War and the Environment
War and the Environment
•
•
•
•
Passive Use of Environment
Collateral Effects
Use of Environment as a Weapon
Environmental Modification to Aid Own
Operations or Impede Enemy
• Eco-Terrorism
• Military actions may include some or all of
these components to varying degrees.
The Choke Point
The Choke Point
Collateral Damage
•
•
•
•
•
No Military Intent to Cause Damage
Rutting by Vehicles
Cratering (Bombturbation)
Fire
Injury to Plants and Animals
– Threat to mountain gorillas from civil war in Africa
– May actually be less damaging to flora and fauna than normal
commerce, development and agriculture.
• Chemical Contamination
• Nuclear Accidents
– Accidental release of chemicals or radiation, as opposed to
chemical or nuclear warfare.
• Vandalism
Vehicle Damage, Bosnia
Battle Damage, Kuwait
Battle Damage, Kuwait
Vandalism
Vandalism
Buddhas of Bamyan
Collateral Protection
•
•
•
•
•
Siegfried Line
Former East European Frontiers
Military Reservations
Political Power to Resist Development
Vested Interest in Preserving Realistic
Training Environment
Former
East
German
Frontier
Vehicle Damage, Germany
Collateral Protection, California
Environmental Modification to Aid
Own Operations or Impede Enemy
• Small-Scale: Virtually all Military
Construction
• Large-Scale:
– Aid Own Operations
• Deprive Enemy of Cover
• Improve Own Mobility
– Impede Enemy Operations
• Impair Enemy Mobility
• Deprive of Supplies
Earthworks, Fort Ticonderoga
St. Lawrence River, Quebec
Earthworks, Quebec
Alcatraz, California
Environmental Modification to Aid
Own Operations
• Deprive Enemy of Cover or Sanctuary
– South Vietnam - Defoliation
• Improve Own Mobility
– Tactical:
• River modification - Civil War
– Strategic:
• German Autobahns
• U.S. Interstate System
• Suez and Panama Canals
Island
Number
Ten and
New
Madrid,
1862
Vicksburg Canals, 1863
Red River
Campaign
and
Bailey’s
Dam,
1864
World War I and Highways
• Railroads insufficient for Army’s needs
• Army turned to truck convoys
• Civilians found convoy routes featured
such revolutionary innovations as:
– Route Markings
– Regular Maintenance
– Snow Removal
Pershing’s Map, 1922
The Interstate Highway System
I-70, Glenwood Canyon, Colorado
I-70, Glenwood Canyon, Colorado
The Suez Canal
Suez Canal
• Connections between Nile and Red Sea
dug in ancient times
• Modern canal by Ferdinand de Lesseps
1858-1869
• Easy terrain
• Principal winner: Britain enabled to extend
military reach
• Red Sea organisms invading
Mediterranean
The Suez-Panama Connection
• De Lesseps took on the job of building a
canal across Panama
• Nobody else could have kept the project
going as long as it did
• 22,000 died before project abandoned in
1893
• French actually excavated about 1/3 of
canal
• Built railroad across Panama
The Nicaragua Alternative
Continental Divide, Nicaragua
Volcan Momotombo
Nicaragua or Panama?
• French lobbied hard to have the U.S. take
over their route in Panama
• An ill-timed postage stamp killed the
Nicaragua route
• French investors in Panama bought out
The Panama Canal
• U.S. and Colombia sign treaty in 1901 to
build canal
• Colombian Senate refuses to ratify
• U.S. backs separatist revolt in Panama
How U.S. Succeeded
• Disease control
• Life support for workers to ensure long
term commitment
• Get a Bigger Hammer
– Bigger equipment
– U.S. experience with railroads
New Lock Construction
Gaillard (Culebra) Cut
Deepening the Canal
Rio Chagres
Dredging
Dredging
Gatun Locks
Gatun Dam
French Trench
Prepared New Channel
The Future?
• Largest ships cannot use the Panama
Canal despite improvements
• Sea Level Canal?
– Panama?
– Nicaragua?
• Environmental Impacts?
Corinth Canal, Greece
Corinth Canal, Greece
Corinth Canal, Greece
Corinth Canal, Greece
Environmental Modification to
Impede Enemy
• Impair Enemy Mobility
•
China 1938 - Breach Huang He Dikes
•
Chemical Warfare
• Deprive of Supplies
•
River Diversion in Sieges
•
Scorched Earth Campaigns
•
Shenandoah Valley - Civil War
•
Sherman's March - Civil War
•
Extermination of Buffalo - Indian Wars
• It is usually easier to mess things up instead of improve
them, especially in war, so it is no surprise that
environmental modification to impede the enemy is so
prominent in military history.
Herbicide Effects, Kurdistan
Diversion of Huang He, 1938
Topography of China
Loess in China
Huang He Diversions 400 BC Present
Scale of Huang He Diversions
Japanese
Strategy
1938
Extent of
Flooding
(After Todd,
1949)
Military Effects of the Breach
• Minor losses of Japanese troops and materiel
• Few troops caught on the wrong side escaped
• Chinese gain time for withdrawal and relocation
of capital
• Flood also protects Japanese flank
• Little additional fighting in Central China
• Japanese capture of Wuhan (Hankow) delayed
by only a couple of months
• No central authority in much of Central China
• Communists gain support
Flood Fatalities, 1938
Affected Population
Flood Fatality Estimation
• Graham, W.J., 1999, DSO-99-06, A Procedure for
Estimating Loss of Life Caused by Dam Failure
• Assuming poor understanding of risk downstream
• Fatality rate in parentheses is recommended prediction
value
Flood Severity
Warning Time
Fatality Rate
High
None
30 – 100 % (75%)
> 1 hour
X Number still at risk
None
3 – 35% (15%)
> 1 hour
<1 – 6% (3%)
None
0 – 2 % (1%)
> 1 hour
<<1 %
Medium
Low
Casualty Model Applied to 1938
• Population of Henan, Anhui and Jiangsu
flooded counties = 13.2 million (Lary,
2001)
• Medium severity, no warning (15%)  2
million fatalities
• Medium severity, > 1 hour warning (3%) 
400,000 fatalities
• 844,000 fatalities = 6.4%
Visualizing the Risk
Use of Environment as a Weapon
• Deliberate Triggering of Environmental
Effect to Cause Direct Damage to Enemy
Forces
• Passive use of the environment as a
combat multiplier is an ancient military
tactic: waiting for suitable weather or moon
phase, channeling the enemy into
unfavorable terrain, and so on. That's not
the sense implied here.
Use of Environment as a Weapon
•
•
•
•
•
Comparatively Rare
Lack of Knowledge
Lack of Capability
Lack of Opportunity
Inefficiency
Use of Environment as a Weapon
• Deliberate Spread of Natural Plagues
• World War I - Italian Alps
• World War II - Allied "Dam Busting"
Eco-Terrorism
•
•
•
•
Mongols in Iraq - 1259
Hitler's Scorched Earth Order - 1945
Sea Island Oil Spill - 1991
Kuwait Oil Wells – 1991
– Pure Eco-Terrorism
– Most Other Examples had Other Military Functions
• Chemical Warfare
• Hypothetical Doomsday Devices
Eco-Terrorism
• Reasons For Use:
– Deterrence
– Intimidation
– Lower Quality of Life for Enemy
– Deprive Victor of Fruits of Victory (Scorched
Earth)
Eco-Terrorism
• Comparatively Modern
• Recent Technological Capability
• Recent Rise of Environmental Concern
First View of Kuwait
Satellite
View,
March 2,
1991
Rawdatain Oil Field
Darkness at Noon
March 24, 1991, 11 AM
Turning Night into Day
What’s Worse than a Burning Oil Well?
Oil on the Beach