across the North Pacific, whose climate-change-affected waters were warming to record temperatures that year. While this obviously played a role in such events, what impact the naval exercises had across the Gulf of Alaska remains largely unknown, in part because the Navy refused in 2015 — as it will again this year — to allow independent observers on its ships or to conduct follow-up studies focused on how their war games impacted the environment and marine life.

Local opposition is strong, as 10 Alaskan communities have passed resolutions requesting that the Navy move the timing and location of Northern Edge 2017 and all future training events to the fall or winter months and further offshore to minimize their impact on fisheries and migrations. Furthermore, the mayors of Cordova, Girdwood, Tenakee Springs, and Valdez sent letters to Senator Murkowski, requesting that she ask the Navy to relocate NE 17.  The senator, hardly a critic of the military, nonetheless wrote the secretary of the Navy last September to “express concern over the manner in which the Navy is approaching its participation in Northern Edge 2017,” and called a lack of naval public affairs guidance “extremely troubling.”

Assistant Secretary of the Navy Dennis McGinn replied, “I readily admit we could have done a better job reaching out to potentially affected stakeholders leading up to NE 15.”

Stolarcyk is truly a David going up against the naval Goliath. Her dedication to this region of the planet has been and continues to be unwavering.

“How could you live in this place and experience all this beauty and not get how precious this is,” she asks with typical intensity as we walk near her town’s harbor and bald eagles soar above us. “I love this place so much, and I can’t even let myself feel all my emotions when I’m working on this issue, because I wouldn’t be able to function.”

The late afternoon sun is just beginning to hint at the evening to come as she stares out into the waters of the Gulf, takes several deep breaths, and says, “We have to defend our lifestyle here, because if we don’t do it, who else is going to do it? If the Navy destroys the Gulf of Alaska, they can just leave, while we’re the ones who have to live with whatever is left.”

“The Navy Is Getting Away With Murder”

My trip to Alaska to report on the upcoming war games began in the small ski town of Girdwood, a 40-minute drive east of Anchorage. There, Stolarcyk and I met up with her colleague, Christina Hendrickson, as they continued their efforts to push the Navy’s schedule for the war games out of prime wildlife season. Hendrickson, who specializes in environmental law, is a former defense contractor. Like two high-octane lawyers before a big trial, she and Stolarcyk instantly begin talking a mile a minute about what their next moves should be.

They bring me up to speed on the latest Navy maneuvers in what is now a publicity war over Northern Edge 17 and the way its officials have officially opted to “work with the stakeholders.” On the other hand, as Hendrickson points out to me, “they have refused to meet with Emily and myself” — and, as it happened at that point, me, too.  I’d recently contacted Captain Anastasia Schmidt, director of public affairs for Alaska Command in Anchorage, to arrange a meeting and my request had been denied.

Unfortunately, as Hendrickson points out, the permits the Navy requested from both the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Marine Fisheries Service allow them to war game their hearts out in the Gulf for the next five years without taking the slightest responsibility for analyzing the potential impact of their actions or dealing with the myriad species migrating through the area during the training period. While those who fish here must adhere to environmental standards, the Navy doesn’t have to.

“Imagine that you have a friend who is a subsistence fisherman,” Hendrickson says, “who is looking at his nets each season, and on the seasons the Navy trains, there seems to be less fish in them, and there are less whales returning, and then there’s a huge Murre die off.  There are sick sea otters or sea otters not returning at all. It’s obvious to me that the Navy is not connecting these dots.”

I ask her what exactly drives her on this issue and she stares out the window at the still snow-covered trees, then looks me dead in the eyes and says, “The Navy is getting away with murder and that upsets me.”

“If It Walks, Swims, or Crawls, I’ve Fished It”

Stolarcyk and I fly on to Kodiak Island where we meet up with Tom Lance, the natural resources director for the Sun’aq tribe. We’re there so that the two of them can make a presentation to the island’s Borough Assembly in hopes of inspiring another Alaskan community to pass a resolution against the timing of the exercises.

Lance and I sit down in a café on the outskirts of town and he immediately begins describing the massive whale carcasses floating in the Gulf of Alaska after Northern Edge 15, many of which washed ashore on Kodiak.  As he points out, just before those war games began, the Sun’aq and Afognak tribes “admonished the DOD [Department of Defense] for not respecting their people and their resources, and demanded that NE 15 not take place. The Navy told the tribal council representatives, basically, ‘thank you.'”

After essentially being blown off, the tribes requested another meeting, which only happened after the exercises were over. At that time, they insisted that the Navy change the season for the next set of exercises to late fall or winter and the location as well. “Another condition was for them to account for fish take [that is, the disturbance or destruction of fish populations], as if it were a commercial fishing operation where they are given a total allowable catch. To this they responded that they don’t harvest fish, so why should they have to track that?”

“From my observation,” Lance says, “I see an undercurrent of frustration within the tribes and the community of fishermen that the Navy is going to do what they are going to do no matter what we say.” He takes a last sip of coffee and concludes, “Everybody is so focused on the short run right now, they’re forgetting about the long run. If we don’t save the ocean as a potential place to farm, we’re not going to be able to feed ourselves in the future.”

Later, I visit with Alexus Kwachka, a Kodiak commercial fisherman for the last 30 years. A bear of a man, he shakes my hand vigorously while welcoming me into his home, which overlooks Kodiak’s massive harbor.  When I ask him what he’s fished for, he responds, “If it walks, swims, or crawls, I’ve fished it.”

He wastes no time going after the Navy. “I question their timing. They say they don’t want to train in the winter and instead they plan it for during the largest migratory period of marine life and birds here.” Fishermen on the island, he assures me, are increasingly apprehensive about the Navy’s plans and its impact on their livelihoods, even though “folks here are patriotic and support the military.”

Prior to Northern Edge 15, Kwachka lined his boat up with dozens of others in the harbor in protest. Now, he’s concerned again and feels slighted that the military doesn’t consider his voice worth listening to.  He says emphatically, “We’re worried about the fact that they are allowed to bring in a load of boats and blow shit up all over the place.”  If they do that, he tells me, the ill effects “start out with the little guys then go up through the whole food web, which is another reason not to do it in the Spring when the forage fish are both reproducing and traveling.  It’s just not a good time to be introducing toxins and blowing things up on top of them. The chemical fallout from those explosions goes down through the food web and is eaten or absorbed by the fish.”

“Food Security Is National Security” 

That evening, Stolarcyk, Lance, and I head over to the Kodiak Island borough building for their meeting. In a small, cramped basement room, several members of the assembly are around a table, while the rest of us are seated on chairs along the walls.

The two of them give their brief talks with a slide show.  As soon as they’re done, Councilman Matt Van Deale indicates that he’ll sponsor the resolution they want, adding, “Food security is national security and we are a fishing town.” A second councilperson responds favorably to the resolution as others nod.

Suddenly, Councilman Kyle Crow speaks up, questioning the threat of toxic wastes. “I know about how hazardous waste is defined and I’ve seen folks declare a block of concrete with a chip of paint on it as hazardous waste.” Stolarcyk promptly projects a slide she’s already shown that displays a chart taken from the Navy’s environmental impact statement indicating that more than five tons of toxic materials could be introduced into the fertile fishing areas of the Gulf each time the Navy conducts a training event.

Crow also questions the dangers of the Navy’s use of sonar, comparing theirs to what he uses on his own fishing boat. Again, Stolarcyk pulls up a slide showing that the Navy’s sonar generates audible blasts up to 235 decibels — humans begin to suffer hearing damage at 85 decibels — that travel for thousands of miles across the ocean. Crow nods in response to the new information, given that it is straight out of the Navy’s own documents.

Councilman Larry LeDoux then requests that the assembly hear the Navy’s side of the story and insists that such war games are necessary, as is the missile testing already happening on Kodiak, because of North Korea’s ability to reach the United States with a missile.  (Not that it can yet.)

Despite these bumps, the majority of the assembly appears to favor the resolution.

The next morning Lance shares an email he sent to councilman Van Deale, thanking him for volunteering to sponsor the resolution. “It is hard to understand,” he wrote to Van Deale, “how some people in Kodiak’s local government (and outside) distrust others who work to protect the sustainability of the very resources that have built the same Kodiak Archipelago economy and heritage!”

Two weeks later, Kodiak became the 10th Alaskan community to pass a resolution opposing the timing and location of the Navy’s exercises.

A day after that, in a letter to the commanders of the Navy’s Pacific Fleet and U.S. Pacific Command, Senator Murkowski, who is also the chair of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, requested that the Navy “give serious thought” to changing the timing of the 2019 war games and moving their location due to impacts on marine life. “I expect to address these issues with senior leaders when the Navy appears before the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee next month,” she wrote.

“We Just Don’t Know How Bad It’s Going to Be”

Cordova is the image of what coastal Alaska once was. There are no cruise ships and the fishing industry still dominates the town, although some of its fisheries were wiped out in 1989 when the tanker Exxon Valdez spilled at least 11 million gallons of crude oil and they have never recovered.

Two years ago, I met James Wiese here.  He is an engineer on an Alaska Department of Fish and Game research vessel. A third generation Cordova mariner, he’s also a local city councilman. At that time, he was already expressing his fears that someday his children might not be able to eat the food that comes out of these waters.  He returned to the subject recently, telling me, “Anyone trying to consume seafood here knows how fragile everything is and is very concerned about what is going to happen to it because it’s part of their everyday life.” He adds that, within his department, the bulk of his colleagues support the resolutions calling on the Navy to alter its plans.

Cordova, he assures me, is “very much in opposition to the training” and still can’t believe the Navy is unable to find a time for their exercises when the salmon and the rest of the sea life in the Gulf aren’t at their height.  “It’s a food web and if salmon get tested and show contaminants from the Navy, everything is at stake. There are safer places for these Navy drills to happen. They need to be conscientious about what they are affecting.”

Clay Koplin is Cordova’s mayor. “It’s pretty simple,” he tells me. “The Navy has the whole span of the year to practice and they picked the absolute worst time to do their exercise. We asked for a conversation in hope of changing the timing,” he adds, turning his hands over in a gesture of puzzlement. “That’s how a conversation works. We hoped to find some middle ground, but thus far there’s been nothing to indicate they are willing to find that middle ground.”

That same day, I meet Kelly Weaverling, the first Green Party mayor ever elected in this country.  He took office in Cordova in 1990, right after the Exxon Valdez oil spill. A former naval navigator in nuclear fast-attack submarines, he is now a Zen Buddhist monk as well as a fisherman.

Sporting a shaved head and dressed in a black Zen robe, grey turtleneck, and sandals with wool socks, Weaverling strides in quietly, yet purposefully, having come straight from leading a three-hour meditation for the community. “What the Navy is doing, we know it is going to be bad,” he begins calmly. “We just don’t know how bad it’s going to be. It’s pretty easy to figure out.  Anybody can do that.”

I ask him to explain and he responds, as though instructing me before one of his meditation sessions, “Is something positive, negative, or neutral is the question. Anything you do is going to have an effect, even if it’s a non-action… So the question is, what effect is it going to have? The Navy’s action will not have a positive effect on the ocean or any of its creatures. It’s going to be a negative effect, we just don’t know how bad.”

“In Your Backyard?”

In the end, I even received a response from Captain Schmidt of the Alaska Command, who agreed to answer some of my questions by email.  I asked her what measures the Navy had taken in the wake of NE 15 to mitigate impacts on marine life. She responded by claiming flatly and without qualification that the new exercises would have “no significant impacts to marine life,” and that the Navy had already gone through “an extensive and comprehensive permit process” with the National Marine Fisheries Service (as they are, in fact, required to do by law).

Why then, I wondered, do its commanders refuse to allow independent wildlife observers aboard their vessels during the training exercises?

To do so, she insisted “would result in unacceptable impacts to readiness,” an odd response given that the only “impact” would assumedly be the use of binoculars.

As Northern Edge 2017 approaches, one thing is clear enough.  Despite growing opposition in Alaska, the Navy continues to do just what it wants in the state’s once-pristine, biologically rich Gulf waters.  Who knows how long it will be before parts of its vast marine web begin to test positive for the Navy’s toxins?

As a journalist, I’ve spent time in Iraq and seen the devastation the U.S. military can visit on a society firsthand.  But I must admit that I never expected to see it in Alaska, whose tallest mountains I spent a decade of my life climbing — where, thanks to Denali (the highest peak in North America), I fell madly in love with this planet. As someone who now regularly reports on climate disruption, I wonder daily how many more decades whole areas of the biosphere will even remain habitable. At a purely personal level, that makes the Navy’s ongoing war against Alaska’s waters and the wildlife in them unconscionable to me.  And in the age of Trump, it’s unlikely the Navy high command will spend much time worrying about the environmental damage its war games are likely to cause.

For most Americans, Alaska is, of course, a distant, almost mythic place. But don’t be fooled.   In Alaska, there’s a broader lesson to be learned from these war games.  Christina Hendrickson makes the point in a way that speaks vividly to my own life experience. “If the Navy is able to come up to this pristine, biologically, ecologically and economically important area and train for war across three training cycles spanning six years and not engage local communities,” she says, “and if we’re allowing this to happen in areas where subsistence is carried out by people who have relied on it for millennia, why couldn’t this happen in your backyard?”

Dahr Jamail, a TomDispatch regular, is a recipient of numerous honors, including the Martha Gellhorn Award for Journalism and the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism for his work in Iraq. He is the author of two books: Beyond the Green Zone and The Will to Resist. His next book will be The End of Ice (the New Press). He is a staff reporter for Truthout.  This is a joint TomDispatch/Truthout report..

[This essay is a joint TomDispatch/Truthout report.]

The Russian and Syrian denials are true if they are innocent and lies if they are guilty of the suspected  chemical weapons attack that killed 90 people including 30 children in Syria. However Trump, US and US Alliance certitude over Russian and Syrian guilt is clear, proven, warmongering lying in the absence of findings from expert and independent investigators. Meanwhile a mass murdering, child-killing Trump continues to make endless war  on famine-wracked Somalia and Yemen where half of the starving populations of 11.2 million and 27.9 million, respectively, are children.

From 2011 in a process of egregious state terrorism and state-sponsored non-state terrorism,  the US, UK, France, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Apartheid Israel, Jordan and Turkey have variously backed rebellion against the Syrian Government under Bashar al-Assad by  increasingly jihadi-dominated Sunni Syrian rebels that include the  Free Syrian Army and jihadi groups like Al-Nusrah.   The secular and democratic Kurds, violently opposed by a decreasingly secular and decreasingly democratic Turkey, have contained the Turkey-facilitated IS (Islamic State) in the north. The fanatical and barbarous Sunni jihadi IS (that was generated by the genocidal and war criminal US Alliance invasion of Iraq and has been variously covertly supported by Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Apartheid Israel and Turkey) dominates the eastern half of Syria but now faces inevitable eventual destruction in Iraq by US Alliance, Iranian and Iraqi forces  and in Syria by everybody. Russian, Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah  support has been crucial for the survival of the Syrian Government which is now dominant in the western half of Syria through control  of the 3 biggest cities, Damascus, Aleppo and Homs.   The US Alliance-backed Syrian Genocide has been associated so far with 0.5 million violent deaths, a comparable number of deaths from war-imposed deprivation, and 11 million refugees, 6 million of whom are Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) [1, 2].

Syria is presently subdivided  into (a) the Apartheid Israel-occupied Golan Heights,  (b) Rebel-  and non-IS jihadi-ruled areas, (c) Syrian Government-ruled areas, (d) Kurdish-ruled areas, and  (e) IS-ruled areas. With the likely defeat of IS in the near future, Syria may have a chance under Assad or a like-minded leader of reverting to its former unitary existence. However a re-unified Syria  is opposed by a  Zionist-subverted US  and Apartheid Israel that want the destruction of Syria by Balkanization for reasons connected with divide-and-rule hegemony, gas and oil exploitation  and distribution plans, and, I suspect, Apartheid  Israeli need for water. Trump’s escalation of the Syrian crisis to a pre-WW3 level over 30 murdered children is simply a pretext for intervention to trump and cripple  Russian-backed Syrian re-unification as discussed below.

1. Alleged chemical weapons use as a pretext for US Alliance invasion, conquest and Balkanization of Syria.

The US Alliance would like a “free fly zone” in Syria that would enable destruction of Syria (formerly the most religiously tolerant country in the  Middle East) [3] just as a UN-permitted  “free fly zone” enabled the France-UK-US (FUKUS) Alliance destruction of Libya (formerly the most prosperous  country in Africa). In 2013 the US Alliance used alleged Syrian Government use of poison gas in the Ghouta atrocity as the basis for demanding formal UN green-lighting of US Alliance intervention. However this move was thwarted by Russian intervention that forced the Syrian Government to hand over such weapons for destruction and sign the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) [4, 5], noting that it is clear that both  the US Alliance-backed Rebels as well as the Syrian Government had access to such weapons [6-8 ].

Presently  192 states, including Syria,  have signed the  CWC but genocidal, serial war criminal Apartheid  Israel has signed but not ratified it,  and Egypt, North Korea and South Sudan have not signed. One notes that chemical weapons have been seen as a “poor man’s weapon of mass destruction” and nuclear terrorist Apartheid Israel has an arsenal of up to 400 nuclear weapons [9]. 5 UN member countries have refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) , of which 4 have nuclear weapons (India, Apartheid Israel, Pakistan and North Korea)  ( South Sudan has also not signed). Egypt’s refusal to sign the CWC is directly connected with nuclear terrorist Apartheid Israel’s refusal to sign the NPT [8].

The recent suspected chemical weapons atrocity in Syria (at Khan Sheikhoun near Idlib with 90 killed, including 30 children) has been used as a pretext for a massive and war criminal US attack on Syria, US adumbration for further  attacks,  and  renewed US calls for the removal of Bashar al-Assad (regime change).  The US actions, threats and demands have been supported by the US Alliance with the endlessly warmongering, anti-Arab anti-Semitic, pro-Zionist, US lackey Australian Government and Opposition united in  their support for the US position (in contrast, the humane Australian Greens have been quite sceptical and have suggested the US attack was for domestic political reasons).  The Syrian Government and the Russians deny the alleged use of chemical weapons.

2. Syrian Rebel and jihadi possession of chemical weapons.

Unlike the CMC signatory Syrian Government,  the US Alliance-backed  non-state Rebels are not bound by the CMC and indeed are evidently in possession of chemical weapons. Thus back in 2013 Carla Del Ponte (formerly Switzerland’s attorney general, prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), and a member of the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria) indicated that there was evidence  that rebel groups had access to sarin nerve gas: “According to their report of last week, which I have seen, there are strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof of the use of sarin gas, from the way the victims were treated … I was a little bit stupefied by the first indications we got… they were about the use of nerve gas by the opposition” [10].

Seymour Hersh (Pullitzer Prize-winning journalist  for his  expose of US Government  cover-up of the  Vietnam Mylai Massacre) on the US-UK attempt to invade Syria based on a chemical weapons lie (2013):  “In 2011 Barack Obama led an allied military intervention in Libya without consulting the US Congress. Last August, after the sarin attack on the Damascus suburb of Ghouta, he was ready to launch an allied air strike, this time to punish the Syrian government for allegedly crossing the ‘red line’ he had set in 2012 on the use of chemical weapons… Then with less than two days to go before the planned strike, he announced that he would seek congressional approval for the intervention. The strike was postponed as Congress prepared for hearings, and subsequently cancelled when Obama accepted Assad’s offer to relinquish his chemical arsenal in a deal brokered by Russia… Obama’s change of mind had its origins at Porton Down, the defence laboratory in Wiltshire. British intelligence had obtained a sample of the sarin used in the 21 August attack and analysis demonstrated that the gas used didn’t match the batches known to exist in the Syrian army’s chemical weapons arsenal. The message that the case against Syria wouldn’t hold up was quickly relayed to the US joint chiefs of staff. The British report heightened doubts inside the Pentagon; the joint chiefs were already preparing to warn Obama that his plans for a far-reaching bomb and missile attack on Syria’s infrastructure could lead to a wider war in the Middle East. As a consequence the American officers delivered a last-minute caution to the president, which, in their view, eventually led to his cancelling the attack ” [11].

3. There is no conclusive report yet from an expert  independent inquiry into the  Khan Sheikhoun disaster.

Obviously, in the absence of conclusions from an expert, independent  inquiry the world does not yet know who was responsible for the alleged chemical gas attack that killed about 90 people including  about 30 children in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in the Idlib region of north-western Syria.  Trump and many US Alliance lackeys immediately and unequivocally blamed the Syrians for using chemical weapons.  However the Syrians and Russians have suggested that the chemical incident arose because  of the bombing of a Rebel/jihadi warehouse containing chemical weapons. A search of the UK BBC and the Australian ABC (the Australian equivalent of the UK BBC) reveals that the phrase “suspected chemical attack” is widely and indeed properly used by both media. UK Labour Party leader and Leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, demanded independent verification: “Unilateral military action without legal authorisation or independent verification risks intensifying a multi-sided conflict that has already killed hundreds of thousands of people.”  However, US lackey, UK PM Theresa May, indicated the lack of proof in tweeting: “”We condemn the use of chemical weapons in all circumstances. If proven, this will be further evidence of the Syrian regime’s barbarism” – but then supported the US strike.

Donald Trump and US lackey politicians of the US Alliance have no such equivocation and declared that (a) a chemical attack happened and (b) the Syrian was government was responsible (with Russia sharing the blame). Donald Trump declared: “Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad launched a horrible chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians.” US lackey Canadian PM Justin Trudeau supported the US attack and widened the blame to countries supporting Assad: “Countries that have been supportive of the Assad regime bear some of the responsibility for the chemical attacks on civilians”. US lackeys Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull and Leader of the Opposition  Bill Shorten blamed Syria and supported the US strike, as did  US lackeys President German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande. Of course, Apartheid Israel, the nuclear terrorist tail wagging the American dog, supported the US strike.

Thus even if ethical journalists  talk of “suspected chemical attack” and “independent investigation”, lying Yellow Press and lying politician populism win out. Thus the results (in brackets) from Google Searches of the following phrases: “suspected chemical attack”(1,010,000) , “Syria’s chemical attack” (303,000), and “Assad’s chemical attack” (185,000).

The Russian Government  in a statement about the chemical incident stated : “[Putin] pointed out that it was unacceptable to make groundless accusations against anyone without conducting a detailed and unbiased investigation” [12].

The Iranian President Hassan Rouhani condemned the US strike and demanded an impartial  investigation: “We are asking for an impartial international fact-finding body to be set up… to find out where these chemical weapons came from” [13].

Sergei Lavrov ( Russian Foreign Minister): “[US strikes are] an act of aggression under a completely invented pretext…Everything resembles the situation of 2003, when the USA, the U.K., and several of their allies invaded Iraq without the UN Security Council’s approval – a grave violation of international law – but at that point they at least tried to show some [concocted] material evidence” [14].

Robert Fisk (eminent UK journalist based in Beirut ): “So did Bashar al-Assad use gas? The Russians must know. They are in the air bases, in the ministries, in the military headquarters. And if they say the Syrians did not use gas, then they had better be sure. The Russians had advance warning of Trump’s 59 Cruise missiles. Many hours of warning – not the one hour that Washington claims – and would have ensured that Syrian jets were way out of the air base. Russians are not to be killed in the Syrian war; their presence would have meant casualties. Did the Syrian army, a trifle arrogant, perhaps, after their capture of eastern Aleppo decide to try to bring the war to an end in a quick way? The question must be asked. In the past, villages in which army officers lived – and in which their families lived – have been gassed. The Syrians blamed the Turks for giving the gas to Jabhat al-Nusra, the al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, and Isis. The Russians said earlier gas attacks on Damascus used chemical components shipped via Turkey to Syria from Libya” [15].

Sacha Llorenti (Sacha Sergio Llorenti Soliz, Permanent Representative and Ambassador of Bolivia to the United Nations) addressing the UN Security Council (UNSC) about the US attack on Syria: “[As the UNSC was] discussing and demanding the need for an independent and impartial investigation [into the Idlib atrocity, the US was] preparing—once again—to carry out a unilateral attack… The United States has not only unilaterally attacked, the United States has become that investigator, has become the prosecutor, has become the judge, has become the jury. Whereas the investigation would have allowed us to establish in an objective manner who is responsible for the attacks, this is an extreme, extreme violation of international law… [UN has] developed instruments of international law to precisely prevent a situation where the most powerful attack the weakest with impunity and to ensure a balance in the world… [historically] many episodes in which…various powers… have acted unilaterally and violently. But that it happened once again does not mean that the UN must accept it… On Wednesday, February 5, 2003, the U.S. Secretary of State came to this room and came to present to us, according to his own words, “convincing proof that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq” … [holding the image of Powell] I believe that we must absolutely remember these pictures…We were told that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and this was the motivation for the invasion. After the invasion there were 1 million deaths and it launched a series of atrocities in that region. Could we talk about [the Islamic State] if that invasion had not taken place? Could we talk about the serious and horrendous attacks in various parts of the world if that illegal invasion had not taken place? I believe it is vital to remember what history teaches us” [16].

Farooque Chowdhury ( Dhaka, Bangladesh writer): “With the pounding of 59 Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles on Shayrat airbase in Syria the Empire has widened its aggression in the strategically crucial country… Following a chemical weapon attack in East Ghouta in Syria in 2013, the Syrian authorities agreed to transfer its chemical weapons to international control for destruction so that these weapons don’t fall into the hands of militants operating in the country. Syria also joined the Convention on the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons following the chemical weapon attack. The Office for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said in January 2016 that all chemical weapons in Syria had been destroyed. Those were destroyed on board a US vessel, and were destroyed under UN supervision… Doesn’t fairness demand that there should be a multi-national, full-fledged investigation of the reported chemical weapons attack in the vicinity of the Khan Shaykhun settlement in the Idlib province on April 4? The OPCW is in the process of gathering and analyzing information from all available sources. In this context isn’t the US missile attack an imperialist intervention?” [17].

4. Cui bono & Means, Opportunity and Motive (MOM) – Rebels and jihadis had means and opportunity,  benefited immensely from the gas attack  disaster,  and may have been responsible.

In any incident  of unproven attribution one can ask: “Cui bono?” – who benefits? The Syrians have suffered immensely  from this attack whereas the Rebels/jihadis have benefited enormously. The Rebels/jhihadis had opportunity and had access to chemical weapons whereas the Syrian government supposedly surrendered all such weapons in its possession  for US-monitored  destruction after a similar (and likely similarly  mis-attributed) gas attack  incident at Ghouta in 2013. Consider the following expert opinions:

Dmitry Peskov (Kremlin spokesperson): “The fact is that we no longer know what goals Washington pursued when deciding to carry out these strikes, but it is univocal that they are launched de facto in the interests of Daesh [IS], al-Nusra Front and other terrorists. In this connection, we can only express regret… So far, it can be said unequivocally that these strikes did harm to the fight against terrorism… We deeply regret this and are very much concerned in this regard” [18].

Günther Meyer (director of the Research Center for the Arab World at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz): “Only armed opposition groups could profit from an attack with chemical weapons. With their backs against the wall, they have next to no chance of opposing the regime militarily. As President [Donald] Trump’s recent statements show, such actions make it possible for anti-Assad groups to receive further support” [19].

Matthias von Hein (editor at Deutsche Welle): “Is the regime of President Bashar al-Assad responsible for the chemical weapons attack in northern Syria? Experts suggest it could have been jihadi rebels. It wouldn’t be the first time… Obama’s Director of National Intelligence at the time [of the 2013 Ghouta attack] , James Clapper, was able to dissuade Obama from ordering a cruise missile strike, according to a newly-published book by Mideast expert Michael Lüders. Presumably, a deciding factor was an analysis of the chemical weapons used in Ghouta, conducted by a British military lab, which found the gas to be of a different composition than the Syrian army possessed.  … Assad has not hesitated to use ruthless means to stay in power. In confronting the most recent use of chemical weapons in Syria, credible questions remain as to why Assad would bring world opinion against him at a time when his continued rule is beginning to be accepted” [20].

Patrick Henningsen (writer, investigative journalist, filmmaker,  founder of the news website 21stCentury Wire.com and an Associate Editor of the Alternative news site Infowars.com ): “The US-led ‘Coalition’ prepares to make its end-run into Syria to ‘Retake Raqqa,’ and impose its Safe Zones in order to partition Syria, more media demonization of the Syrian government appears to be needed by the West. On cue, the multi-billion dollar US and UK media machines sprung into overdrive this morning over reports based primarily from their own ‘activist’ media outlets. Aleppo Media Center and others embedded in the Al Nusra-dominated terrorist stronghold of Idlib, Syria, alongside their media counterpart the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights  (SOHR) funded by the UK and EU, are all now claiming that the Syrian and Russian Airforces have launched a chemical weapons airstrike killing civilians in Idlib. In their report today entitled “Syria conflict: “chemical attack” on Idlib kils 58”, the BBC is also alleging in their report that Sarin gas was used. The alleged “chemical airstrikes” are said to have taken place in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, about 50km south of the city of Idlib. Predictably, the BBC and other similar reports by CNN, have triggered a wave of ‘consensus condemnation’ and indignation by the usual voices… But is the mainstream media’s version of events what actually happened?… In 2013, the US and UK went on an all-out propaganda blitz to try and implicate the Syrian Government in advance of war votes in both Washington and London. The campaign failed. The following are links to a small sample of factual reports publicly available which clearly show that the alleged “Sarin Attack” in 2013 [on the Damascus suburb of Ghouta] was in fact the work of western and Gulf-backed ‘opposition rebels’ (terrorists) and not the Assad government, and all of these reports have been more or less ignored by CNN, BBC and the entirety of the western mainstream media – because they do not fit into the western ‘regime change’ and US-led military intervention narrative: Seymour M. Hersh https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line …” [21].

Bill Van Auken (politician and activist for the Socialist Equality Party and was a presidential candidate in the U.S. presidential election of 2004): “The day after US warships rained some 60 Tomahawk missiles on a Syrian government airbase, US officials made it clear that this unilateral and criminal attack against an oppressed former colonial country is merely the first shot in what is to be an escalating and widening campaign of American military aggression. The governor of Syria’s central Homs province reported Friday that the missiles killed at least 15 people, including nine civilians. Four of the dead were children. Many more civilians were injured by two of the missiles, which struck nearby villages. Six of the dead were Syrian personnel at the al-Shairat airbase. The missile strike was the first time that Washington has carried out a direct military attack against Syrian government forces since the US and its regional allies orchestrated a war for regime change utilizing Al Qaeda-linked Islamist “rebels” as its proxy ground troops. The attack on the airbase is a direct intervention in that war on the side of the Al Qaeda elements… Washington seized on an alleged incident Tuesday involving chemical weapons in the village of Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib province as the pretext for Thursday night’s attack. Syria has denied any use of such weapons, and Washington and its allies have presented no evidence to support their allegations in relation to the incident, which has all the earmarks of a provocation staged by the CIA and its Islamist proxies”[22].

Dr Jon V. Kofas (retired university professor of history specializing in International Political economy, and author of ten academic books and two dozens scholarly articles): “Nothing unifies America at home and rallies support among its allies quicker than a bombing of a Muslim nation, no matter the ideological, political, and moral justifications about the military option as a first resort before or after the bombing… This is not to imply that the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad (2000-present) has been politically and socially just; certainly no more so than others in the region allied with the US against Syria in the civil war started in 2011 and intended to bring down the regime that the US, UK, France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Israel, [Qatar] and Turkey oppose…. On 6 March 2017, the US hit Syrian Shayrat Airfield with 59 missiles from two ships in the Eastern Mediterranean. The reason given was that US officials “believed” – not knew as and had verified by the UN – that Damascus was responsible for the use of gas warfare against jihadist rebel targets a few days before where 100 civilians died. The UN Security Council had requested time to investigate the use of chemical weapons to determine what actually took place. Russia argued that Syria’s chemical weapons had been removed in 2014 and that its planes hit a gas chemical weapons site belonging to jihadists, thus releasing the toxic chemicals that killed innocent civilians” [23].

Jim Miles (Canadian educator and a regular contributor to The Palestine Chronicle): “It is apparent given the timelines and the lack of time given to verifying the validity of accusations concerning the gas attack in [Idlib] Syria, that plans had already been coordinated for such an attack … Who benefits? As for the chemical attacks, if one does use some rationality, meaning who benefits from it, the answer is definitely not Assad, and Assad should not be mistaken for either stupid or irrational. The beneficiaries are ISIS and al-Nusra (al-Qaeda in Syria). One of the side line winners as always with U.S. military mayhem in the region, is Israel, a country all our politicians seem to fawn over in spite of their terrible human rights and international law record. Israel would love to have all the rest of the Middle East broken up into fighting little fragments of tribal groups in order that their tribe can dominate the region, its resources, and perhaps find a ‘final solution’ to the Palestinian demographic problem” [24].

Dr Tim Anderson (humane Australian academic and author of “The Dirty War on Syria” [25]): “There is no independent evidence and no plausible motive to implicate the Syrian Government. The main sources of this allegation are those working closely with the al Qaeda groups … I have a responsibility to educate the public, especially in face of the constant misinformation from Australia’s corporate and state media” [26]. Dr Tim Anderson has further stated: “The chemical attack is certainly a war crime, but there is no real independent evidence that it was carried out by the Syrian government… The main sources of this allegation [of Syrian/Russian guilt] are those working closely with the al Qaeda groups and they have a history of deceit. On the other hand, there is a long history, from 2012 onwards, of the al Qaeda groups using chemical weapons, at time falsely blaming this on the Syrian Army… The Syrian Army certainly has been bombing and killing many hundreds within the al Qaeda groups in Idlib, without need for CW. Nor does the Syrian state possess such weapons, since the unilateral disposals of 2013 – 2014, which were held as a deterrent against nuclear armed Israel. The US (which was involved in the process) has previously agreed that this disposal was effectively carried out. On the other hand, al Qaeda stocks of chemicals have been discovered several times, including early this year in east Aleppo. See this report: http://www.mintpressnews.com/syrian-soldiers-allegedly-find-saudi-chemical-weapons-in-east-aleppo/224204/  “ [27].

I offered the following in defence of Dr Tim Anderson in his exchange with the Australian ABC’s Media Watch program: “Dr Tim Anderson’s comments, his appended statement and his alternative suggested hypothesis of a jihadi false flag are eminently reasonable and consistent with numerous correct ABC reports of a suspected/alleged chemical weapons attack that the US and US Alliance blame on the Syrians/Russians, an allegation that the Syrians/Russians deny. However the Media Watch segment while not being formally incorrect had a slimy bias best exampled by “But in the face of that [US Alliance] chorus of certainty a bizarre coalition of the Hard Left and Extreme Right has joined the Russians and Syrians to cast doubt on it all”. In 2013 the Russians persuaded the Syrian Government to surrender chemical weapons for destruction but the UN found evidence that such weapons were in the hands of the Rebels/jihadis. The Russians/Syrians may be lying (if guilty) or telling the truth (if innocent) but the US/US Alliance certitude in the absence of findings from expert independent investigation is unequivocal lying and indeed “fake news” whatever the reality” [26].

5. The US attack on Syria was an imperialist aggression on a dubious pretext.

In the absence of an expert independent investigation, the US attack on Syria was clearly simply another  imperialist aggression on a dubious pretext. Thus the following expert opinions:  

Professor Francis A. Boyle ( international law,  human rights and genocide expert) on US attack on Syria: “Historically, this latest eruption of American militarism at the start of the 21st Century is akin to that of America opening the 20th Century by means of the U.S.-instigated Spanish-American War in 1898. Then the Republican administration of President William McKinley stole their colonial empire from Spain in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines; inflicted a near genocidal war against the Filipino people; while at the same time illegally annexing the Kingdom of Hawaii and subjecting the Native Hawaiian people (who call themselves the Kanaka Maoli) to near genocidal conditions… By shamelessly exploiting the terrible tragedy of 11 September 2001, the Bush Jr. administration set forth to steal a hydrocarbon empire from the Muslim states and peoples living in Central Asia and the Persian Gulf and Africa under the bogus pretexts of (1) fighting a war against international terrorism; and/or (2) eliminating weapons of mass destruction; and/or (3) the promotion of democracy; and/or (4) self-styled “humanitarian intervention”/responsibility to protect. … This current bout of U.S. imperialism is what my teacher, mentor and friend Hans Morgenthau denominated “unlimited imperialism” in his seminal work Politics Among Nations (4th ed. 1968, at 52-53): … It is the Unlimited Imperialists along the lines of Alexander, Rome, Napoleon and Hitler who are now in charge of conducting American foreign policy. The factual circumstances surrounding the outbreaks of both the First World War and the Second World War currently hover like twin Swords of Damocles over the heads of all humanity” [28].

James Cogan (a staff writer for the World Socialist Web Site): “The pretext for the US attack is the sinister and dubious allegation that Assad’s air force used chemical weapons in an attack on a rebel-held town on Tuesday. The claims are dubious, above all, because the Syrian government had no motive to use such weapons, knowing that it would be seized upon to demand that Trump order a direct US-led intervention. The Islamist rebels, by contrast, along with their CIA advisors, had ample motive under conditions in which they are facing complete military defeat. Moreover, the Al Qaeda-linked al-Nusra militia is known to be in possession of, and to have used chemical weapons… On the other side of the world, an indication of how numerous US allies may respond has been given in Australia. The country’s defence minister was phoned by US officials several hours before the US strikes. Australia has fighter-bombers and other aircraft operating with American forces in Syria and Iraq. Both the [Coalition] government and the main Labor Party opposition have made statements fully endorsing the US strike, though Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull would not confirm if the Australian military would join attacks on the Syrian government” [29].

Colin Todhunter (a former social policy researcher and an independent writer and author writing on food, agriculture, geopolitics and globalization): “We now have the situation in Syria where deception once again trumps reality  as the US seeks to gain support for broadening its military campaign to balkanise Syria and redraw the map of the Middle East. Unfounded claims about Assad using chemical weapons are front page news, mirroring similar baseless claims that occurred a few years back and mirroring the lie of WMD in Iraq. Millions are dead in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Afghanistan as the US and its allies play out a continuation of a modern-day ‘Great Game’… The world is in the grip of a structural war against people, land, economies and ecosystems. It is being waged by organised, institutional criminal interests bent on monopolizing energy, food and violence across the globe. From farmer suicides and failed Bt cotton in India and the impacts of glyphosate in Argentina to war in Syria and beyond, theirs is a neoliberal doctrine of death and destruction” [30].

Kim Petersen (a former co-editor of “Dissident Voice”): “DN [Democracy Now] begins with the leading statement of “worldwide outrage mounts over an alleged chemical weapons attack in Idlib province, which was reportedly carried out by the Assad government…” No evidence is presented to support the accusation, and the accusers also are unnamed. What kind of journalism is this? It would be completely nonsensical and insane for Syria to use chemical weapons while the war is turning in its favor. And, of course, there is evidence that refutes the allegation. For the record, when a Zionist and war criminal Barack Obama was bent on attacking Syria in 2013 following false accusations that the Assad government used sarin gas in Ghouta, Syria – to preempt the threatened invasion Assad agreed (UN Resolution 2118) to give up Syria’s stockpile of chemical weapons (a deterrence against Israel’s nuclear weapons). Now the Syrian government stands accused of using a chemical that was disposed of under international supervision. Is the Syrian government that stupid to risk another threat of invasion by using a non-conventional attack? And why is this new gas attack in Idlib taking place just after Rex Tillerson declared that it is the Syrian people who should decide the fate of their current president?” [31].

6. The US attack on Syria violates International Law.

International Law says that a nation can only invade another country (a) if it has been invited to do so  by that  country, (b) if it or another nation  has been invaded by that country, or  (c)  if it has been permitted to do so by the UN Security Council, with extensive pre-invasion dialogue being a fundamental  requirement. In this instance, (a) the Syrian Government has not invited the US to invade its territory, (b) the Syrian Government has not invaded the US, (c) the UN Security Council has not permitted such a US invasion of Syria, and there has been no  extensive pre-invasion dialogue (e.g. of the kind that preceded the illegal US, UK and Australian invasion of Iraq in 2003). Trump and his war-making associates are war criminals in gross violation of International Law and his US Alliance lackeys like Canada, Australia, the UK, France and Germany are accessories  to this US  war crime. Consider the following expert, humane opinions:

The words of Sacha Llorenti (Permanent Representative and Ambassador of Bolivia to the United Nations) at the UN Security Council (UNSC) about the US attack on Syria are worth repeating in this context: “[As the UNSC was] discussing and demanding the need for an independent and impartial investigation [into the Idlib atrocity, the US was] preparing—once again—to carry out a unilateral attack… The United States has not only unilaterally attacked, the United States has become that investigator, has become the prosecutor, has become the judge, has become the jury. Whereas the investigation would have allowed us to establish an in an objective manner who is responsible for the attacks, this is an extreme, extreme violation of international law… [UN has] developed instruments of international law to precisely prevent a situation where the most powerful attack the weakest with impunity and to ensure a balance in the world… [historically] many episodes in which…various powers…have acted unilaterally and violently. But that it happened once again does not mean that the UN must accept it” [16].

John Wight (journalist widely published in Alternative media and more progressive Mainstream media): “Without any recourse to international law or the United Nations, the Trump administration has embarked on an act of international aggression against yet another sovereign state in the Middle East, confirming that neocons have reasserted their dominance over US foreign policy in Washington. It is an act of aggression that ends any prospect of détente between Washington and Moscow in the foreseeable future, considerably increasing tensions between Russia and the US not only in the Middle East but also in Eastern Europe, where NATO troops have been conducting military exercises for some time in striking distance of Russian territory. In the wake of the horrific images that emerged from Idlib after the alleged sarin gas attack, the clamor for regime change in Damascus has reached a crescendo in the West, with politicians and media outlets rushing to judgement in ascribing responsibility for the attack to the Syrian government. No one knows with any certainty what happened in Idlib, which is why an independent investigation should have been agreed and undertaken in pursuit of the truth and, with it, justice” [32].

Taj Hashmi (who teaches security studies at Austin Peay State University and author of several books including “Global Jihad and America: The Hundred-Year War Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan”): “The US has no international mandate to work as the custodian of any world order. There’s nothing called “US exceptionalism” in any textbook on international law or diplomacy. Any unilateral invasion of another country, without prior approval from the UN Security Council, is a flagrant violation of international law, hence a war crime. Unfortunately, the US has been behaving like a bull in the china shop since its annexation of Mexican territories in the 1840s. It’s invading countries, almost non-stop and with impunity from Hawaii to the Philippines, Hiroshima to Honduras, Indo-China to Indonesia, Afghanistan to Iraq, Libya, and Syria – and in the process, has killed multiple millions of innocent civilians across the world. Instead of justifying the latest US aggression in Syria, it’s time to condemn it as war crime. The UN should ask US to apologise to Syria, and pay compensation for the illegal attack” [33].

Rosemarie Jackowski ( humanitarian  journalist, activist,  and  author of “Banned in Vermont”): “The attack on Syria is a violation of the U.S. Constitution, International Law, and the Geneva Convention.  Why did President Trump make this disastrous decision? We may never know why. BUT we do know that the decision was not made to protect those ‘beautiful little babies’.  No U.S. president in recent history has ever placed any value on the lives of babies, children, or any other civilians.  Remember Madeleine Albright saying that the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children were ‘worth it’.  U.S. Policy is so devoid of any compassion that it dehumanizes those we kill and refers to them as “collateral damage”. When Trump says he did it to protect babies, we need to ask which babies. The babies starving to death in Somalia, the babies we kill with drones, the babies in Yemen, the babies who drown while escaping a war zone, the Palestinian babies, the babies who are refugees that we will not allow in our country.   No, President Trump does not care about the beautiful babies.  That is not why he used Tomahawk Missiles in Syria” [34].

The official Korean news agency KCNA quoting an unnamed spokesman for the North Korean foreign ministry: “The US missile attack against Syria is a clear and unforgivable act of aggression against a sovereign state and we strongly condemn this. The reality of today proves our decision to strengthen our military power to stand against force with force was the right choice a million times over” [35]. One notes that 28% of the North Korean population was killed in US bombing  in the 1950-1953 Korean War [36], a Korean Genocide with genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention being “:acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group” [37].

7. The Russians and Syrians may possibly be lying or telling the truth, but the US and its allies are unequivocally  lying about the Idlib chemical weapons disaster.

Truth is the first  casualty of war. The Russians and/or the  Syrians may be  (a) telling the truth (if they had no hand in the gassing atrocity) or  (b) lying (if they were responsible). However in the absence of a report from expert, independent investigators, Donald Trump and his US and US Alliance supporters are undoubtedly and  unequivocally lying by baldly asserting that the Russians and/or the  Syrians were responsible because either (a) they do not actually know what happened,  or (b) were actually complicit in rebel use of poison gas as a false flag pretext for US military intervention.

UK PM Theresa May is an interesting exception within the US Alliance because, while supporting the war criminal US action against Syria,  she is awaiting proof  of the Syrian Government’s complicity in the Idlib atrocity:  “We condemn the use of chemical weapons in all circumstances. If proven, this will be further evidence of the Syrian regime’s barbarism”. I am quite sure that Theresa May was brought up as a “nice girl who doesn’t lie” by her parents and has read the brilliant and exquisitely  truthful works of English novelist  Jane Austen who, like Theresa May, was daughter of a Church of England clergyman. Jane Austen’s novels were set in the utterly peaceful and  rarefied  environment   of the English upper class at the time of the Napoleonic Wars and the consistent theme in all her novels  was utter detestation (“disapprobation”) of untruth and deception (see my huge book “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History” [38]).

8. Endlessly  racist and serial war criminal  American Governments have invaded over 70 nations but lie and always need a pretext.

The 4th of July is Independence Day for the United States of America and commemorates the 4 July 1776 Declaration of Independence for America, the key passage of which is “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. Unfortunately entrenched American racism has grossly violated the proposition that “all men are created equal” and the worst form of racism involves invasion and devastation of other countries. The US has invaded about 70 countries since its inception and has invaded a total of about 50 countries since 1945 [39-41] . Indeed  I have suggested that the 4th of July  be celebrated as Independence From America Day [39]. A properly informed  World needs to urgently declare a transition from the 4th of July as Independence for America Day to the 4th of July as Independence From America Day.

To be precise, the US has invaded 72 countries  (including Syria; 52 after WW2).  The list does not include the 1801-1805 US Marine Barbary War operations against Barbary pirates based in Morocco , Algeria , Tunisia and Libya , and also ignores massive US subversion of virtually all countries in the world and US bases in about 75 countries [39]. By way of comparison,  over the last millennium the  British have invaded 193 countries, Australia 85, France 82, Germany 39, Japan 30, Russia 25, Canada 25,  Apartheid Israel 12 and China 2  [41-46].

The remarkable thing about American imperialism is that it always requires an “excuse for war” or “casus belli” . The excuses for war are typically pretexts purveyed by remorseless  Mainstream media lying [47-50] and in particular by Mainstream media fake news by lying by omission [49, 50].  Consistent and monumental American Government and pliant Western Mainstream media lying is compelling evidence in itself for  the utter fraudulence  of the US Government’s 9-11 deception. Numerous science, architecture, engineering, aviation,  military and intelligence experts have concluded that the 9-11 atrocity (about 3,000 killed) was  a US Government false flag atrocity (with likely Zionist and Israeli complicity) that was used as a pretext for the post-9-11 War on Terror [51, 52]. The US War on Terror (in reality a genocidal  US War on Muslims)  has, so far, been associated with 32 million Muslim deaths from violence, 5 million, or imposed deprivation, 27 million, in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since 9-11 [53]. The US-mediated Syrian Holocaust and Syrian Genocide (0.5 million dead, 11 million refugees) is part of a wider and horrendous  Muslim Holocaust Muslim Genocide and a genocidal,  Zionist-backed US War on Muslims [54].

The 9-11 false flag deception  that led to the genocidal invasion of Afghanistan by the US Alliance and thence  20 other countries  from Mali to the Philippines [52-54],  must take its place with other excuses for American imperialist wars e.g. defeat of American invaders at the  Alamo ( seizure of present-day South-western USA, Texas and California from Mexico),   the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor (blamed on the Spanish by the Yellow Press; Spanish-American War), the sinking of the arms-laden Lusitania (long-term British denial of arms shipment; US entry into WW1), Pearl Harbor (permitted to occur notwithstanding  and US and UK pre-knowledge; US entry into WW2) [38]; Korean invasion of their own country (Korean War), the fictional Gulf of Tonkin Incident (US Indo-China War), alleged threat to US students (US invasion of Granada) , General Noriega’s longstanding CIA-linked drug involvements (US invasion of Panama), and false claim of Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (war criminal invasion of Iraq by the US, UK and Australia) [40, 41, 51].

Just as there is no report from an independent investigation of the Idlib atrocity proving Syrian Government  guilt in this atrocity, so there has been no formal trial of those accused by the lying Bush Administration of the 9-11  atrocity. Indeed the FBI had Osama bin Laden on its Most Wanted List but not for his alleged complicity in 9-11, an allegation that he denied  [52]. Osama bin Laden was allegedly killed by US forces in 2011 and his body rapidly disposed of at sea according to the endlessly  lying Obama Administration. Further, Western Mainstream media continue to remorselessly lie by commission and lie by omission  for a genocidally racist,  serial war criminal and  exceptionalist America [47-50].

9. Trump’s crocodile tears over Syrian children as he  makes war on famine-wracked and starving Somalia and Yemen populations (50% children).

Trump is a pathological liar and falsely justified his illegal attack on Syria on the basis of the Idlib atrocity and the horrible deaths of about 30 children: “My fellow Americans: On Tuesday, Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad launched a horrible chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians. Using a deadly nerve agent, Assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children. It was a slow and brutal death for so many. Even beautiful babies were cruelly murdered in this very barbaric attack. No child of God should ever suffer such horror. Tonight, I ordered a targeted military strike on the airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched. It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons. There can be no dispute that Syria used banned chemical weapons, violated its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention, and ignored the urging of the U.N. Security Council” [55].

Trump has only been in power for several months but he has inherited the bloody mantle from his predecessor as US President, Barack Obama,  as the world’s leading war criminal, warmonger, war-maker, opiate drug pusher,  and killer of men, women and children. Under Trump the US Alliance is making war in 20 significantly or substantially Muslim countries and the US per se is directly making  war in 8 of these countries, namely (West to East) Libya,  Somalia,  Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Philippines. The UN reports that 20 million people – half of them children –  are now facing famine and starvation in Nigeria, South Sudan, Somalia and Yemen. Child-killer Trump is obscenely and unforgivably making endless war in Somalia and Yemen, countries with populations (50% children) of 11.2 million and 27.9 million, respectively, and which  are presently ravaged by drought, famine and starvation [56].

In the 14-year post-9-11 period of September 2001- November 2015, there were an estimated  26.8 million Muslim avoidable deaths from deprivation in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since 9-11 [53] i.e. 26.8 million/14 = 1.91 million avoidable deaths per year. For impoverished Developing countries, under-5 infant deaths are about 0.7 times the avoidable deaths and hence there were 1.91 million x 0.7 = 1.34 million under-5 infant deaths per year in these invaded countries. If 90% of these infant deaths were avoidable then there were 0.9 x 1.34 million = 1.21 million avoidable under-5 infant deaths per year or 1.21 million /365.25 = 3,312 such avoidable  under-5 year old infant deaths each day from war-imposed deprivation . War criminal Trump as leader of the US Alliance is killing these  3,300 Muslim under-5 year old infants each day through imposed deprivation  just as surely as if he were bombing, shooting or gassing them [41].

Final comments and conclusions.

The ultimate in racism is invading another country “with intent to destroy in whole or in part”, conduct that is  defined as genocide by the UN Genocide Convention [52]  When Trump was elected worried people asked who is next in the American firing line? Now we know – Syria,  that Trump now seems to have condemned to de facto Balkanization  and endless civil war on the pretext of the Idlib atrocity but without expert determination of who was actually responsible. Who is next after Syria? North Korea, one supposes, as a missile-armed  and one supposes nuclear-armed US battle fleet heads for Korea. And then, who is next after North Korea? And after them … ? Of course one can well ask “Why America?” Why not civilized, neutral Sweden, civilized neutral Switzerland  or indeed civilized, army-free Costa Rica to police the world? The honest answer to these questions reveals that the US has been  invading country after country for over  2 centuries  for hegemony and resources and not for “freedom”, “democracy”, “human rights” or the well-being of innocent children.

It is claimed that about 90 Syrians including  about 30 children were killed in the alleged gas attack on Khan Sheikhoun near Idlib in Syria [57] .  About 0.5 million people have been violently killed  so far in the Syrian Civil War  and a similar number of Syrians would be expected to have died from war-imposed deprivation [41, 54]. About half of the Syrian population are children and one can accordingly conclude that the US Alliance support for the Syrian Civil War means critical complicity in the  killing of 0.5 million Syrian  children through violence or war-imposed deprivation. 32 million Muslims, about 16 million  them children, have died from violence, 5 million, or imposed deprivation, 27 million, in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since the US Government’s 9-11 false  flag atrocity [53].

Too obvious to make it to the Ten Commandments is the fundamental human imperative: “Thou shalt not kill children”. That wonderful Palestinian humanitarian Jesus declared: “But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea”  [58].  Back in the 1960s and 1970s,  anti-war demonstrators  chanted “Hey, hey, USA, how many kids did you kill today?” The answer today with America ruled by child-killer Trump is about 3,300.

US President Donald Trump has inherited the war criminal mantle of his blood-stained, child-killing  predecessor and is continuing the genocidal and  mass pedocidal, Zionist-backed  US War on Syria and US War on Muslims. What can decent Humanity do in the face of this mass murder of men, women and children ? Decent Humanity must (a) inform everyone they can, and (b) urge and apply Boycotts Divestment  and Sanctions ()BDS) against  a remorselessly  war criminal US and its complicit US Alliance supporters. Peace is the only way but silence kills and silence is complicity.

The following excerpt is reprinted with permission from Too Much Stuff: Capitalism in Crisis by Kozo Yamamura, published by Policy Press at the University of Bristol. © 2017 by Policy Press at the University of Bristol. All rights reserved.

The urgency of the need to increase investment to prevent further degradation of the environment was brought home to me on a visit to Switzerland. In July 2006, my wife and I were staying at a hotel in Grindelwald, an alpine village southwest of Bern and located under the famous North Face of the Eiger and its glacier. Our hotel was approximately three kilometers across the valley from the mountain.

One morning, shortly after dawn, we were awoken by thunderous noises coming from the direction of the Eiger. Startled, we looked toward the mountain and saw a huge, grey dust cloud rising high into the sky from the edge of the mountain next to the glacier’s path. Tons of rock, including gigantic boulders, along with an immense quantity of gravel and dirt, were cascading down toward the river valley. In no time, the dust cloud drifted over the village, obscuring the houses. The noise and the avalanche of rocks and dirt gradually stopped and, as the dust cloud dissipated, we could see that a stalagmite-like rock column as high as the Empire State building that once stood at the edge of Eiger was gone forever.

By the end of the day, we learned that the accelerating pace of melting of the glacier, which had supported the eastern flank of the mountain, was the cause of the huge rockslides that had been occurring every few years since the 1990s. As the ice retreated, the side of the mountain was crumbling. Estimates of the amount of rock, gravel and dirt that had fallen into the valley varied, but the lowest were several hundred thousand cubic meters. The melting of the same glacier had caused a lake to form under the ice, necessitating the expenditure of millions of francs in subsequent years to drain the lake in order to prevent it from bursting and inundating the valley and the village.

Average temperatures in Switzerland have been rising by more than half a degree Celsius on average every decade since 1970, resulting in an 18 percent loss of the surface of glaciers between 1985 and 2000. For us, it was a case of “seeing is believing.” With our own eyes we had seen that the climate was warming dangerously and the world now faced a crisis unprecedented in recorded history.

Given my experience, I readily understood the message of Kenneth Chang’s article “The Big Melt Accelerates,” which appeared in the New York Times on May 19, 2014.

Centuries from now, a large swath of the West Antarctic ice sheet is likely to be gone, its hundreds of trillions of tons of ice melted, causing a four-foot rise in already swollen seas. Scientists reported last week that the scenario may be inevitable, with new research concluding that some giant glaciers had passed the tipping point of no return, possibly setting off a chain reaction that could doom the rest of the ice sheet. For many, the research signaled that changes in the earth’s climate have already reached a tipping point, even if global warming halted immediately.

Nothing but a major global effort

An environmental catastrophe cannot be averted if a major international effort is not begun immediately. This is the conclusion reported in the 6,000-pages-long, the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the UN), compiled by 800 of the world’s top scientists and other experts and published in 2014. In order to avoid a 2°C increase in temperature – the level above which catastrophic damage will occur—global emissions must be reduced to half their current level by 2050. Unless all countries make a strong commitment to reduce carbon emissions immediately, the world’s environment will pass the tipping point and suffer the irredeemable consequences of doing too little too late.

If no major global effort to reduce carbon emissions is made in the very near future, at least 177 million people—mostly in Asia (about 50 million of them in China) – will experience frequent floods by the end of this century. This is in addition to the large number of people living in low-lying countries and in island nations, such as the Netherlands, Bangladesh and the Maldives, which are already seeing increasingly frequent flooding. But flooding is occurring in other countries as well, such as in the UK and along the Mississippi River in the US.

Flooding not only endangers lives but also has very high economic costs. For example, a group of Harvard scholars estimated that “rising seas could put American property worth 66 to 106 billion dollars literally under water by 2050” and noted that “If the numbers are any guide, the real damage would be greater still.” And, as an increasing number of news reports make us aware, droughts have been becoming longer and more severe worldwide in recent decades. These droughts are imposing an increasing economic cost and endangering the lives of more and more people because they reduce the water available for drinking, agriculture and many other uses and increase the frequency of large-scale forest fires.

Noting these developments, Antonio Guterres, the former UN High Commissioner of Refugees, stressed that all the world’s countries in must be concerned with “the case of entire populations forced to migrate due to the lack of access to clean water, productive land or the occurrence of natural disasters.” He went on to say:

Climate change further exacerbates this issue through drought and desertification, two of the major factors contributing to food insecurity because they render land unsuitable for agriculture. Without productive lands, farmers cannot grow crops and are forced to leave their land plots in search of more fertile territories, which often cross national boundaries. Currently, over 1.5 billion people depend on degrading land and more than 1 billion are experiencing droughts. Climate change will exacerbate these issues, and most likely increase the number of environmental refugees, presently surpassing 36 million worldwide.

Despite Guterres’ assessment and the data and findings of the IPCC, the developed economies continue to do far less than is necessary to try to avert a catastrophe. To be sure, many governments have adopted numerous policies because those who are working towards doing more to sustain the environment have won some victories in policymaking arenas and in the courts. A good example is the US Supreme Court case in which in June 2014 the Environmental Protection Agency won the right to regulate greenhouse gases emitted by modified utility plants. However, the victory, won on a 7 to 2 decision, was restrained in that, in a separate 5 to 4 vote, the Court rejected the Agency’s broad assertion of regulatory power under one section of the Clean Air Act.

As the continuing climate warming demonstrates, such victories in the developed economies have been too few to reverse the tide, despite the fact that in the battle against the looming environmental tipping point the developed economies must take a lion’s share of the responsibility. This is because today’s developed economies are the economies that have been emitting greenhouse gases and polluting the air since they began to industrialize, as the following quotation reminds us.

A London fog is brown, reddish-yellow, or greenish, darkens more than a white fog, has a smoky, or sulfurous smell, is often somewhat dryer than a country fog, and produces, when thick, a choking sensation. Instead of diminishing while the sun rises higher, it often increases in density, and some of the most lowering London fogs occur about midday or late in the afternoon. Sometimes the brown masses rise and interpose a thick curtain at a considerable elevation between earth and sky. A white cloth spread out on the ground rapidly turns dirty, and particles of soot attach themselves to every exposed object.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions per person measured in tons in 2012 were: 16.4 for the US; 10.4 for Japan; 9.7 for Germany; 7.7 for the UK; 7.1 for China; and 1.6 for India, according to estimates made in 2013 by the European Commission. In short, the developed economies are responsible for the environmental crisis we are facing today.

Effective policies on emissions

Although developing economies such as China and India that have now become major emitters of greenhouse gases must do their best to limit their emissions, the fact remains that the developed economies must do what is necessary to prevent the looming environmental tipping point. The critical question is this: why haven’t policies sufficient to reduce and reverse the trend of environmental degradation, especially the critical emission of carbon dioxide, already been adopted by the developed economies?

The answer is that many politicians, business leaders and voters believe their political power, their profits or their incomes would be negatively affected by more robust environmental policies. Their shortsightedness is preventing the adoption of the policies that are necessary to prevent the coming of the tipping point within the next few decades. What has created this regrettable outcome is the strength of misguided arguments such as the following:

1. None of the results of scientific research to date has convincingly demonstrated that human actions have been responsible for climate warming and other environment degradation. Rather, this is a natural phenomenon out of our control. Thus there is little reason to allocate more resources to protect the environment, at the cost of economic growth.
2. Scientific studies presumably showing the urgency of the need to do more to protect the environment are an elaborate hoax put forth by the liberals. Whatever the scientific findings, doing more to protect the environment means more government involvement. This would reduce the efficient working of capitalism, which is indispensable for economic growth.
3. Since the developing economies, such as China and India, are causing environmental problems at such a rapid pace and of such huge magnitude, there is no reason for the developed economies to do more, to the detriment of their own economic performance.

Argument 1 is feigned skepticism or ignorant anti-scientism, put forth despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary. This is the same brazen deception as was used at a US Congressional hearing in April of 1994 by the seven CEOs of the largest American cigarette firms when they all denied that nicotine is addictive.

Argument 2 is no more than a desperate ruse motivated by ideology and/or political or financial gain. The “efficient working of capitalism” is a fig-leaf to conceal shortsighted self-interest.

Argument 3 is ludicrous because the developed economies, which polluted and degraded the environment freely from the time they began to industrialize until only several decades ago, are still the major emitters of pollution. This argument also ignores the fact that today the per capita consumption of energy from fossil fuel and other sources and the consequent emissions per capita in the developed economies are at least 10 to 100 times greater than the energy consumption and emissions output in all of the emerging economies.

The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report and the  Paris Agreement of 2015

In 2014 the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC, cited above, reported that the reductions in emissions that were necessary to avert the environmental tipping point would require huge investments. The Assessment describes the mitigation scenarios needed to make improvements in the technology of energy production from fossil fuels and renewables in order to stabilize atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations in the range of 430–530 ppm CO2eq (parts per million, CO2 equivalent) by 2100. They would require an additional annual global investment of about $177 billion through 2029. Further, the annual incremental investment necessary globally to improve energy-use efficiency (involving the modernization of existing equipment and infrastructures) must increase by about $336 billion per year, also until 2029. The total comes to $513 billion per annum over a 15-year period, on top of the annual investments that the developed economies have been making during recent years.

A very large proportion of this additional annual investment of $513 billion must be made collectively by the developed economies. If their existing capitalist system remains unchanged and they continue to follow their current fiscal and monetary policies, they will not be able to make the investment necessary to avert the environmental tipping point and at the same time create the increased demand that will enable their economies to grow.

A meeting to discuss the global environmental crisis was held by the United Nations in Paris from November 20 to December 11, 2015 and was attended by the political leaders and scientists of 196 countries. Its purpose was essentially to adopt the recommendations of the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC. Most news reports called this a major victory in our efforts to prevent further degradation of the environment. However, as was expected, the outcome was in fact only another victory in a skirmish, and the war is far from won. This is evident in the principal agreement reached. Each country has promised to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in order to prevent a global temperature rise by 2°C (possibly 1.5°C), but the agreement is to be implemented on the “honor” system, with no international enforcement. The developed economies are to provide at least $100 billion per year, starting in 2020, to aid the developing economies in their efforts to reduce emissions. And the agreement is to be effective only if 55 countries, or the countries emitting 55 percent of the total emissions, ratify the agreement.

Unfortunately, there are numerous reasons why the Paris Agreement is only a victory in a skirmish, one that is certain to be followed by many more skirmishes. The “pledged” contributions towards the $100 billion to be paid by the developed economies include a contribution from the US of at least $10 billion annually. That this pledge will be honored is highly problematic because it is very likely that the Republican Party, whose leaders have already voiced strong opposition to the Agreement, will continue to control the House of Representatives. To be sure, more and more American voters have become highly concerned about the sustainability of their environment. But to believe that the US Congress will ratify the Agreement and continue to provide at least $10 billion per year over the coming decades is simply not realistic. And this is not the situation just in the US. It would be naïve to believe that all the other developed economies will be able to honor their pledges over the coming years.

Conclusion

For those of us who are very concerned about the future of our environment, the Paris Agreement is another triumph in the ongoing political skirmishes. However, in order to the triumph meaningful, we must first change the existing capitalist system, because that is the only way to put an end to ineffective pro-investment policies and to reinvigorate our economies by increasing investments to meet societal needs. And the most important societal need of all is to increase investments to avert further degradation of the environment.

Kozo Yamamura (1934-2017) was the Job and Gertrude Tamaki Professor of Japanese Studies and professor of economics at the University of Washington. He authored twenty-five books, many focused on the Japanese economy and economic history, as well as several on comparative economic institutions and policy.

The record-breaking heat that made 2016 the hottest year ever recorded has continued into 2017, pushing the world into “truly uncharted territory”, according to the World Meteorological Organisation.

The WMO’s assessment of the climate in 2016, published on Tuesday, reports unprecedented heat across the globe, exceptionally low ice at both poles and surging sea-level rise.

Global warming is largely being driven by emissions from human activities, but a strong El Niño—a natural climate cycle—added to the heat in 2016. The El Niño is now waning, but the extremes continue to be seen, with temperature records tumbling in the US in February and polar heatwaves pushing ice cover to new lows.

“Even without a strong El Niño in 2017, we are seeing other remarkable changes across the planet that are challenging the limits of our understanding of the climate system. We are now in truly uncharted territory,” said David Carlson, director of the WMO’s world climate research programme.

“Earth is a planet in upheaval due to human-caused changes in the atmosphere,” said Jeffrey Kargel, a glaciologist at the University of Arizona in the US. “In general, drastically changing conditions do not help civilisation, which thrives on stability.” 

The WMO report was “startling”, said Prof David Reay, an emissions expert at the University of Edinburgh: “The need for concerted action on climate change has never been so stark nor the stakes so high.”

The new WMO assessment also prompted some scientists to criticise Donald Trump. “While the data show an ever increasing impact of human activities on the climate system, the Trump administration and senior Republicans in Congress continue to bury their heads in the sand,” said Prof Sir Robert Watson, a distinguished climate scientist at the UK’s University of East Anglia and a former head of the UN’s climate science panel.

“Our children and grandchildren will look back on the climate deniers and ask how they could have sacrificed the planet for the sake of cheap fossil fuel energy, when the cost of inaction exceeds the cost of a transition to a low-carbon economy,” Watson said.

Trump is aiming to cut climate change research. But the WMO’s secretary-general Petteri Taalas said: “Continued investment in climate research and observations is vital if our scientific knowledge is to keep pace with the rapid rate of climate change.”

2016 saw the hottest global average among thermometer measurements stretching back to 1880. But scientific research indicates the world was last this warm about 115,000 years ago and that the planet has not experienced such high levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere for 4m years.

2017 has seen temperature records continue to tumble, in the US where February was exceptionally warm, and in Australia, where prolonged and extreme heat struck many states. The consequences have been particularly stark at the poles.

“Arctic ice conditions have been tracking at record low conditions since October, persisting for six consecutive months, something not seen before in the [four-decade] satellite data record,” said Prof Julienne Stroeve, at University College London in the UK. “Over in the southern hemisphere, the sea ice also broke new record lows in the seasonal maximum and minimum extents, leading to the least amount of global sea ice ever recorded.”

Emily Shuckburgh, at the British Antarctic Survey, said: “The Arctic may be remote, but changes that occur there directly affect us. The melting of the Greenland ice sheet is already contributing significantly to sea level rise, and new research is highlighting that the melting of Arctic sea ice can alter weather conditions across Europe, Asia and North America.”

Global sea level rise surged between November 2014 and February 2016, with the El Niño event helping the oceans rise by by 15mm. That jump would have take five years under the steady rise seen in recent decades, as ice caps melt and oceans get warmer and expand in volume. Final data for 2016 sea level rise have yet to be published.

Climate change harms people most directly by increasing the risk of extreme weather events and the WMO report states that these raised risks can increasingly be calculated. For example, the Arctic heatwaves are made tens of times more likely and the soaring temperatures seen in Australia in February were made twice as likely .

“With levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere consistently breaking new records, the influence of human activities on the climate system has become more and more evident,” said Taalas.

Damian Carrington is the head of environment at the Guardian.

The month of March includes the International Day of Forests. It is an important time to note our window for avoiding catastrophic climate change is rapidly closing. We will not solve the climate crisis without a massive increase in the protection of forests around the world, including in our own backyard.We will not solve the climate crisis without a massive increase in the protection of forests around the world, including in our own backyard.

This year I am releasing a report I co-authored with Bill Moomaw, a renowned climate scientist from Tufts University, with one simple but urgent message: forest protection needs to be a national priority in the fight against climate change. Through the release of "The Great American Stand: U.S. Forests & the Climate Emergency," followed by a series of speaking engagements, Dr. Moomaw and I hope to elevate forests into the national climate spotlight and catalyze new action focused on protecting and restoring our nation’s forests in ways that strengthen the resiliency and economic vitality of our most vulnerable rural communities.

The United States produces and consumes more forest products than any country on Earth. Forest disturbance from logging in the southern U.S. alone is four times that of South American rainforests. The rate and scale of logging are significantly diminishing the extent to which our nation’s forests would otherwise be removing and keeping carbon out of the atmosphere, protecting communities from floods and stabilizing fresh water supplies. We simply cannot afford to ignore this critical fact any longer.  

Latest calculations document that current concentrations of carbon in the atmosphere have reached the dangerous level of 400 parts per million (ppm), well above the 350 ppm threshold necessary to avoid catastrophe. The last time carbon was at 400 ppm, humans did not exist on the planet. We must therefore bring annual emissions down to as close to zero as possible, while also removing more carbon from the atmosphere. Forests are the only systems we have that can suck carbon out of the atmosphere within the timeframe and at the scale necessary to save humanity. We simply cannot achieve the ambitious climate goals as set forth in the historic Paris Climate Agreement without a massive scale-up in forest protection across the planet.

Old, intact natural forests are the most highly complex, efficient, climate-stabilizing technology we have. When left standing, natural forests can pull increasingly vast amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere, storing it in plants and soil. They also happen to be the best natural defense against impacts of extreme weather events, providing flood control and stabilizing fresh water supplies. These services buffer our communities against intensifying storms and more severe periods of drought.

Yet, in just a few hundred years, human civilization has severely compromised our nation’s forests’ ability to provide these critical climate stabilizing functions, while releasing vast amounts of forest carbon into the atmosphere. In the lower 48 states, less than 1 percent of our original, unspoiled forests with all species intact remains. Though trees can live to be hundreds, even thousands of years old, less than 15 percent of our forests are older than 100 years.

Meanwhile, tens of millions of acres of forests have been replaced with fast-growing, single-species pine plantations, routinely sprayed with chemical fertilizers and herbicides. Our nation’s forested landscape has become a patchwork of forest fragments, flanked by clearcuts and tree plantations. This widespread destruction and degradation has occurred in tandem with the accelerated release of carbon into the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels. Yet to date, climate strategies in the United States largely ignore the important climate-stabilizing function of forests, and efforts are too narrowly focused on only one critical aspect of the climate equation—phasing out the use of fossil fuels.

According to the latest EPA annual report of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, our nation’s forests annually remove an amount of carbon from the atmosphere equivalent to a mere 11-13 percent of emissions. This is roughly half that of the global average of 25% and a mere fraction of what is needed to avoid climate catastrophe. A 2016 study found that from  2006 to 2010, logging diminished the potential U.S. forest carbon sink by at least 35%.

And while the EPA annual greenhouse gas inventory report fails to report U.S. emissions from logging, the same study calculated average annual harvest emissions at 161 +/- 10 MMT C (596 MMT CO2). That’s more than the annual average emissions during that same period from the commercial and residential sectors combined as reported by EPA’s most recent emissions report. Actual carbon emissions from logging are probably significantly higher since soil emissions, which can be significant, were not even considered.

In addition, two of 2016’s most expensive natural disasters in the world were from flooding in the rural coastal communities of southeastern region, where logging rates are some of the highest on Earth, protected areas are few and regulations are lacking. And despite having the strongest forest markets of anywhere in the world, poverty persists across the rural South, disproportionately affecting people of color.

Forest protection and restoration in the United States has been largely ignored as a climate imperative. Instead, accelerated logging is often proposed as a climate solution. In the past several years, the coastal region of the South has become the world’s largest exporter of wood pellets to Europe, where they are burned to generate electricity in place of coal. This new market is driving increased logging of forests, including wetland forests along the rivers in rural communities.

Meanwhile, burning trees for electricity releases up to 50 percent more carbon dioxide than burning coal per unit of electricity generated. We cannot log our way out of the climate crisis. If we don’t change course, we will not solve the climate emergency.  

Treating forests as an unlimited, renewable, extractable commodity that can support infinite growth in the forest products industry is an outdated business model that must yield to a new economic system that values standing forests and strengthens the resilience of our communities. We can solve the climate crisis by expanding forest protection while we rapidly drive down emissions from fossil fuels and transition toward clean, renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind. New investments in forest protection and restoration can also drive business innovation and create new economic opportunities for our most vulnerable communities. But, we won’t get there if we continue to turn a blind eye to what is happening to the forests and communities right here at home.

Download the report and take action today.

Watch a video about how healthy forests help wildlife, climate, public health and the economy: 

Related Stories

How Europe's Good Environmental Intentions are Inadvertently Destroying America's Forests

America's Southern Forests Are Being Decimated to Supply Europe With Energy

Forest Fires Are Terrible, but the Industrial Biomass Industry Destroys Even More Trees

Danna Smith is the founder and executive director of Dogwood Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to protecting the forests and communities of the southern United States from destructive industrial logging. 

In his proposed budget unveiled Thursday, President Trump called for dramatic cuts to initiatives aimed at combatting climate change, as well as a wide swath of social programs, to make way for a $54 billion increase in military spending.

Under his plan, the Environmental Protection Agency would be slashed by 31 percent, or $2.6 billion. According to the outline, the budget “Eliminates the Global Climate Change Initiative and fulfills the President’s pledge to cease payments to the United Nations’ (UN) climate change programs by eliminating U.S. funding related to the Green Climate Fund and its two precursor Climate Investment Funds.” The blueprint also “Discontinues funding for the Clean Power Plan, international climate change programs, climate change research and partnership programs, and related efforts.”

The move comes as no surprise for a president who once claimed that climate change is a hoax invented by China, ran on a platform of climate denialism and appointed Exxon Mobil oil tycoon Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. However predictable, the slashing comes at a dangerous time, as NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warn that 2016 was the hottest year on record globally, in the third straight year of record-breaking temperatures. For people across the global south, climate change is already sowing disaster. Worsening droughts have jeopardized the food supply of 36 million people in southern and Eastern Africa alone.

But Trump’s proposal is also dangerous for a less-examined reason: the U.S. military is a key climate polluter, likely the “largest organizational user of petroleum in the world,” according to a congressional report released in December 2012. Beyond its immediate carbon footprint—which is difficult to measure—the U.S. military has placed countless countries under the thumb of western oil giants. Social movements have long sounded the alarm over the link between U.S.-led militarism and climate change, yet the Pentagon continues to evade accountability.

“The Pentagon is positioned as a destroyer of the environment, war is being used as a tool to fight for extractive corporations and we now have a state department that is openly run by an oil magnate,” Reece Chenault, national coordinator for U.S. Labor Against the War, told AlterNet. “Now more than ever, we have to be really aware of the role militarism plays in climate change. We are only going to see more of that.”

The overlooked climate footprint of the U.S. military

The U.S. military has a massive carbon footprint. A report released in 2009 by the Brookings Institute determined that “the U.S. Department of Defense is the world’s single largest consumer of energy, using more energy in the course of its daily operations than any other private or public organization, as well as more than 100 nations.” Those findings were followed by the December 2012 congressional report, which states that the “DOD’s fuel costs have increased substantially over the last decade, to about $17 billion in FY2011.” Meanwhile, the Department of Defense reported that in 2014, the military emitted more than 70m tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. And according to journalist Arthur Neslen, that figure "omits facilities including hundreds of military bases overseas, as well as equipment and vehicles.”

Despite the U.S. military’s role as a major carbon polluter, states are permitted to exclude military emissions from United Nations-mandated cuts to greenhouse gas emissions, thanks to negotiations dating back to the Kyoto climate talks of 1997. As Nick Buxton of the Transnational Institute noted in a 2015 article, “Under pressure from military generals and foreign policy hawks opposed to any potential restrictions on U.S. military power, the U.S. negotiating team succeeded in securing exemptions for the military from any required reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Even though the U.S. then proceeded not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, the exemptions for the military stuck for every other signatory nation.”

According to Tamara Lorincz, Senior Researcher with the International Peace Bureau, this exemption has not changed. “There is no evidence that military emissions are now included in the IPCC guidelines because of the Paris Agreement,” she said. “The Paris Agreement does not say anything about military emissions, and the guidelines have not changed. Military emissions were not on the COP21 agenda. Emissions from military operations overseas are not included in national greenhouse gas inventories, and they are not included in the national deep decarbonization pathway plans.”

Spreading environmental harm across the globe

The American military empire, and the environmental harm it spreads, expands far beyond U.S. borders. David Vine, the author of Base Nation: How U.S. Military Bases Abroad Harm America and the World, wrote in 2015 that the United States “probably has more foreign military bases than any other people, nation, or empire in history”—numbering roughly 800. According to reporting from Nick Turse, in 2015, special operations forces were already deployed to 135 countries, or 70 percent of all the nations on the planet.

This military presence brings large-scale environmental destruction to the land and peoples across the globe through dumping, leaks, weapons testing, energy consumption, and waste. This harm was underscored in 2013 when a U.S. naval warship damaged much of the Tubbataha Reef in the Sulu Sea off the coast of the Philippines.

“The environmental destruction of Tubbataha by the presence of the U.S. military, and the lack of accountability of the U.S. Navy for their actions, only underscores how the presence of U.S. troops is poisonous to the Philippines,” Bernadette Ellorin, chairperson of BAYAN USA, said at the time. From Okinawa to Diego Garcia, this destruction goes hand-in-hand with mass displacement of and violence against local populations, including rape.

U.S.-led wars bring their own environmental horrors, as Iraq's history shows. Oil Change International determined in 2008 that between March 2003 and December 2007, the war in Iraq was responsible for “at least 141 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.” According to report authors Nikki Reisch and Steve Kretzmann, “If the war was ranked as a country in terms of emissions, it would emit more CO2 each year than 139 of the world’s nations do annually. Falling between New Zealand and Cuba, the war each year emits more than 60 percent of all countries.”

This environmental destruction continues to the present, as U.S. bombs continue to fall on Iraq and neighboring Syria. According to a study published in 2016 in the journal Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, air pollution directly tied to war continues to poison children in Iraq, as evidenced by high levels of lead found in their teeth. Iraqi civil society organizations, including the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq and the Federation of Workers Councils and Unions in Iraq, have long been sounding the alarm on environmental degradation that is giving rise to birth defects.

Speaking at a People’s Hearing in 2014, Yanar Mohammed, president and co-founder of the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq, said: “There are some mothers who have three or four children who don't have limbs that work, who are totally paralyzed, their fingers fused to each other.” She continued, "There needs to be reparations for families facing birth defect and areas that have been contaminated. There needs to be cleanup."

The link between war and big oil

The oil industry is tied to wars and conflicts around the world. According to Oil Change International, “It has been estimated that between one-quarter and one-half of all interstate wars since 1973 have been linked to oil, and that oil-producing countries are 50 percent more likely to have civil wars.”

Some of these conflicts are fought at the behest of western oil companies, in collaboration with local militaries, to quell dissent. During the 1990s, Shell, the Nigerian military and local police teamed up to slaughter Ogani people resisting oil drilling. This included a Nigerian military occupation of Oganiland, where the Nigerian military unit knows as the Internal Security Task Force is suspected of killing 2,000.

More recently, the U.S. national guard joined forces up with police departments and Energy Transfer Partners to violently quell indigenous opposition to the Dakota Access Pipeline, a crackdown many water protectors called a state of war. “This country has a long and sad history of using military force against indigenous people, including the Sioux Nation,” water protectors stated in a letter sent to then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch in October 2016.

Meanwhile, the extractive industry played a key role in pillaging Iraq’s oil fields following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. One individual who benefited financially was Tillerson, who worked at Exxon Mobil for 41 years, serving the last decade as CEO before retiring at the beginning of this year. Under his watch, the company directly profited from the U.S. invasion and occupation of the country, expanding its foothold and oilfields. As recently as 2013, farmers in Basra, Iraq, protested the company for expropriating and ruining their land. Exxon Mobil continues to operate in roughly 200 countries and is currently facing fraud investigations for financing and backing junk research promoting the denial of climate change for decades.

Climate change appears to play a role in worsening armed conflict. Research published in 2016 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found evidence that “risk of armed-conflict outbreak is enhanced by climate-related disaster occurrence in ethnically fractionalized countries.” Looking at the years 1980 to 2010, the researchers determined that “about 23 percent of conflict outbreaks in ethnically highly fractionalized countries robustly coincide with climatic calamities.”

And finally, oil wealth is central to the global arms trade, as evidenced by the heavy imports of the oil-rich Saudi government. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, “Saudi Arabia was the world’s second largest arms importer in 2012-16, with an increase of 212 percent compared with 2007–11.” During this period, the U.S. was the top major arms exporter in the world, accounting for 33 percent of all exports, SIPRI determines.

“So many of our military engagements and wars have been around the issue of access to oil and other resources,” Leslie Cagan, the New York coordinator for the People’s Climate Movement, told AlterNet. “And then the wars that we conduct have an impact on the lives of individual people, communities and the environment. It's a vicious cycle. We go to war over access to resources or to defend corporations, wars have a devastating impact, and then the actual use of military equipment sucks more fossil fuel resources.”

‘No war, no warming’

At the intersections of war and climate chaos, social movement organizations have long been linking these two human-made problems. The U.S.-based network Grassroots Global Justice Alliance has spent years rallying behind the call of “No war, no warming,” citing the “framework of Dr. Martin Luther King’s philosophy of the triple evils of poverty, racism and militarism.”

The 2014 People’s Climate March in New York City had a sizeable anti-war, anti-militarist contingent, and many are now mobilizing to bring a peace and anti-militarist message to the march for climate, jobs and justice on April 29 in Washington, D.C.

“The foundation is laid for people to make the connections, and we are trying to find ways to integrate peace and anti-military sentiment into that language,” said Cagan, who has been preparing for the April march. “I think people in the coalition are very open to that, although some organizations haven't taken anti-war positions in the past, so this is new territory.”

Some organizations are getting concrete about what it looks like to stage a “just transition” away from a military and fossil fuels economy. Diana Lopez is an organizer with the Southwest Workers Union in San Antonio, Texas. She explained to AlterNet, “We’re a military city. Until six years ago, we had eight military bases, and one of the primary avenues for people getting out of high school is joining the military.” The other option is working in the dangerous oil and fracking industry, says Lopez, explaining that in poor Latino communities in the area, “We’re seeing a lot of young folks who come out of the military going straight into the oil industry.”

The Southwest Workers Union is involved in efforts to organize a just transition, which Lopez described as a “process of moving from a structure or system that is not conducive to our communities, such as military bases and the extractive economy. [That means] identifying next steps forward when military bases shut down. One of the things we’re working on is increasing solar farms.”

“When we talk about solidarity, it is often those communities exactly like ours in other countries that are being harassed, killed and targeted by U.S. military operations,” said Lopez. “We think it is important to challenge militarism and hold folks accountable who are defending these structures. It’s communities around military bases that have to deal with the legacy of contamination and environmental destruction.”

Sarah Lazare is a staff writer for AlterNet. A former staff writer for Common Dreams, she coedited the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War. Follow her on Twitter at @sarahlazare.

This story originally appeared on GreenBiz.

As a woman who has chronicled the technology business for close to three decades (ahem), I’m used to being at briefings where the gender demographics are way out of balance and I am decidedly in the minority.

So I must admit feeling an unusual kinship with the mostly female audience at the inaugural Women4Climate conference in snowy New York City earlier this month—although the event’s rallying cry about the need to protect vulnerable communities from the effects of climate change is one that people of all genders, ages and ethnicities really should hear.

Women4Climate conference, New York City (credit: Scout Tufankijan/C40)

"As women, we know all too well that the powerful often seek to silence our voices when we speak out to protect the most vulnerable in our communities," Anne Hidalgo, the first mayor of Paris and chairwoman of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, said in a statement prepared for the gathering at Columbia University. "We are here today to show that we refuse to be silenced. All around the world, in city halls, corporate boardrooms and on the streets of our cities, women are demanding action to protect the planet from the threat of climate change."

As she commanded the podium to open the conference, Hidalgo, apologizing for her heavily accented English, was far more candid and far less formal. "Be confident on this, American women, we will stand by your side," she declared during her opening remarks, referring to the steps that President Donald Trump is already taking to step back the country’s federal commitment to reducing carbon dioxide emissions and other decades-old environment protection measures. "Climate change and women’s rights are not questionable."

Anne Hidalgo (credit: Scout Tufankijan/C40)

Data shows that women and children are the ones who feel the effects of global warming most acutely, although that’s not exactly common knowledge, she reminded the attendees. But she also believes women are "strongest when it comes to collectively changing the world... We have always needed to work 10 times harder."

In 2014, there were just four women mayors in the C40 network, a forum created to address the threat that climate change poses to cities around the world. Now there are 15, representing more than 100 million urban citizens and more than $4 trillion in gross domestic product. Among those who trekked to New York last week with Mayor Hidalgo were Patricia de Lille and Zandile Gumede, the mayors of Cape Town and Durban in South Africa; and Helen Fernandez, mayor of Caracas, Venezuela.

The former mayor of New York, Mike Bloomberg, president of the C40 board and a special United Nations envoy on cities and climate change, also lent his voice to the discussion.

Bloomberg drew a direct connection between climate health and human health. "Women leaders are speeding our progress," he told the gathering. "Cities are committed to these goals. No matter what happens in Washington, I really am confident that the U.S. will deliver on its Paris commitments."

In just one example of how this could play out, dozens of U.S. cities last week revealed an initiative under which they collectively could place about $10 billion in orders for electric vehicles. The participants, which include New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, could buy up to 114,000 vehicles, which represents 72 percent of all the EVs bought in 2016, reports Bloomberg. "Now matter what President Trump does or what happens in Washington, cities will continue leading the way on tackling climate change," the chief sustainability officer for Los Angeles, told the news service in an email.

Here, in alphabetical order, are nine public-sector and NGO women likely to be up-front-and-center in the cities movement, all around the world, both at the civic and grassroots level. Seven of them spoke during the Women4Climate conference.

1. Muriel Bowser (Mayor, Washington, D.C.).

In office since 2015, she last week announced plans to set aside $7 million for the District’s first Green Bank to support building improvements that will reduce carbon dioxide emissions. The program would emulate statewide initiatives in places such as Connecticut and New York. In a statement, Bowser positioned it as the nation’s first city-level effort, one meant to support her interest in "inclusive prosperity" across the 660,000-person city. (The D.C. region is home to nearly 6 million people.) She added: "As the nation’s capital, we need to lead the way when it comes to protecting and preserving the environment."

2. Margaret Chan (Director-General, World Health Organization).

In early March, WHO published a new report linking environment risks such as indoor and outdoor air pollution, and unsafe water to the deaths of more than 1.4 million children younger than 5 annually. Chan’s rule is one of credible advocacy. "A polluted environment is a deadly one — particularly for young children," she observed in a press release about the research. "Their developing organs and immune systems, and smaller bodies and airways, make them especially vulnerable to dirty air and water."

3. Patricia de Lille (Mayor, Cape Town).

Intimately involved with the COP21 climate negotiations in Paris, de Lille is leading the charge for Cape Town to procure between 10 percent and 20 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020. A big part of this is an initiative encouraging home owners and businesses to install rooftop solar photovoltaic panels. The city, home to 3.7 million people, leads the C40 Municipal Building Efficiency Network, which is identifying and defining best practices for energy contracting and management. It also has spearheaded a 30 percent reduction in water consumption over the past 15 years. "Every single decision and every single department is overlaid with climate considerations," de Lille said at the Women4Climate conference. "This needs to be worked into everyday decisions."  

4. Helen Fernandez (Mayor, Caracas).

Since rising to power in 2015 after the arrest of her predecessor, the leader of Venezuela’s capital city has become an outspoken advocate of gender equality, which for her goes hand with the climate movement. Speaking through a translator at the conference, Fernandez said she views every policy through that lenses and decries the "jargon" that sometimes can cloud the real impact of climate change, and the ability of advocates to win support. The commitment of this 5.3 million-citizen city is pretty nascent, a side effect of the nation’s political turmoil. But she sees women becoming protagonists in the emerging climate movement there. "We can and should simplify this strategically," Fernandez said.

5. Zandile Gumede (Mayor, Durban).

This South African seaside city of around 600,000 is facing the reality of fiercer droughts and more frequent floods with a wide array of ecosystems projects aimed at making it more resilient. Among them: green rooftop gardens; reforestation efforts; riverbed restoration; and bioswales, to name a few. Gumede, a vice chairperson of C40 Cities (the governor of Tokyo, Yuriko Koike, is her co-chair), views addressing climate change as unprecedented opportunity to help women become entrepreneurs. "As women fighting for change, we must make sure that we don’t lose hope, we keep pushing," Gumede said.

6. Anne Hidalgo (Mayor, Paris and C40 Cities Chair).

Elected in 2016 to head the C40 Climate Leadership Group, Hidalgo’s top priority is to ensure that the world’s biggest cities are firmly committed to the Paris Agreement. That will include encouraging new financing approaches, helping mayors get a better handle on their energy consumption and clean up their power sources, and setting pathways for inclusive and sustainable growth. "This will take political courage and concrete action," she said during last week’s conference.

7. Mary Anne Hitt (Director, Beyond Coal, Sierra Club).

It’s no accident that the woman beyond the NGO’s enormously successful Beyond Coal Campaign comes from one of biggest coal-producing regions, West Virginia. The original goal was to advocate for the retirement of half the coal-fired power plants in the United States by 2020. It already had exceeded that target, with more than 248 facilities closed or intending to do so, and a lot of the action that inspired this progress happened at the local level. "In this grassroots movement, many of the leaders are women," Hitt observed. "Because it’s women who are often on the front lines of family emergencies that are tied to coal pollution."

8. Naoko Ishii (CEO, Global Environment Facility).

Her organization’s trust fund, established 25 years ago, is one of the oldest financing mechanisms for funding development projects meant to mitigate the negative effects of global warming. One example is a public-private initiative launched in mid-March to strengthen support and awareness for "green chemistry" and safer alternatives to hazardous substances. GEF describes itself as the world’s largest funder of environmental projects. Ishii, previously the deputy vice minister of finance for Japan, was promoted to her post five years ago. Her job: transform GEF from a "silent partner" in the movement to one that will work more closely, and vocally, with a global coalition of partners. We cannot afford to be "gender-ignorant" in these discussions, Ishii said at last week's conference, noting: "We have missed opportunities by not paying attention to this."

9. Amina J. Mohammed (Deputy Secretary-General, United Nations).

The former minister of climate for Nigeria, who is also an advisor to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, was named to her United Nations post in December. In her previous role, she was instrumental in convincing West Africa’s biggest economy to approve a series of green bonds intended to support climate-resilient infrastructure projects, such as renewable energy development or electric vehicles for commuters. The first bonds worth $63 million were issued this quarter.

The provision of care has often been marginalized in economic theory and policy, yet it remains basic to the well-being of current and future generations. Allen White, a senior fellow at Tellus Institute, explores the economics of caring and its role in fostering a Great Transition with feminist economist Nancy Folbre.

Allen White: The 'economics of caring' has been central to your research for more than two decades. How did you come to focus on this field of study?

Nancy Folbre: One can like being a woman, but notice that it is costly. One can see how gender differences both reflect and reproduce other polarities, parallel dialectics between self-interest and altruism, freedom and solidarity, conflict and cooperation. One can worry to death about the meanings of womanhood and manhood. In these respects, I am one of many.

Like the economics of caring, socialism has some decidedly girly aspects, which helps explain why many men are fearful of it. Sounds so soft. In contrast, feminism has some boyish qualities, which helps explain why some women veer away from it. Sounds so hard.

Now, imagine socialism and feminism having sex, reaching a climax, making a baby, sharing its care, watching it grow. This intersection of political economy, psychology, and feminism shaped the field of inquiry I call the economics of caring. I am not a pioneer or a lone ranger. I am one of a few travelers hoping to persuade others to come my way.

AW: You have often spoken of 'patriarchal capitalism.' Are patriarchy and capitalism inextricably linked?

NF: No, patriarchal systems gave birth to capitalist systems, which initially fed on the milk of exploited women but slowly expanded their diet to include the meat of men. It is possible to imagine a capitalist system that is non-patriarchal, but we don’t live in one and don’t know yet whether such a system could reproduce itself.

What would a non-patriarchal system look like? Responsibilities for the care of children, people suffering sickness or disability, and the frail elderly would be equally shared. The division of labor might continue to be somewhat gendered, but not in ways that put women at a disadvantage.

Whether such a system could emerge within capitalism depends on how you conceptualize capitalism. If all you mean is that a small group owns the means of production, and everyone else works for wages, then you could imagine a society with differences based on class, but no differences based on gender or other aspects of collective identity such as age, race, or citizenship.

But if you mean a system where no firm produces anything unless it can make a profit, and workers only earn enough to subsist, then it is not clear who would produce the next generation or take care of those unable to work. I describe patriarchal capitalism as a hybrid of hierarchical structures based on class, gender, and age, but I emphasize that it is overlaid with inequalities based on citizenship and race.

Feminist theory offers some good reasons why capitalism cannot be blamed for all forms of social conflict and dysfunction that plague human society because these patterns long predated the emergence of anything that could be called capitalism. Left-wing environmentalists often seem to embrace a kind of naïve golden-age-ism. They don’t seem to recognize that many pre-capitalist systems physically mutilated, battered, and exploited women and also promoted warfare, collective theft, and environmental destruction.

Feminist theory puts great emphasis on the concept of “intersectionality” to capture the concept of overlapping identities and systems of oppression. I bring this concept to political economy in ways that can explain hierarchical and exploitative systems that cannot be explained by class conflict alone.

AW: The title of your book The Invisible Heart: Economics and Family Values challenges Adam Smith’s invisible hand of the market with the concept of the 'invisible heart.' What is this invisible heart, and if widely embraced, how would it transform contemporary economic relations?

NF: The invisible heart is a metaphor for the interpersonal affections and commitments that bind society. No economic system can function on the basis of pure self-interest or pure altruism. We need to develop systems of economic organization that successfully balance individual freedom with social obligation and environmental sustainability.

We have not yet figured out how to do this, but we can point to some pieces, fragments, shards of otherwise broken systems that we might piece together: cooperatives and worker-owned enterprises that are community-minded; social democratic policies that socialize many of the costs of producing and maintaining human capabilities; public enterprises that truly serve the public interest, without succumbing to bureaucratic dysfunction. I don’t think the word “socialist” is specific enough to represent anything more than a general compass.

Defenders of the mainstream economic faith like to point to Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments. I describe Smith as a utopian capitalist (for a longer discussion, see my book Greed, Lust, and Gender: A History of Economic Ideas). If you agree with Adam Smith that people are basically moral creatures, then you don’t have to worry about an economic system that urges everyone to pursue their own interests. If you think people resort to selfish actions when they fear others will do the same, then you need to design an economic system that discourages opportunism.

AW: How should the field of economics change to better incorporate the values you advocate?

NF: Neoclassical economics can’t really change, but economists can. They should stop assuming that perfect self-interest drives the market and perfect altruism beautifies the home. Both families and the larger economic systems of which they are a part must encourage and enforce equitable commitments to the care of others and our planetary ecosystem.

Economics should recognize that unpaid care work—e.g., caring for children, for elders, for the infirm—provides economically valuable services that contribute both to living standards and to the gross domestic product. Like natural resources and ecosystem services, they are unpriced resources that can be depleted if not explicitly recognized.

Economics should also recognize that paid care work is undervalued because it provides services whose value cannot be directly measured, for people who can’t directly pay for them, with positive spillovers for society as a whole.

GDP is a useful indicator of what it actually claims to indicate: the market value of goods and services that are bought and sold. Unfortunately, it is a terrible indicator of total value. Goods and services that are not priced play a crucial role in the global economy, and the expansion of market production is increasingly destabilizing their provision.

Many economists now recognize this point, and reports such as those published by the Stiglitz Commission, in which I participated, document the need for broader measures. But not nearly enough is being done to develop, refine, or publicize measurement of non-market goods and services.

AW: To what extent has this marginalization of care work and women’s work been a factor in rising income inequality?

NF: A good answer to this question requires some thinking about how income inequality should be defined—in terms of market income or extended income (market income plus the value of non-market goods and services).

In the U.S., in the 1950s, many male wage earners were married to women who were full-time homemakers. The value of the unpaid services these homemakers provided was quite similar across households, exerting an equalizing effect on consumption and living standards. As more women entered the labor market, differences in their earnings based on class, race/ethnicity, and education, among other factors, began to escalate. Ironically, the very success of feminist efforts increased earnings inequality among women. Women with access to college educations and professional degrees were able to enter higher-paying jobs; women who lacked such access were left behind.

Other disequalizing forces have also come into play. In the U.S., changes in family structure and income flows between mothers and fathers have increased inequality between traditional two-parent households and other households with children. Between the 1950s and the late 1990s, women’s earnings steadily increased relative to men’s. But during the same period, both divorce and non-marriage increased, accompanied by a steady increase in the number of children raised by mothers alone. So women assumed a larger share of the financial costs of caring for children. And the costs of children relative to adults increased over this period, partly as a result of increased educational requirements and partly a result of the need to pay for the external provision of services once performed in the home.

Improvement in women’s earnings relative to men’s has slowed in recent years. Women pay a significant “motherhood penalty” for time taken out of wage employment or for declining to work more than 40 hours per week. Women are also overrepresented in the paid care sector of the economy (health, education and social services), where even highly skilled work tends to be undervalued by the market.

These trends are not unique to the U.S., though they have been studied in more detail here. Divorce and non-marriage are less common in Asia, but increasingly common in Latin America. Motherhood penalties tend to be lower in the social democratic countries of Northwestern Europe. But occupational segregation by gender is a global phenomenon.

AW: You have described children as a 'public good.' Please explain this characterization and how it would change economic and social relations if it were fully acknowledged.

NF: Children are public goods in three respects. The most concrete (and technical) respect is that most children grow up to pay taxes. Depending on the structure of public debt, and trends in labor market earnings, they are likely to pay more in taxes than is actually spent on them before they reach taxpaying age. The U.S. Social Security system provides a specific example. It is called “pay-as-you-go” because payments by the current working age generation largely finance payments to retirees. Levels of Social Security benefits along with eligibility for Medicare are determined entirely by lifetime earnings and marital status. People who have devoted zero time or money to raising the next generation have a claim on the future tax payments of other people’s children.

Children are also public goods in the larger sense of representing a stock of human capital—a set of capabilities for future innovation, work and care. If parents didn’t produce them at very low cost to others (parental expenditures far exceed social expenditures on children), employers would have to pay more for labor. This may not hold true in the future to the same degree if bullish projections of a robotic world materialize. But it has certainly been true in the past.

Finally, children are a more abstract form of public good: children are the future, and the future is a public good. If you love your species, you must love its children. If you hate your species, never mind.

None of these arguments imply that grownups (and the elderly) are not also public goods—they too offer both implicit and unpriced benefits that cannot be reduced to bilateral market exchange. And none of these arguments address the optimal rate of population growth. On a global level, however, we would do better to continue reducing fertility rates and improve the care provided to each child.

AW: How will aging populations in the U.S., Europe, Japan, and China affect the economics of caring?

NF: They will raise the costs of care and disrupt existing systems of intergenerational transfer, hence increasing distributional conflict on the national and international level. This is already happening. Many public pension systems were put in place when the size of the younger generation was increasing relative to the older. That trend has reversed itself.

Global fertility decline initially generated a kind of “demographic dividend” because time and money devoted to children could be reallocated to other purposes. Now, the burden of caring for a growing elder population prey to chronic health problems looms large.

AW: What would be the key attributes of a caring economy in full fruition? To what extent would it align with a Great Transition society rooted in solidarity, well-being, and ecological resilience?

NF: A well-designed social insurance system would reduce the private costs and risks of caring for dependents and distribute these more equitably between women and men, parents and non-parents, rich and poor, regardless of national citizenship. It would also encourage gender-egalitarian commitments to families and communities on a smaller scale.

Unfortunately, we don’t have good models of international democracy or collaboration in either the social or the ecological arena. But surely any Great Transition must address huge global inequalities in life expectancy, living standards, and environmental degradation.

I can’t even begin to describe the principal barriers or prospects for building such a system. What I do know is that it will require careful thinking about the political economy of gender and care.

This interview was originally published by the Great Transition Initiative.

Allen White is vice-president and senior fellow at the Tellus Institute, where he directs the institute’s Program on Corporate Redesign. He co-founded the Global Reporting Initiative and Corporation 2020, and founded the Global Initiative for Sustainability Ratings. 

Learning about the predicted impact of climate change for the next generation was enough to shift Tomorrow filmmakers Mélanie Laurent and Cyril Dion into high gear.

"Syril came to me when I was pregnant and told me about this study...that [said] my son would grow up in a world where food, water and oil will be hard to find," said Laurent, a César Award-winning actress known for her role in Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards.

Meanwhile, Dion was running a non-profit where he'd met Laurent and was wary of making the issue a focal point. 

"How could we tell people about what we heard when they're already fed up with catastrophes?" he asked. "And how could we tell millions?"

They started by looking for people worldwide "offering creative alternatives," said Dion, who serves as the project manager for the Switzerland-based Hommes de Parole Foundation, which sponsors conferences where thought leaders can find common ground.

Through that process, the new film Tomorrow was born. The documentary aims to empower everyday people to take control of their resources, one day at a time. 

Environmentalist and author Paul Hawken said of Tomorrow, "Without question, this is absolutely the best and most creative film on the future of humanity and the environment."

Watch the Tomorrow trailer:

What if all the food a community needed to thrive was grown within city limits? It's a question Keep Growing Detroit co-director Ashley Atkinson has been asking for years. 

"We have this really audacious mission of helping to promote a food-sovereign city where the majority of fruits and vegetables are grown...for Detroiters by Detroiters," Atkinson explains in the film.

Ironically, Popular Science predicts Michigan will be the best place to live in America in the next 100 years. But although shifts like mass extinction won't occur for a century, the World Wildlife Fund estimates that humans have just two decades to take action. 

"There's no perfect democracy or economic model, but what seemed to emerge from our journey was a new vision for the world where each community is more autonomous, and therefore more free," explained Dion.

Tomorrow is playing in select cities.

Watch an exclusive clip of Tomorrow:

Alexandra Rosenmann is an AlterNet associate editor. Follow her @alexpreditor.

For the next two decades, the U.S. Navy will inject hundreds of thousands of pounds of flares and billions of metal-coated glass fibers into ocean waters off the coasts of Washington and Oregon.

When the last two decades are added in, the Navy will have left behind more than half a million pounds of flares and trillions of microfibers of chaff (a radar countermeasure dropped by aircraft) by the year 2037.

Additionally, as Truthout previously reported, upcoming naval exercises will inject 20,000 tons of heavy metals and explosives into the seas.

These shocking numbers are due to a widespread domestic military expansion, which entails a dramatic uptick in the number of naval training exercises conducted each year.

When one looks more closely at what it means for that much toxic material to be added to the oceans, the news becomes even more disconcerting.

No Significant Impact?

The Navy claims its ramped-up activity will have no significant impacts.

However, Karen Sullivan, a retired endangered species biologist who cofounded the West Coast Action Alliance, which acts as a watchdog of naval activities in the Pacific Northwest, disagrees with that claim.

"When have they ever claimed there would be significant impacts?" Sullivan asked, in an interview with Truthout.

The Navy makes no-impact claims on a regular basis, but conducts its own research to back up the claims.

"The data they produce never fails to back up their 'no significant impact' claims," Sullivan explained. "To wit: The mission statement of the Navy's 'Living Marine Resources (LMR) Program,' a taxpayer-funded government research program run by the Navy, is to ' ... improve the best available science regarding the potential impacts to marine species from Navy activities ... while preserving core Navy readiness capabilities.' Which translates to, let's not get too carried away with conclusions we don't like."

There are 22 ongoing research projects taking place at LMR, and some are genuinely collaborative scientific efforts. But others are not.

For instance, the lead scientist for a study on the effects of explosions on marine species works for the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center, a Navy-owned division that, according to the Navy, "will be the Nation's Technical Leader for Integrated Information Warfare Solutions." The lead scientist for another study, on beaked whales, works for the Naval Undersea Warfare Center -- as do eight of the 11 other authors.

"This fox-in-henhouse science is not new," Sullivan explained. "Take flares, for example. Among other things, they contain hexavalent chromium, which is highly carcinogenic when ingested or inhaled in small quantities."

However, when confronted with this fact, the Navy persistently quotes an Air Force study from 1997, which concluded that it is safe to fire 8.2 billion flares containing 2.4 billion grams of hexavalent chromium over a 1.6 million acre area of land, without significantly increasing the risk of cancer. That conclusion is based on a human being living 70 years and not being exposed to any other type of carcinogens besides chromium.

Another example of the Navy's deceptive research practices relates to chaff. Chaff fibers are about the thickness of a human hair and range in length from a third of an inch to about three inches. The armed services now use a lot of it worldwide for peacetime training. Most people are aware of what fiberglass does to human skin: The tiny fibers can irritate and make you itch for days. They can irritate the eyes, cause contact dermatitis, and if inhaled, can cause breathing difficulties.

"Chaff fibers are larger than fiberglass, but are not without risk, especially considering the huge volumes that the Navy is dropping from the sky," Sullivan said. "Considering that chaff is labeled by the Navy as an 'ingestion stressor,' and considering the length of time chaff has been in use, and the fact that until 1987, chaff strands were made of solid aluminum coated with strips of lead to increase flutter, and considering the amount released (43.7 tons of it in one year over one 2.7 million acre range alone), the public has a right to be concerned."

Once deployed, chaff fibers can remain suspended in the air for 10 or more hours, raising concerns about air quality, safety from unintended interference with FAA or other radar systems, risks to other aircraft engines, impacts to grazing livestock, and impacts on birds and bats. Seabirds have been known to swallow plastic canister parts and land birds have been observed building nests with chaff. The amount of time chaff remains airborne depends on the combination of local weather conditions and the altitude of deployment.

However, the Navy itself appears unperturbed about chaff. "Predictably, the military has downplayed public concerns for decades," Sullivan said.

Despite the Navy's near-silence on the topic, chaff still occasionally makes it into public conversations. For example, TV weather people have mentioned it, as it tends to show up on their radar when explaining weather systems. In one case in 2010, a former US marine described chaff and called out the military for using it -- and covering up its use -- on air. Another example can even be viewed on Fox News. Once a chaff cloud drifted across the state of Florida, and was so big on the TV weather radar that the entire center of the state was blotted out.

More Impacts

In the late 1990s the Air Force, Navy and Marines dropped an average of 2.5 million bundles of chaff per year, each bundle weighing six to seven ounces and containing plastic parts, on 53 ranges in the United States, including offshore waters of the Pacific Northwest. Which means that, at the time, the yearly average of chaff dropped on US soil and in coastal waters was 547 tons. If this number stayed steady, we would have seen at least 11,000 tons of chaff dropped over the last 20 years. However, advocates say that number may well be much higher.

Moreover, according to the Navy, the use of chaff in the Pacific Northwest will increase from the current 2,900 "events" per year to 5,000 events. The maximum number of chaff canisters that the Navy says it would drop in one place is 360, or about 160 pounds of chaff containing 5.3 billion fibers. Thus, it is challenging to figure out how the military came up with its "worst-case scenario for environmental concentration" estimate for all that chaff dropped in one place: only 0.02 fibers per square meter. That figure assumes the chaff plume spreads out evenly over 200 square miles, and it does not count multiple chaff events that occur in one location (in this case, within the Pacific Northwest naval training region). Multiply those 360 canisters by 5,000 events and, at a minimum, the Navy is injecting 26.5 trillion chaff fibers -- or 400 tons of chaff -- per year into the environment. The chaff is being dropped quite near the shoreline -- sometimes as close as 12 miles off Washington's coast.

"Does chaff drift inshore to more sensitive habitats?" asked Sullivan. "Absolutely. What are the chemical and physical impacts of chaff on soil functioning? What are the implications to human and wildlife health, from so much aerial deposition? What happens if the water body where chaff lands is not the ocean, but an enclosed inland lake, where concentrations of metals build up?"

When it comes to how different sea life will be impacted by the Navy's exercises, the devil is in the details.

The Navy's own so-called environmental impact statement (EIS) claims the potential for impacts from military-expended materials like flares and chaff to sea turtles are low, in part because there are so very few sea turtles.

Yet, the EIS adds, "If a leatherback sea turtle were to incidentally ingest and swallow a projectile or solid metal high-explosive fragment, it could disrupt its feeding behavior or digestive processes."

The Navy concludes that its activities won't cause a "population-level" effect, meaning it won't lead to extinction for leatherback sea turtles, but it admits: " ... sublethal effects from ingestion of military expended materials other than munitions used in testing activities may cause short-term or long-term disturbance to an individual turtle."

The Military's Contradicting Statements

When it comes to flares, what can we make of the Navy's assessment of environmental impact? The aforementioned 20-year-old Air Force report often cited by the Navy says that when a burning flare cools, its toxic combustible materials condense from a vapor state to solid particles. Unfortunately, because information was not available about the actual size of these particles or the way they condensed, the Air Force found it "hard to speculate" as to whether breathable particles were produced at all.

The report did say that over time, emissions from all these flares would not cause the Environmental Protection Agency to classify our air as failing to meet air quality standards, and it acknowledged the lack of scientific research on the impacts of flare materials on soil and water.

"Most of the documents reviewed came to the conclusion that no impacts would occur but did not support their findings with empirical data," it said (emphasis added). And because flare dud rates were unknown, the authors assumed a low total of 20 duds per year.

The Navy does not keep records of when and where it releases multiple chaff cartridges. This lack of recordkeeping allows them to conclude that marine mammal exposures are "difficult to calculate."

As Truthout has previously reported, the Navy also fails to keep track of where it fired depleted uranium rounds into the ocean over the course of decades, making it impossible to calculate exactly how much depleted uranium remains in the waters off the Washington coast. It was only possible to estimate the total amount (34 tons, at the minimum), by adding up figures found in multiple Navy documents.

Contradictions abound throughout the Navy's assessments of what it is dropping into our oceans. On the subject of chaff, the Navy has claimed that chaff will have "no significant impact" on marine life, yet in its Northwest Training and Testing EIS, it states, "Some marine animal species within the Study Area could be exposed to chaff through direct body contact, inhalation, and ingestion. Chemical alteration of water and sediment from decomposing chaff fibers is not expected to occur. Based on the dispersion characteristics of chaff, it is likely that marine animals would occasionally come in direct contact with chaff fibers while either at the water's surface or while submerged...."

Again citing the Air Force report, the Navy's final word on chaff's impact on marine mammals is dismissive -- yet simultaneously admits significant impact.

"Because of the flexibility and softness of chaff, external contact would not be expected to impact most wildlife (U.S. Air Force 1997) and the fibers would quickly wash off shortly after contact," the Navy report reads. "Given the properties of chaff, skin irritation is not expected to be a problem (U.S. Air Force 1997). The potential exists for marine animals to inhale chaff fibers if they are at the surface while chaff is airborne. Arfsten et al. (2002), Hullar et al. (1999), and U.S. Air Force (1997) reviewed the potential impacts of chaff inhalation on humans, livestock, and other animals and concluded that the fibers are too large to be inhaled into the lungs. The fibers were predicted to be deposited in the nose, mouth, or trachea and either swallowed or expelled."

More Naval Obfuscation

In the Navy's 2015 Northwest Training and Testing EIS, it quotes several studies, saying, "contamination of the marine environment by munitions constituents is not well documented."

The Navy has consistently made this claim in an attempt to show that its actions are not harmful to the environment, but it does so simply by claiming the impacts are "not well documented."

"That statement actually means that it has neither looked for nor measured its impacts on the environment," Sullivan said. "The need for more data does not mean it is scientifically sound to assume there has been no damage."

In its 2015 EIS, the Navy states, "Long-term exposure to pollutants poses potential risks to the health of marine mammals, although for the most part, the impacts are just starting to be understood." Yet later, it delineates impacts, including " ... organ anomalies and impaired reproduction and immune function." There are multiple other examples of such doublespeak within the Navy's own documents.

Lastly, if more data is needed in order to understand the impacts of the Navy's exercises on wildlife and marine life, the prudent course to take would be to not conduct exercises until the requisite data is available -- if the data show there is truly no significant impact to the environment.

A Global Perspective

When we consider the debris that US military is dropping off our own shores, we must also acknowledge the massive amounts of contamination our military has wrought abroad. Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an environmental toxicologist and winner of the 2015 Rachel Carson prize for her research on depleted uranium (DU) and heavy metal contamination, told Truthout that the global implications of U.S. military exercises are staggering.

"Since 2001, the United States has accelerated its war contamination of the planet," she told Truthout. "The US has spent over $3 trillion on the decimation of Iraq and Afghanistan. The number of bombs and bullets dropped on those nations alone is staggering, let alone the contamination caused by their naval exercises around the world."

As early as 2005, it was reported that US forces were using 1.8 billion rounds of small-arms ammunition per year.

"That means that approximately a quarter of a million US bullets were being expended to kill every single US war victim in the Middle East," Savabieasfahani said. "In 2015 alone, the United States dropped over 23,000 bombs on the Middle East, according to the Council on Foreign Relations."

Now, in addition to the toxic debris the US military has left strewn across large swaths of the Middle East, the Navy is planning to add to global contamination by injecting unfathomable amounts of toxic contaminants into the seas surrounding the US.

When taken together, the amount of environmental damage the U.S. military is causing around the planet on an annual basis is nearly impossible to comprehend.

This article was originally published by Dahr Jamail, a Truthout staff reporter, is the author of The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan (Haymarket Books, 2009, and Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches From an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq (Haymarket Books, 2007). 

With more mobile phones than people on the planet, there's an army of regular citizens across the world who are able to help advance scientific research.

"By observing their environments, monitoring neighborhoods, collecting information about the world and the things they care about, so-called 'citizen scientists' are helping professional scientists to advance knowledge while speeding up new discoveries and innovations," write the producers of The Crowd & the Cloud, a new four-part public television series premiering today. (Click here to find stations and air dates.)

"I was NASA chief scientist at the time when Curiosity landed on Mars, so I know big data and big science," explains the show's host Waleed Abdalati, who is the current director of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, a research center sponsored in part by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "But I'm also convinced that citizen-generated data has an important role." 

In his open-sourced data quest, Abdalati invites viewers to "do science" by using the #CrowdCloudLIVE Twitter hashtag to tweet questions and comments.

On @CrowdAndCloudTV, @OpenStreetMap volunteers aid disaster relief by
mapping roads after disasters. Way to be! #citsci #CrowdCloudLIVE pic.twitter.com/rvUDoY7k1d

— Danita Bayer (@DanitaLillian) April 5, 2017

Segments feature the volunteer water testers of “Philly Unleaded," first responders to the Gorkha earthquake in Nepal, as well as a rural Wyoming bucket brigade monitoring their own air. 

After smelling an uptick in emissions and the state's refusal to investigate, residents of Pavillion, Wyoming, quickly took matters into their own hands. 

"People wanted to know what they were breathing, you know, it's pretty basic," Bucket Brigade founder Denny Larson explains in one episode. 

Samples were analyzed using EPA protocols in a laboratory certified by the U.S. Department of Defense. The results were shocking.

"Basically what we found is that sixty percent of these samples did not exceed any federal guidelines, but that is to say forty percent of them did," said David Carpenter, director at the School of Public Health at the University of Albany. 

"Many of the toxic chemicals that are known to cause cancer that we found in this report were in some cases hundreds in other cases thousands and in one case 22 million times over the EPA cancer risk," Larson adds. 

The Crowd and the Cloud is distributed by American Public Television (APT, APTonline.org). The four episodes will air on April 6, 13, 20 and 27. You can also view the episodes online.

The growing rift in the Antarctic Peninsula has now lengthened to 110 miles, meaning that the Larsen C ice shelf is now connected to the main ice shelf by only a 12-mile "thread," USA TODAY reports.

The British Antarctic Survey determined that the crack has expanded by 50 miles since 2011.

"It is particularly hard to predict when it will occur," Adrian Luckman of Project MIDAS told USA TODAY about the eventual calving, which would create a Delaware-sized iceberg. "I am quite surprised as to how long it is holding on!"

"The rift (or crack) has continued to open, and the berg continues to drift outward at a very consistent rate," Luckman added.

However, he noted that the crack has not grown longer in recent weeks. 

As EcoWatch mentioned previously, the loss of this portion of the ice shelf will not raise sea levels as it is already floating on the water. However, as these ice shelves disintegrate, the land-locked glaciers they hold back may begin sliding into the sea. If all of the ice the Larsen C ice shelf holds back slides into the ocean, it will raise sea levels globally by four inches.

According to Project MIDAS, "there is not enough information to know whether the expected calving event on Larsen C is an effect of climate change or not, although there is good scientific evidence that climate change has caused thinning of the ice shelf." 

Temperatures at the Antarctic Peninsula, where the Larsen ice shelf is found, have risen by 2.5 degrees Celsius in the past 50 years.

Antarctica's ice shelves are indeed melting rapidly as ocean waters warm. Climate Nexus reported in October that three glaciers in West Antarctica have undergone "intense unbalanced melting," risking their stability and further acceleration of sea level rise.

Research published in Nature Communications found that the Smith, Pope and Kohler glaciers in the Amundsen Sea embayment collectively lost about 1,000 feet of ice from 2002 to 2009.

Lorraine Chow is a freelance writer and reporter based in South Carolina.

It was only a few weeks ago that I wrote about changes to extreme weather in a warming world. That prior article dealt with the increase of extreme precipitation events as the Earth warms. I termed the relationship a thermodynamic one; it was driven by local thermodynamic processes. But extreme weather can also occur because of large-scale changes to the atmosphere and oceans. This issue is the topic of another just-published paper that makes a convincing case for a whole new type of influence of humans on extreme weather. In a certain sense, this study confirms what was previously reported here and here. With the march of science, the tools, methods, and evidence get better each year.

Before getting into the study, a little background. The jet stream(s) are high-speed rivers of air that flow in the upper atmosphere. There’s more than one jet stream; they blow west to east and they mark the separation of zones of different temperatures. A good primer on jet streams is available here.

If you were to stand at the northern pole and travel southwards, you would experience a gradual increase in temperature. However, when you reached the first jet stream (the Polar Jet), temperatures would rapidly become warmer. That is, the Polar Jet separates two different temperature air regions. Typically, if you are north of the jet stream, you are in a colder zone whereas if you are south of the stream, it is warmer. Sometimes, the jet streams undulate as they encircle the planet and these undulations move. So, sometimes you happen to be in a position north and sometimes south of the stream, even though your location is fixed.

The interface between warm and cold temperatures creates a lot of weather-pattern changes. In addition, if the undulations of the streams become fixed, it means your weather patterns will get stuck. For instance, you could find yourself in an upward undulation for weeks or longer and experience warm and potentially dry weather. Alternatively, if your location is north of a stuck jet undulation, you may experience persistent cold weather. Perhaps even more importantly, these stuck waves can become larger in their magnitude.

So, scientists really want to know what affects these undulations – both their magnitudes and their persistence. We also want to know whether these undulations will change in a warming planet. This is precisely where the new study comes in. The researchers used both weather observations and climate models to answer these questions. What they found was very interesting.

Using measurements, the authors documented what conditions led to extreme weather patterns that persisted for extended durations. They found that many occur when the jet stream becomes stationary with the undulations stuck in place. They also saw that under certain situations, the jet stream undulations do not dissipate in time; they become trapped in a wave guide.

Interestingly, this pattern of a stuck jet stream would occur when the number of undulations was between six and eight. When these circumstances all lined up, according to study co-author Stefan Rahmstorf:

The same weather persists for weeks on end in one region, then sunny days can turn into a serious heat wave and drought, and lasting rains can lead to flooding.

And this is also how humans come into the story. As humans emit greenhouse gases, the planet warms. We know that, we predicted it, and it is occurring. However, the warming is not uniform. The Arctic, for instance, is warming more rapidly than the rest of the planet. As a result, the temperature difference between the Arctic and the rest of the world is reducing. It is this temperature difference that maintains the jet stream patterns. As stated by lead author, Michael Mann:

The warming of the Arctic, the polar amplification of warming, plays a key role here. The surface and lower atmosphere are warming more in the arctic than anywhere else on the globe. That pattern projects onto the very temperature gradient profile that we identify as supporting atmospheric waveguide conditions.

The authors compared the observations to computer models and they found similar patterns. The authors went on to say in a press release:

Using the simulations, we demonstrate that rising greenhouse gases are responsible for the increase ... We are now able to connect the dots when it comes to human-caused global warming and an array of extreme recent weather events.

This is really where the science is. We know humans are causing climate change and we know that weather will change as this process evolves. What we really want to know is how human-caused climate change will influence extreme weather. It’s extreme weather like droughts, floods, heat waves, etc. that cause high social and economic costs. These authors have concluded a convincing study that connects the dots. Perhaps the study is best summarized by Michael Mann, who said:

We came as close as one can to demonstrating a direct link between climate change and a large family of extreme recent weather events.

Dr. John Abraham is a professor of thermal sciences. He researches in climate monitoring and renewable energy generation for the developing world. His energy development work has extended to Africa, South America and Asia.

[This essay is a joint TomDispatch/Truthout report.]

It’s war in the Gulf and the U.S. Navy is on hand to protect us. No, not that Gulf! I’m talking about the Gulf of Alaska and it’s actually mock war -- if, that is, you don’t happen to be a fin whale or a wild salmon. 

This May, the Navy will again sail its warships into the Gulf of Alaska.  There, they will engage in military maneuvers and possibly drop bombs, launch torpedoes and missiles, and engage in activities that stand a significant chance of poisoning those once-pristine waters, while it prepares for future battles elsewhere on the planet.  Think of it as a war against wildlife, an assault on the environment and local coastal communities.

And call it irony or call it American life in 2017, but the U.S. military's Alaska Command has branded Emily Stolarcyk "a troublemaker" for insistently pointing this out.  In a state where such a phrase is the equivalent of an obscenity, some have bluntly called her "anti-military." The office of Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski has termed her a "rabble-rouser," while a Kodiak Assembly member labeled some of what she’s been saying about the Navy "just silly."

As a resident of the tiny fishing town of Cordova, Alaska, the most radical rabble-rousing thing about Stolarcyk may be the passion with which she loves this region of the planet in all its majesty. It’s why she’s taken a fierce and unwavering stand for years now against the ongoing training exercises the Navy carries out in the Gulf of Alaska during one of the largest migrations of birds and marine life on Earth. These exercises, which inject tons of toxic materials into the Gulf and use significant explosive ordnance, are once again scheduled to take place just as Alaska's commercial fishing season opens.

Located in the state’s massive Chugach National Forest, coastal Cordova is nestled between the glacial-clad Chugach Mountains, Prince William Sound, and the Copper River. Fishing is the heart and soul of the town, as well as the foundation of its economy. A rough and tumble place, it regularly lands on lists of the top 10 American fishing ports, whether measured in pounds of fish caught annually or their value. A fish tax pays for its schools and the upkeep of most of its infrastructure. At least a quarter of its jobs are connected to the commercial fishing industry. "Without fishing, the town wouldn’t even be here," says Stolarcyk, who knows the intricacies of the Navy's plans better than most people in the Navy do, as we tour Cordova’s harbor.

It is impossible to overstate how iconic salmon are here. “What we have in Cordova is one of the last wild places left in the world, and one of the last places on Earth where we still have healthy salmon runs," she tells me.  She’s the program director for the Eyak Preservation Council, an environmental and social-justice-oriented nonprofit based in Cordova, whose primary mission is to protect wild salmon habitat.

Her partner is about to start his seventh season as a commercial fisherman. Their apartment building even has a fish smoker. "Salmon bring this town to life, you can feel the energy once the fish start returning, it's palpable," she explains, excitement in her voice. "You can hear the boats coming in and people go to stand on the shore to welcome them back."

However, this year, as in 2015, the Navy plans to conduct its part of Northern Edge 2017 (NE 17), a training exercise, right in her neighborhood. These war games, which occur every other year, include ships, aircraft, ordnance, and the widespread use of sonar across more than 42,000 square nautical miles of the marine environment of the Gulf of Alaska. And it is well known that sonar causes injury and death to whales, dolphin, and other marine life.  It has been shown that whales will even beach themselves to escape the noise, which is more than 100 decibels louder underwater than even the loudest rock concert. Thanks to a major lawsuit against them, the Navy agreed to limit the use of certain kinds of sonar in Southern California and Hawaii, due to its impact on the endangered Blue Whale along with other species. But not in the Gulf of Alaska.

Fishing for an Answer

As in 2015, the Navy's plans threaten an area of the Gulf that couldn’t be more biologically sensitive or rich in wildlife.  Their training area includes a State of Alaska Marine Protected Area, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Protected Area, and both the Gulf of Alaska Seamount Protected and Slope Habitat Conservation areas.

Nevertheless, the Navy is requesting permits to use live ordnance including bombs, missiles, and torpedoes, along with active and passive sonar in "realistic" war-training exercises that could release as much as 352,000 pounds of "expended materials" into those waters including, according to the Navy’s own Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), missiles, bombs, and torpedoes.

These waters support some of the most valuable fisheries left in the United States and the commercial fishing industry is the single largest private sector employer in the state of Alaska, providing over 63,000 jobs. Nevertheless, the Navy's own EIS claims that fish in the area are at risk of chemical exposures of various sorts because the war games will introduce chromium, lead, tungsten, nickel, cadmium, cyanide, and ammonium perchlorate, along with numerous other heavy metals and toxic substances, into Alaskan waters.  According to the EIS, "Little is known about the very important issues of nonmortality damage in the short and long-term, and nothing is known about the effects on behaviour of fish." It adds that “potential effects” include “death or damage” and that "fish not killed or driven from a location by an explosion might change their behavior, feeding pattern, or distribution."

While the Navy itself is aware of some of the damaging impacts of its exercises, others remain unknown and that service is making no effort to learn what they might be. The precautionary principle of do no harm is clearly not operative here.

The Navy's EIS does estimate that, during the years in which these war games are to be conducted, there will be more than 182,000 "takes" -- direct deaths of marine mammals or disruptions of their essential behaviors like breeding, nursing, or surfacing. On fish deaths, it offers no estimates at all. 

A partial list of affected species includes blue, fin, gray, humpback, minke, sei, sperm, and killer whales, the highly endangered North Pacific right whale (of which there are only about 30 left), as well as dolphins and sea lions. No fewer than a dozen native tribes including the Eskimo, Eyak, Athabascan, Tlingit, Sun'aq, and Aleut rely on the area for subsistence living, not to speak of their cultural and spiritual identities.

As the May 1st launching day for NE 17 looms, we already have at least some inkling of just what kinds of damage might result.  Immediately following Northern Edge 15, Alaska witnessed the single largest whale mortality event ever to occur in its waters.  Eighteen carcasses of endangered whales were found floating near Kodiak Island within the area in which the Navy had conducted its exercises, attracting national media attention.

Statewide, in the year that followed, Alaska had its worst pink salmon fishing season in four decades.  A federal disaster declaration was even issued to give salmon fishermen some relief, deferring the repayment of loans. That year also saw the biggest die off of Murres, a small seabird, ever recorded in the state.

Human-caused climate disruption impacts had long been noted across the North Pacific, whose climate-change-affected waters were warming to record temperatures that year. While this obviously played a role in such events, what impact the naval exercises had across the Gulf of Alaska remains largely unknown, in part because the Navy refused in 2015 -- as it will again this year -- to allow independent observers on its ships or to conduct follow-up studies focused on how their war games impacted the environment and marine life.

Local opposition is strong, as 10 Alaskan communities have passed resolutions requesting that the Navy move the timing and location of Northern Edge 2017 and all future training events to the fall or winter months and further offshore to minimize their impact on fisheries and migrations. Furthermore, the mayors of Cordova, Girdwood, Tenakee Springs, and Valdez sent letters to Senator Murkowski, requesting that she ask the Navy to relocate NE 17.  The senator, hardly a critic of the military, nonetheless wrote the secretary of the Navy last September to "express concern over the manner in which the Navy is approaching its participation in Northern Edge 2017," and called a lack of naval public affairs guidance "extremely troubling."

Assistant Secretary of the Navy Dennis McGinn replied, "I readily admit we could have done a better job reaching out to potentially affected stakeholders leading up to NE 15."

Stolarcyk is truly a David going up against the naval Goliath. Her dedication to this region of the planet has been and continues to be unwavering.

"How could you live in this place and experience all this beauty and not get how precious this is," she asks with typical intensity as we walk near her town’s harbor and bald eagles soar above us. "I love this place so much, and I can't even let myself feel all my emotions when I'm working on this issue, because I wouldn't be able to function."

The late afternoon sun is just beginning to hint at the evening to come as she stares out into the waters of the Gulf, takes several deep breaths, and says, “We have to defend our lifestyle here, because if we don't do it, who else is going to do it? If the Navy destroys the Gulf of Alaska, they can just leave, while we’re the ones who have to live with whatever is left."

“The Navy Is Getting Away With Murder”

My trip to Alaska to report on the upcoming war games began in the small ski town of Girdwood, a 40-minute drive east of Anchorage. There, Stolarcyk and I met up with her colleague, Christina Hendrickson, as they continued their efforts to push the Navy’s schedule for the war games out of prime wildlife season. Hendrickson, who specializes in environmental law, is a former defense contractor. Like two high-octane lawyers before a big trial, she and Stolarcyk instantly begin talking a mile a minute about what their next moves should be.

They bring me up to speed on the latest Navy maneuvers in what is now a publicity war over Northern Edge 17 and the way its officials have officially opted to "work with the stakeholders." On the other hand, as Hendrickson points out to me, “they have refused to meet with Emily and myself" -- and, as it happened at that point, me, too.  I'd recently contacted Captain Anastasia Schmidt, director of public affairs for Alaska Command in Anchorage, to arrange a meeting and my request had been denied.

Unfortunately, as Hendrickson points out, the permits the Navy requested from both the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Marine Fisheries Service allow them to war game their hearts out in the Gulf for the next five years without taking the slightest responsibility for analyzing the potential impact of their actions or dealing with the myriad species migrating through the area during the training period. While those who fish here must adhere to environmental standards, the Navy doesn’t have to.

"Imagine that you have a friend who is a subsistence fisherman,” Hendrickson says, “who is looking at his nets each season, and on the seasons the Navy trains, there seems to be less fish in them, and there are less whales returning, and then there’s a huge Murre die off.  There are sick sea otters or sea otters not returning at all. It's obvious to me that the Navy is not connecting these dots."

I ask her what exactly drives her on this issue and she stares out the window at the still snow-covered trees, then looks me dead in the eyes and says, "The Navy is getting away with murder and that upsets me."

“If It Walks, Swims, or Crawls, I’ve Fished It”

Stolarcyk and I fly on to Kodiak Island where we meet up with Tom Lance, the natural resources director for the Sun'aq tribe. We’re there so that the two of them can make a presentation to the island’s Borough Assembly in hopes of inspiring another Alaskan community to pass a resolution against the timing of the exercises.

Lance and I sit down in a café on the outskirts of town and he immediately begins describing the massive whale carcasses floating in the Gulf of Alaska after Northern Edge 15, many of which washed ashore on Kodiak.  As he points out, just before those war games began, the Sun'aq and Afognak tribes "admonished the DOD [Department of Defense] for not respecting their people and their resources, and demanded that NE 15 not take place. The Navy told the tribal council representatives, basically, 'thank you.'"

After essentially being blown off, the tribes requested another meeting, which only happened after the exercises were over. At that time, they insisted that the Navy change the season for the next set of exercises to late fall or winter and the location as well. "Another condition was for them to account for fish take [that is, the disturbance or destruction of fish populations], as if it were a commercial fishing operation where they are given a total allowable catch. To this they responded that they don't harvest fish, so why should they have to track that?"

"From my observation,” Lance says, “I see an undercurrent of frustration within the tribes and the community of fishermen that the Navy is going to do what they are going to do no matter what we say." He takes a last sip of coffee and concludes, "Everybody is so focused on the short run right now, they’re forgetting about the long run. If we don't save the ocean as a potential place to farm, we're not going to be able to feed ourselves in the future."

Later, I visit with Alexus Kwachka, a Kodiak commercial fisherman for the last 30 years. A bear of a man, he shakes my hand vigorously while welcoming me into his home, which overlooks Kodiak's massive harbor.  When I ask him what he’s fished for, he responds, "If it walks, swims, or crawls, I've fished it."

He wastes no time going after the Navy. “I question their timing. They say they don't want to train in the winter and instead they plan it for during the largest migratory period of marine life and birds here." Fishermen on the island, he assures me, are increasingly apprehensive about the Navy's plans and its impact on their livelihoods, even though "folks here are patriotic and support the military.”

Prior to Northern Edge 15, Kwachka lined his boat up with dozens of others in the harbor in protest. Now, he’s concerned again and feels slighted that the military doesn’t consider his voice worth listening to.  He says emphatically, "We’re worried about the fact that they are allowed to bring in a load of boats and blow shit up all over the place."  If they do that, he tells me, the ill effects "start out with the little guys then go up through the whole food web, which is another reason not to do it in the Spring when the forage fish are both reproducing and traveling.  It’s just not a good time to be introducing toxins and blowing things up on top of them. The chemical fallout from those explosions goes down through the food web and is eaten or absorbed by the fish."

“Food Security Is National Security” 

That evening, Stolarcyk, Lance, and I head over to the Kodiak Island borough building for their meeting. In a small, cramped basement room, several members of the assembly are around a table, while the rest of us are seated on chairs along the walls.

The two of them give their brief talks with a slide show.  As soon as they’re done, Councilman Matt Van Deale indicates that he’ll sponsor the resolution they want, adding, "Food security is national security and we are a fishing town." A second councilperson responds favorably to the resolution as others nod.

Suddenly, Councilman Kyle Crow speaks up, questioning the threat of toxic wastes. "I know about how hazardous waste is defined and I've seen folks declare a block of concrete with a chip of paint on it as hazardous waste." Stolarcyk promptly projects a slide she’s already shown that displays a chart taken from the Navy’s environmental impact statement indicating that more than five tons of toxic materials could be introduced into the fertile fishing areas of the Gulf each time the Navy conducts a training event.

Crow also questions the dangers of the Navy's use of sonar, comparing theirs to what he uses on his own fishing boat. Again, Stolarcyk pulls up a slide showing that the Navy's sonar generates audible blasts up to 235 decibels -- humans begin to suffer hearing damage at 85 decibels -- that travel for thousands of miles across the ocean. Crow nods in response to the new information, given that it is straight out of the Navy's own documents.

Councilman Larry LeDoux then requests that the assembly hear the Navy's side of the story and insists that such war games are necessary, as is the missile testing already happening on Kodiak, because of North Korea's ability to reach the United States with a missile.  (Not that it can yet.)

Despite these bumps, the majority of the assembly appears to favor the resolution.

The next morning Lance shares an email he sent to councilman Van Deale, thanking him for volunteering to sponsor the resolution. "It is hard to understand,” he wrote to Van Deale, “how some people in Kodiak's local government (and outside) distrust others who work to protect the sustainability of the very resources that have built the same Kodiak Archipelago economy and heritage!"

Two weeks later, Kodiak became the 10th Alaskan community to pass a resolution opposing the timing and location of the Navy’s exercises.

A day after that, in a letter to the commanders of the Navy's Pacific Fleet and U.S. Pacific Command, Senator Murkowski, who is also the chair of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, requested that the Navy “give serious thought” to changing the timing of the 2019 war games and moving their location due to impacts on marine life. “I expect to address these issues with senior leaders when the Navy appears before the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee next month,” she wrote.

“We Just Don’t Know How Bad It’s Going to Be”

Cordova is the image of what coastal Alaska once was. There are no cruise ships and the fishing industry still dominates the town, although some of its fisheries were wiped out in 1989 when the tanker Exxon Valdez spilled at least 11 million gallons of crude oil and they have never recovered.

Two years ago, I met James Wiese here.  He is an engineer on an Alaska Department of Fish and Game research vessel. A third generation Cordova mariner, he’s also a local city councilman. At that time, he was already expressing his fears that someday his children might not be able to eat the food that comes out of these waters.  He returned to the subject recently, telling me, "Anyone trying to consume seafood here knows how fragile everything is and is very concerned about what is going to happen to it because it's part of their everyday life." He adds that, within his department, the bulk of his colleagues support the resolutions calling on the Navy to alter its plans.

Cordova, he assures me, is "very much in opposition to the training" and still can’t believe the Navy is unable to find a time for their exercises when the salmon and the rest of the sea life in the Gulf aren't at their height.  "It's a food web and if salmon get tested and show contaminants from the Navy, everything is at stake. There are safer places for these Navy drills to happen. They need to be conscientious about what they are affecting."

Clay Koplin is Cordova’s mayor. "It's pretty simple," he tells me. "The Navy has the whole span of the year to practice and they picked the absolute worst time to do their exercise. We asked for a conversation in hope of changing the timing," he adds, turning his hands over in a gesture of puzzlement. "That's how a conversation works. We hoped to find some middle ground, but thus far there's been nothing to indicate they are willing to find that middle ground."

That same day, I meet Kelly Weaverling, the first Green Party mayor ever elected in this country.  He took office in Cordova in 1990, right after the Exxon Valdez oil spill. A former naval navigator in nuclear fast-attack submarines, he is now a Zen Buddhist monk as well as a fisherman.

Sporting a shaved head and dressed in a black Zen robe, grey turtleneck, and sandals with wool socks, Weaverling strides in quietly, yet purposefully, having come straight from leading a three-hour meditation for the community. "What the Navy is doing, we know it is going to be bad," he begins calmly. "We just don't know how bad it's going to be. It's pretty easy to figure out.  Anybody can do that."

I ask him to explain and he responds, as though instructing me before one of his meditation sessions, "Is something positive, negative, or neutral is the question. Anything you do is going to have an effect, even if it’s a non-action... So the question is, what effect is it going to have? The Navy's action will not have a positive effect on the ocean or any of its creatures. It's going to be a negative effect, we just don't know how bad."

“In Your Backyard?”

In the end, I even received a response from Captain Schmidt of the Alaska Command, who agreed to answer some of my questions by email.  I asked her what measures the Navy had taken in the wake of NE 15 to mitigate impacts on marine life. She responded by claiming flatly and without qualification that the new exercises would have "no significant impacts to marine life," and that the Navy had already gone through "an extensive and comprehensive permit process" with the National Marine Fisheries Service (as they are, in fact, required to do by law).

Why then, I wondered, do its commanders refuse to allow independent wildlife observers aboard their vessels during the training exercises?

To do so, she insisted "would result in unacceptable impacts to readiness," an odd response given that the only “impact” would assumedly be the use of binoculars.

As Northern Edge 2017 approaches, one thing is clear enough.  Despite growing opposition in Alaska, the Navy continues to do just what it wants in the state’s once-pristine, biologically rich Gulf waters.  Who knows how long it will be before parts of its vast marine web begin to test positive for the Navy's toxins?

As a journalist, I’ve spent time in Iraq and seen the devastation the U.S. military can visit on a society firsthand.  But I must admit that I never expected to see it in Alaska, whose tallest mountains I spent a decade of my life climbing -- where, thanks to Denali (the highest peak in North America), I fell madly in love with this planet. As someone who now regularly reports on climate disruption, I wonder daily how many more decades whole areas of the biosphere will even remain habitable. At a purely personal level, that makes the Navy’s ongoing war against Alaska’s waters and the wildlife in them unconscionable to me.  And in the age of Trump, it’s unlikely the Navy high command will spend much time worrying about the environmental damage its war games are likely to cause. 

For most Americans, Alaska is, of course, a distant, almost mythic place. But don’t be fooled.   In Alaska, there’s a broader lesson to be learned from these war games.  Christina Hendrickson makes the point in a way that speaks vividly to my own life experience. “If the Navy is able to come up to this pristine, biologically, ecologically and economically important area and train for war across three training cycles spanning six years and not engage local communities,” she says, “and if we're allowing this to happen in areas where subsistence is carried out by people who have relied on it for millennia, why couldn't this happen in your backyard?"

Dahr Jamail, a Truthout staff reporter, is the author of The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan (Haymarket Books, 2009, and Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches From an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq (Haymarket Books, 2007). 

Perhaps the Senate, in its hearing on Scott Pruitt's nomination to head the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), should have questioned Pruitt as the chief pediatrician for America's children. As head of the EPA Pruitt gets to decide what is safe for our kids—in the air they breathe, the water they drink, the food they eat and the communities they play. Senators didn't ask—but they are finding out.

In his first big test of what kind of pediatrician he will be, Pruitt decided to reverse an earlier EPA decision to ban the pesticide chlorpyrifos, a potent nerve gas banned from household use years ago, but still used in farms, orchards, pastures and golf courses.

Chlorpyrifos belongs to the same family as the nerve gas sarin—suspected of being behind the appalling chemical weapon attack which occurred this week in Syria, provoking appropriate outrage from the administration. But EPA has just decided to allow the continued dousing of America's rural landscapes with a close cousin—a different chemical weapon.

Chlorpyrifos is one of the most frequently cited causes of farm-worker pesticide poisoning—but is particularly toxic to young children and the fetus. The pesticide has come across my email screens periodically for over a decade, as organizations like the Nature Resources Defense Council slogged forward, petitioning the EPA to implement a simple requirement of federal pesticide law: that any pesticide must be shown to be safe before use. In 2015 the agency said is intended to ban it—but didn't finalize the decision. Eventually, courts ordered EPA to make a final decision on the ban—and Pruitt decided to ignore the science.

He did not do so because he asserted that chlorpyrifos was safe; he simply said that there were uncertainties, and that in that situation farmers were entitled to continue to use the chemical, exposing farm workers, their children, surrounding communities and consumers of food sprayed with the chemical, to a pesticide whose safety is at best highly dubious—in quantities up to 14,000 times the safe level.

"We need to provide regulatory certainty to the thousands of American farms that rely on chlorpyrifos, while still protecting human health and the environment," Pruitt said—not the message you would expect to hear from a pediatrician if you asked him if you should give your kids foods laced with a potent neurotoxin that has been shown to damage their mental development.

This reversal of the clear requirement of federal pesticide law—that safety come first—along with Pruitt's revealing ordering of his priorities—regulatory certainty to pesticide users first, with human health qualified by "still"—reinforces something we are learning about the Trump administration

Candidate Trump made a wide array of promises, many of them expressed within the 140 characters of a tweet. Huge numbers contradicted each other. How the administration would resolve those conflicts was one of the great unknowns. Trump, for example, proclaimed that "I want clean air and clean water" during his campaign. But he also pledged to dismantle the EPA.

It has been a fairly consistent pattern in the first 10 weeks of the administration that a campaign promise to help the powerful was likely to be honored, while one to help the vulnerable would be an earlier casualty of priority setting. Children of farm workers don't rank as high as Dow Chemical, the main manufacturer and defender of chlorpyrifos. QED—we know how this administration will come down.

That, of course, is precisely what you don't choose your children's pediatrician for—his loyalty to chemical and drug companies before his concern for your family. There's been a fair amount of media coverage of the decision, which may be a sign that the country is waking up to the fact that Trump's campaign tweet language has consequences, even when the courts and Congress block many of his initiatives.

Sen. Tom Carper, of Delaware, has jumped on the chlorpyrifos question, sending Pruitt a sharp query, and pointing out that Pruitt's own decision did not even purport to find the legally necessary "reasonable certainty of no harm" required to allow pesticide residues on food. Carper asked Pruitt to provide him "all documents (including but not limited to emails, legal and other memorandum, drafts of legal or regulatory decisions or orders, white papers, scientific references, letters, telephone logs, meeting minutes and calendars, slides and presentations)" relating to the decision.

Normally, a demand for such documentation is seeking the "smoking gun"—and Pruitt fiercely resisted requests for such documents from his attorney-general's office in Oklahoma until after his confirmation had occurred, seeking to conceal his hand-in-glove cooperation with big oil and coal interests in that office. But while I am very sure Pruitt will resist Carper's request, there is a sad possibility here—that no smoking gun was required, so blandishment's, no elaborate courtship by pesticide interests. Pruitt may simply never have considered any other decision than letting a dangerous chemical be massively applied to America's food supply.

After all, wasn't America at its greatest when the air, food and water were most toxic?

Fake News Alert: Callous as Pruitt's decision to continuing allowing the use of a nerve gas as a tool in American agriculture, there is no evidence, however informed your informant claims to be, that President Trump ordered Pruitt to permit use of chlorpyrifos to please his golf course management.

A veteran leader in the environmental movement, Carl Pope spent the last 18 years of his career at the Sierra Club as CEO and chairman. He's now the principal advisor at Inside Straight Strategies, looking for the underlying economics that link sustainability and economic development. Pope is co-author—along with Paul Rauber—of Strategic Ignorance: Why the Bush Administration Is Recklessly Destroying a Century of Environmental Progress.

There are some places in the world that are so vital to the survival of wildlife and so important to surrounding people and their livelihoods that even if we will never visit them in person, we know we must cherish them.

The Leuser Ecosystem (pronounced low-sir) is a vast tropical landscape on the island of Sumatra. Spanning over 6.5 million acres of lowland jungle, montane rainforests and teeming peat swamps, Leuser’s forests are among the most ancient on earth. This is a realm where volcanic eruptions, fluctuating sea levels and species migrations over uninterrupted millennia have enabled one of the most biodiverse landscapes ever documented to evolve.

The Leuser Ecosystem pulses with life. It is the last place on earth where orangutans, tigers, rhinos and elephants still live side by side in the wild. To step into Leuser’s steamy rainforests is to experience a serenade of biodiversity, a cacophony of buzzing insects, singing birds, croaking frogs and loud-calling primates.

The Leuser contains some of the world’s highest known levels of plant and animal abundance, with at least 105 mammal species, 382 bird species and 95 reptile and amphibian species, among countless others still unrecorded by scientists. The rainfall Leuser’s forests produce, and the numerous clear rivers that emanate within them, provide millions of local people with clean drinking water and irrigation for agriculture, including water-intensive rice cultivation, as well as many other needs essential to local economies.

Even if you’ve never heard of Leuser, and couldn’t locate it on a map, the Leuser Ecosystem is providing you with a critical service too. As probably the largest intact, contiguous forest remaining in Southeast Asia, and containing three of the planet’s most indispensable carbon-rich deep peat swamp forests, the Leuser Ecosystem stores immense quantities of carbon in its forests and peatlands, mitigating global climate change by keeping pollution out of the atmosphere.

While still relatively little known outside Southeast Asia, the Leuser Ecosystem is easily among the most important expanses of forest left in the region and is widely recognized by scientists worldwide as a global conservation priority. If the Amazon rainforests are the lungs of the planet, the Leuser Ecosystem is its heart, beating with vitality for us all.

But today, Leuser’s forests are under constant and escalating threat. Despite being protected by Indonesian law, the Leuser Ecosystem is under siege for short-term profits. Corporate interests such as industrial pulp and palm oil plantations, mining and logging operations, energy projects, and all the roads and infrastructure that are built to support them, are eating away at every corner of the Ecosystem.

As the last remaining intact lowland forests and peatlands are being cleared, drained, burned and carved up into smaller and smaller fragments, all of the region’s threatened and endangered species are being pushed closer to the brink of extinction.

Since the vast majority of Sumatra’s remaining orangutans are found within the Leuser Ecosystem, the Sumatran orangutan could easily become the first great ape species to go extinct in the wild. Only a few hundred Sumatran tigers remain in the wild, and even fewer Sumatran rhinos are believed to still exist. If we lose Leuser, we will lose these species and countless others, forever.

Confiscated from the home of an Indonesian palm oil plantation worker, Gokong the orangutan was weak, suffering from malnutrition and severely underweight. He was snatched from his mother after witnessing her brutal torture, and bought for less than $10 from the fisherman who stole him from his wild home. (The Orangutan Project)

Continued deforestation of the Leuser Ecosystem has begun to drastically change the region’s landscape. Totally preventable environmental disasters such as major floods and landsides have increased over recent years in both frequency and intensity. As local communities lose their forest buffer, more people are killed, more homes and villages are wiped off the map, and more livelihoods are crippled.

The future of all Leuser’s wildlife species, the water supplies and numerous other environmental services it provides to the millions of people living around it and to the climate itself, all depend on us protecting the Leuser Ecosystem today. To achieve that, we need to put the Leuser Ecosystem on the middle of the map for all the world to get to know it, to appreciate and cherish its importance, and ultimately to fall in love with it.

The Love the Leuser Ecosystem movement is a global effort to raise the profile of this amazing place in the imagination of everyone, everywhere, to make it a global household name.

This has worked in the past. It certainly helped slow the destruction of the Amazon, for example, and we need it to work for the little-known Leuser Ecosystem now. Of course, fame doesn’t guarantee protection, but a gleaming bright international spotlight on Leuser will send a clear signal to political and corporate decision-makers that the world won't stand for its destruction. With a united global movement demanding its protection, we will build greater pressure and increase the risk to the public image and reputation of anyone seeking to profit from the demise of Leuser’s forests.

I hope you will join us.

Instead of having to express our regret and apologies to future generations for what has been lost, we must be able to look back with pride in coming years that together we averted the current crisis facing Leuser, through collective global action. Let’s elevate the Leuser Ecosystem to its rightful place next to the Amazon, Great Barrier Reef, Serengeti and Grand Canyon—another place so widely loved that no one can tamper with it without encountering massive, overwhelming global resistance.

Watch a video of Dr. Ian Singleton reporting from the Jantho Forest in the Aceh region of Indonesia, about his work to save endangered orangutans, who are losing their natural habitat to rapid human development, deforestation and resource extraction.

This article was originally published by U.S. News & World Report. Reprinted with permission. Read the original.

Dr. Ian Singleton is the director of the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program. He works to confiscate orangutans who are illegally kept as pets and return them to a life in the wild, and conducts field research of the remaining wild Sumatran orangutan population in efforts to protect their habitat.

It is impossible to predict the future. What we can do is extrapolate a vision from our current body of scientific knowledge, mixed with a bit of good old-fashioned imagination. The result is a sort of trailer, which offers us a glimpse of what may be in store.

At the moment, our future appears set for a classic apocalypse blockbuster. Thanks to a new mathematical formula that charts the rate of humanity’s environmental impact, we may even have a rough idea of when to expect it at the cinema (and for that matter, everywhere else on the globe).

Named the Anthropocene equation, the formula was created by Will Steffen, a climate research professor at the Australian National University, and Owen Gaffney, a science journalist and communications consultant at the sustainability research firm Future Earth. According to their formula, recently published in The Anthropocene Review, human activity is altering the environment 170 times faster than under normal circumstances.

What do the authors mean by normal circumstances? Up until the Anthropocene age—our current geological age, during which human activity has exerted a dominant influence on the planetary ecosystem—Earth’s environment was shaped by three main determinants: astronomical forces (A), which affect insolation and mostly relate to the “gravitational effects of the sun and other planets”; geophysical forces (G), which include “volcanic activity, weathering and tectonic movement”; and internal dynamics (I), which pertain to the natural course of biological activity taking place on the planet.

But within the last century, the authors argue, these forces have largely paled in comparison to the overwhelming effects of human activity (H). Given this fact, Steffen and Gaffney were able to model their equation, which essentially suggests that due to massive population growth, consumption and technology, the (H) factor has become the sole force shaping the trajectory of Earth’s environmental system. The authors demonstrated this point using the rate of global temperature change over the past 7,000 years.

Until 45 years ago, this figure has decreased at 0.02°F per century. However, since our current age of industrialization, that rate has drastically reversed, with the figure now reflecting an increase of 3.1°F per century, which translates to a rate 170 times higher than the 7,000-year average.

This figure, Gaffney explained to New Scientist, reflects the fact that “far from living on a deeply resilient planet, we live on a planet with hair triggers.” The problem is that we have been “lulled into a false sense of security by the deceptive stability of the Holocene”—the previous geological era that spanned the last 11,700 years.

“Remarkably and accidentally,” Gaffney continued, “we have ejected the Earth system from the interglacial envelope and are heading into uncharted waters.”

Humanity has reached a tipping point. How our leaders decide to act now and in the next decade will drastically determine what direction our future takes. The authors themselves described their study as “an unequivocal statement of the risks industrialised societies are taking at a time when action is vital.”

If no drastic changes takes place, it could “trigger societal collapse.”

We face two very distinct possible realities. In one future, thanks to the greed of a small handful of global elites, humans will become extinct. How might we react to such an outcome? According to a recent psychology study by the University of Buffalo, the answer is—peacefully. Reported on iflscience.com, the study created its observational conditions by using the open world of a multiplayer online role-playing game called ArcheAge. A separate server was created for the study and all 270 million participants were told that in around 11 weeks, all their progress made in the game would be deleted. As the deadline approached, rather than grow more violent or greedy, players actually tended to become less aggressive and more cooperative.

Taken with a large pinch of salt, the study highlights an altruistic streak in human nature. But why wait until it’s too late to demonstrate it?

Enter the second possible future, forged through global unity, instead of division. It’s difficult to picture what form such unity should take, which makes it a challenge. What we do know, as the New Scientist article points out, is that instead of our current “dominant neoliberal economic systems [which] still assume Holocene-like boundary conditions,” what we need is “a ‘biosphere positive’ Anthropocene economics.”

“The old 20th-century political model of left versus right is now largely irrelevant,” Harari said. “The real divide today is between global and national, global or local.” He noted that we now have a global ecology and economy, but a national politics, which makes our “current political system ineffective, because it has no control over the forces that shape our life.”

Like our two possible futures, Harari believes human society has two possible solutions: “Either de-globalize the economy and turn it back into a national economy, or globalize the political system.” The latter suggestion might sound a bit unrealistic at the present moment, but if humanity wants to avoid near-certain doom, it is probably the direction we will need to take.

Fortunately, in Harari’s view, humanity still looks like it could be on track for a happy ending. “I am an optimist,” he said. “I think the human race will rise to meet these challenges.”

Editor's note: An earlier version of this story misstated the figures used to calculate the shift in global temperature change per century. These numbers have since been amended to reflect the actual figures.

Robin Scher is a freelance writer from South Africa currently based in New York. He tweets infrequently @RobScherHimself.