Another Inconvenient Truth - Links Between the Climate Crisis and the Military

Registration is Required:
In Person: Registration Link
Zoom: Registration Link

Topic: Another Inconvenient Truth - Links Between the Climate Crisis and the Military

Speaker: Jim Rine from Veterans for Peace Climate Crisis and Militarism Project

When: Thursday, June 5th, 2025 | 7pm Hybrid meeting, both In person and on Zoom

In-person: Bloomfield Township Public Library, 1099 Lone Pine Rd, Bloomfield Hills, MI 48302

####

##### Synopsis of the presentation:

If the world’s militaries were a country, it would rank 4th in emissions, more than Russia. In that mix of global militaries, the U.S. is the #1 emitter because the U.S. is the #1 military spender, over 2 times the spending of China and 9 times that of Russia. The U.S. annual military funding is over 20 times the yearly climate funding in the Inflation Reduction Act. And yearly spending on our nuclear arsenal almost equals the annual climate funding in the IRA, even though we already have enough bombs and missiles to end civilization.

But perhaps the most important effect of militarism on the climate crisis can be summed up in an essay by Amitav Ghosh in Greta Thunberg’s The Climate Book. Ghosh writes:

“…nationalism, military power and geopolitical disparities are fundamental to the dynamics that have repeatedly stymied efforts to reach a global agreement on rapid decarbonization. In that sense, it could be said that conflict and national rivalries are fundamental drivers of climate change.”

Some of the various ways both peace and environmental groups work locally and internationally on addressing this problem will be described at this session.

About the speaker:
Jim Rine helped form the Veterans for Peace Climate Crisis and Militarism Project (CCMP) https://www.veteransforpeace.org/take-action/climatecrisis.

During the 117th Congress, CCMP helped draft, with Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA-13), H. Res. 767, which calls on the Department of Defense to report and to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Jim has participated in protests in Washington, D.C., New York, NY, and Lansing. MI. He is also on the executive committee of the Move the Money Michigan Coalition, which lobbied the city councils of Hamtramck, MI and Detroit, MI to pass resolutions telling the U.S. Congress and POTUS move $100 billion from the Pentagon to fund human needs (https://www.movethemoneymi.org/).

After serving in the U.S. Army in West Germany (1969-1973), Jim Rine earned his Ph. D. at U of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science. For over three decades, Jim researched and published on topics in marine and environmental geology, and potential interactions of the U.S. petroleum industry to climate change. Rine is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Geology at Wayne State University in Detroit.