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BRATTLEBORO

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Your support powers every story we tell. We're committed to producing high-quality, fact-based news and information that gives you the facts in this community we call home. If our work has helped you stay informed, take action, or feel more connected to Windham County – please give now to help us reach our goal of raising $150,000 by December 31st.

Voices

Climate change: an opportunity by our country and military to expand influence

PUTNEY — I think that politicians who pretend to have a plan for a cleaner, greener planet, while simultaneously shoveling money at our agency of death and destruction, the Pentagon (which failed its first-ever audit last year, miserably) are selling us a monstrous lie.

The Center for Climate and Security has published a paper, “A Responsibility to Prepare,” in which they talk about the eagerness of many countries for a melted Arctic region.

According to the report, “Arctic ice is receding, opening previously inaccessible natural resources, shipping lanes, and tourism opportunities, with many countries eager to compete for claims and influence.”

You can read about how climate change is viewed as an opportunity by our country and military to expand influence in “key geostrategic environments” and for “military capacity building programs.”

This report reminds me of the document “Rebuilding America's Defenses,” which dreamed of a “new Pearl Harbor” just before 9/11.

How exactly does our incessant urge to impoverish economically and to physically destroy large swathes of the planet simultaneously jive with this pie-in-the-sky selling of a clean and shiny, new, greener planet?

As though any small effort any of us could make individually could compensate for the footprint on this planet of our military-industrial complex.

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