Photo courtesy of the Associated Press
How Donald Trump’s Negligence of Climate Facts Undermines His Own Approaches to Border Security
Zackary Tamimi | July 5th, 2018
Over the years, the consequences of human induced climate change have become increasingly apparent. Flooding, droughts, and the amplified intensity of hurricanes have had devastating effects on vulnerable populations that leave them open to bigger, more human threats like terrorist and criminal organizations. These threats are the very groups that Donald Trump campaigned so fervently against in 2016. Yet Trump, a self-appointed champion of border security, cannot seem to see how his denial of climate change will make the problems he has set out against infinitely more complicated.
Throughout the 2016 election and well into his presidency, Trump has taken a rather hardline stance against immigration, refugees, and has repeatedly painted himself as a strongman in the face of terror groups like the Islamic State. Trump’s policies, like the travel ban, his desire to build a wall along the US-Mexico border, and pushes to slash the acceptable number of refugees for admittance, demonstrates that border security is a top priority for him whilst showing his isolationist colors .
Simultaneously, Trump and his appointments are not the strongest advocates for adaptive climate policy. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt vocally refuses to link CO² and global warming while Trump himself has pulled the US from the Paris Climate Agreement.
However, climate change and the criminal/terrorist organizations that haunt Trump’s border security concerns are hardly mutually exclusive issues. Rather, they are intrinsically connected as part of a much wider problem.
Climate change can have incredibly detrimental effects on the economies and ecologies of nations around the world, especially if they don’t have the most stable governments. The Pentagon released a report detailing the burden of climate change on developing countries, citing water scarcity, the loss of costal habitat, and reductions in food productivity as major risk multipliers for conflict, collapse, and human crisis in underdeveloped regions of the world.
It is in the shadow of such climate induced crises that many belligerent non-state actors come to prominence or solidify their position. As a result, they are given the perfect opportunity to project their power and influence on an international stage. A study conducted by the Climate Diplomacy initiative titled Insurgency, Terrorism and Organized Crime in a Warming Climate has shown that none of this is mere speculation either. According to the report, such belligerents, or “non-state armed groups”, use climate related disasters to undermine the authority of governments in already weakened states.
The report thoroughly investigates four different case studies. However, one study on the Islamic State in Syria and another on organized crime in Guatemala demonstrate how Trump is only treating the symptoms of his principle concerns rather than the underlying causes by ignoring climate change.
Drought in Syria and the Islamic State
In 2007, Syria was caught in the throes of a severe drought that would come to last for five years. Years of government mismanagement and reliance on water intensive crops lead to water usage exceeding replenishment rates by 20 percent. In Syria, winter is usually the time of year that brings the most rainfall. However, 10 of the 12 driest winters in Syria’s history have occurred in the last 20 years. In fact temperatures saw an increase of 1.2 degrees Celsius since 1900 and rainfall decreased by 13 percent overall since 1931 according to the National Academy of Sciences. Thus, the perfect drought conditions were created.
Because of the drought, around 1.3 million rural people lost their livelihoods in agriculture or a supporting industry. Local economies dried up and a mass migration to urban centers was triggered. Syria’s metropolitan areas became overwhelmed as millions of people from the surrounding countryside began pouring in. This was on top of the 1.2 million Iraqi refugees Syria already accepted in prior years.
As more and more people began to crowd into cities, the physical infrastructure of these urban areas proved to be inadequate. Simultaneously, the Syrian government was failing profoundly in its response to the crisis, angering many urban residents as a result. Tensions rose, protests broke out, and Syria began to slip into civil war.
Shortly after the outbreak of conflict, the Islamic State appeared to seize upon the chaos with fundamentalist militants arriving from around the world. However, IS began to do something unique. It began to provide humanitarian relief in the areas that the resource strapped Syrian government failed to respond to, essentially replacing the state as a provider of services. IS’s success came from providing much needed infrastructure and services such as irrigation systems, clean water distribution, and various social programs, all of which were badly needed in the wake of a devastating drought. Additionally, the terrorist group tended to provide higher wages than what was normal in a given area. Subsequently, IS saw recruitments rates of up to 70 percent in some regions, giving them the manpower to project their influence even further.
With the established government of Syria in disarray and the entirety of the country caught in civil war, IS managed carve a swath of territory and declare its caliphate in 2014. Around this time, IS had established a rather extensive social media propaganda network which began to radicalize people outside of the organization. Since 2014 there have been over 140 attacks either conducted directly or inspired by IS in 29 countries other than Iraq or Syria. This includes the US.
In the aftermath of the Orlando shooting in 2016 and various attacks across Europe and Asia, Donald Trump began to capitalize upon anti-terrorist rhetoric. Even after his election, policy choices like his travel ban and cuts to refugee numbers reflect such anxieties over terrorism. But it is at this point that the merit of Trump’s policy must be judged, and frankly, he’s missing a big point.
Even if Trump’s policy was to be considered effective without any doubt, once all the facts are put into perspective it is easy to see how the current administration’s approaches to combating terrorism will fail in the long term if they don’t factor in climate change. Merely tightening our borders and even beefing up counter-terrorist operations ultimately fails to acknowledge that climate change plays a major role in global instability, and subsequently, in the creation of threats to our national security.
However, climate change exacerbating national security threats isn’t just a fluke limited to the Middle East. It is also giving organized crime groups in Guatemala like cartels and localized gangs more freedom to operate.
Crime Groups and Climate Change in Guatemala
Just as IS has done in Syria, criminal organizations in Guatemala capitalize upon the opportunities that climate related disasters give them. Guatemala is still recovering from decades of civil war and strife while also attempting to manage a large criminal presence that results from a poor economy and key drug trade routes running through the country. Consequently, the Guatemalan government is stretched thin and climate change is making the situation worse.
Many in the scientific community support the notion that warming seas and increased water vapor in the air due to the greenhouse effect is strengthening the intensity of hurricanes and other storms. Meanwhile, Guatemala sits in a major hurricane zone. With storms becoming more devastating, the Guatemalan government has to divert more resources to disaster relief. In fact, Guatemala’s government spent a fourth of its annual budget, or $1.02 billion, on disaster relief programs in the wake of the 2010 hurricane season.
However, it isn’t just intensifying hurricanes that are placing an immense strain on the people and government of Guatemala. Increasingly unpredictable El Niño and La Niña cycles are devastating an economy highly reliant on agriculture.
“Rainfall events are projected to increase in intensity and the number of dry days with higher temperatures is expected to rise as well, elevating both the risk of droughts and floods,” said Lukas Rüttinger, author of Insurgency, Terrorism and Organized Crime in a Warming Climate. “Between 2007 and 2011, El Niño and La Niña climate cycles have increased in frequency, bringing years of unusually high or very low rainfall respectively. Guatemala heavily relies on agriculture for exports and food security, and the impact of climate change on yields like coffee and sugar cane could have severe economic and social effects.”
The immense strain on Guatemala and its people, due to natural cataclysms and economic desperation linked to climate shifts and a slow post-civil war recovery, have given cartels and local gangs immense flexibility to expand. Like IS, criminal organizations provide both services and economic incentives to disenfranchised populations that authorities have trouble reaching. Subsequently such criminal groups win popular support, undermine government spheres of influence, and expand their own.
Between 2008 and 2010, harvest losses in Guatemala were around 80 percent while 50 percent of children under five were considered malnourished. With little police oversight and crushing poverty, there is much incentive to participate in organized crime and a global industry worth $4.35 billion annually. Farmers who cultivate opium poppy can actually increase their incomes roughly twenty-fold. This increased income can create a security against droughts or flooding that normal crops cannot create.
However, with an increased participation in the drug trade comes amplified violence. Guatemala is in the infamous “Northern Triangle” and has one of the highest murder rates in Central America. 45 percent of homicides are connected with drug trafficking, tearing communities apart and creating much anxiety over safety. As a result, many flee their homes and seek refuge in safer, more stable countries like the US.
Climate change not only spurs increasing numbers of people to join a cycle of supply and demand that brings more drugs into our country, but it also helps perpetuate a migration crisis at our southern border. The number of unauthorized immigrants from Guatemala living in the United States has increased from 520,000 in 2010 to 560,000 in 2012 according to the DHS Office of Immigration. Meanwhile another 400,000 people from central America and Mexico attempt to reach the US on a yearly basis because of the violence that climate change helps enable.
Donald Trump is almost comically infamous for wanting to build a solid border wall along our territory with Mexico to keep such people out. But once again, a $21.6 billion-dollar wall ignores a core cause of the problem it is trying to solve. There’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting the borders of one’s nation to be secure, but the Trump administration is fighting a losing war against multiplying factors by ignoring climate change. Pushes for projects like this while the EPA is put on the chopping block demonstrates the hubris of the current administration in thinking that climate change has nothing to do with the problems they are trying to address.
At the end of the day…
We can’t just ignore the consequences of climate change. Deciding to bury our heads in the sand or declaring wars on the shadows of much larger problems isn’t going to help us. In fact, it is going to set us up for failure. Climate change is one of those much larger problems and a wall isn’t going to defend us against it or the complications it will create.
We need to understand what is happening to our planet, what we can do to slow the process, and start preparing those of us who are most susceptible to the ravages of a changing world. Because if we don’t, the issues that Donald Trump campaigned on will only worsen with time.
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