Why a Climate Change Wargame?
Type: CNAS Commentary
May 27, 2008 — Is climate change really a national security issue? We think so.
Our three-day wargame, Clout and Climate Change: A New Global Agenda for the 21st Century will focus on “gaming” how the world’s major emitters – the United States, China, India, and the European Union – are likely to adapt to climate change in the future and assess the consequences of their decisions. We are focusing on these countries because without movement from the major emitters, true progress will prove elusive. We also believe that U.S. leadership is necessary to meet the complex challenges of global climate change.
We do not have time to push hard decisions on climate change until The Day After Tomorrow. Resource decisions that we make today will have clear consequences in the future. Exploring the potential consequences of our climate change decisions and how they may affect our future security and international relationships and alliances is at the core of our upcoming climate change wargame.
We chose to host a wargame because the methodology allows us to create plausible future scenarios, where participants must think through the implications of their actions. The “rules of the game” are those of the real world. For this reason, game participants will be senior level officials and experts from the United States, China, India, and the EU with experience in making the types of decision that the game demands. In essence, this wargame will provide insights into the climate change priorities, trade-offs, and constraints embedded in the national psyche of each represented country. These insights will form the foundation for policy recommendations for the next U.S. administration.
The basis for our wargame is inspired by a recent CNAS-CSIS report, The Age of Consequences: The Foreign Policy and National Security Implications of Global Climate Change, which outlines three potential alternative futures based on projections from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). In The Age of Consequences and in the wargame we hope to challenge a common myth that climate change will be smooth and measured. In reality, some changes will be slow and gradual; some will be abrupt and dramatic. We don't know exactly how climate change will unfold, but we do know that it is already happening.
Above all else, we hope this exercise convinces the policy communities involved that climate change is in fact a national security concern. The question is: will the United States use its clout and leadership toward developing a clear and principled climate change policy?
Topic(s): Natural Resources + National Security = Natural Security
Project(s): Energy Security and Climate Change
