Don’t saddle the military with an irrelevant climate mission 

In a well-intentioned and idealistic op-ed published last week, a promising high school student argued that if combatting climate change were added to the U.S. military’s mission set, our armed forces would be more attractive to the author’s generation, which could reverse current recruiting shortfalls.

Respectfully, I feel obligated to put forward a counterpoint that draws on my extensive experience with this topic.  

First and foremost, we must identify and address the root causes of the Department of Defense’s recruiting crisis. At the top of the list is declining eligibility. A 2022 study from the Pentagon showed that 77 percent of young Americans would not qualify for military service without a waiver due to being overweight, having a criminal record, or suffering from mental and physical health problems. These issues are beyond the scope of this op-ed, but options are being explored. 

Another factor is that fewer young people are willing to serve in the first place. While the author’s proposed solution attempts to address this issue, there could not be a worse time for our armed forces to add extraneous responsibilities to their primary mission of deterring conflict and winning wars when deterrence is unsuccessful.

Two other recent op-eds in The Hill have made the alarming claim that World War III is already upon us, yet the Biden administration has yet to take the decisive and bold action necessary to win it. This is hardly hyperbole. China is rapidly preparing to move against Taiwan, Israel is surrounded by more than a dozen proxy forces backed by a nuclear-ambitious Iran, and Ukraine has crossed into the Kursk region of Russia, setting an Armageddon-bent Vladimir Putin back on his heels and forcing him to evacuate 180,000 civilians.  

These are only the dangers closest to our door; now is not the time to rebrand the military as a “climate force.” 

In fact, I have already detailed multiple times how the Defense Department climate plans praised by the author are not only misdirected but a dangerous distraction from the urgent deterrence necessary to address current threats.  

I made this point during a Senate Budget Committee hearing earlier this year, testifying that the Pentagon’s focus on greenhouse gas emission reductions to mitigate climate change is a costly unforced error. Even if the entire planet were to cease emissions today, the Earth would continue to warm for several decades because of previous emissions. That is why I have urged the department to focus instead on adapting to climate change, which can be most effectively done by improving the military’s capability to observe and predict weather, water and ice.  

A third point is that the author simply assumes that climate change is causing a wide range of unspecified consequences, all of which are negative. This is far too vague, imprecise and incomplete to justify revising Title 10 of the U.S. Code, which defines the role, mission and organization of America’s armed forces. This view has been influenced by the pervasive inaccuracies in the media, some scientific journals, and even congressional hearings regarding climate change. Far too often, implausible emissions scenarios are relied upon because of the extreme, albeit unlikely, outcomes they produce. 

Finally, if a climate connection is desired to remedy the recruiting of our armed forces, we should simply amplify the stories of those in the service who do the most in making the military climate-ready. These are the Defense Department’s professional meteorologists and oceanographers who participate in the planning of every exercise and operation. This cadre of highly educated enlisted service members and officers and civilian scientists are just the type of highly trained experts to draw in the author’s Gen Z peers. 

Retooling the U.S. armed forces with a climate mission is not the way to bring in more of the next generation. But if it helps, the department can showcase the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines who already expertly assess climate, weather and ocean conditions for mission accomplishment. The Pentagon has been using these professionals to adapt to climatic conditions for decades, and they are the perfect candidates to put military recruiting back on track.

Rear Adm. (ret.) Tim Gallaudet is the former acting administrator and deputy administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; acting undersecretary and assistant secretary of commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere; and oceanographer of the U.S. Navy. He also served as the director of Task Force Climate Change in the Pentagon.