Do you think that you are actually engaged in a war?
For most of us, war may be something distant. Yet, if we reconsider war in the context of our environment, we might recognise, bitterly, that we are already in one.
This war is not about guns or tanks, but about the ecological crisis and climate change.
This war has no frontline, no uniforms, no ceasefires and no respect for borders. This war, ironically, is being created by our own actions.
Believe it or not, the scale of destruction from this environmental war rivals, and in many cases surpasses, that of conventional warfare. While the ecological and human toll of armed conflicts is widely condemned, the consequence of environmental crisis inflicted during ‘‘peacetime’’ is often ignored.
It is not easy to compare the environmental toll of war with the damage inflicted by our ongoing assault on nature. If we want to make the stakes clear, we need to put both in the same frame of reference.
One way to do that is by using a common unit of measurement — carbon emissions.
During the Vietnam War, the United States dropped about 7.5million tonnes of bombs, which is equivalent to the total tonnage deployed during World War 2. These bombs, along with the widespread use of defoliants such as Agent Orange, generated about 600million tonnes of CO2.
More recently, the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war has released about 230million tonnes of CO2 since its outbreak in 2022.
Such figures are staggering. Yet they appear almost negligible when placed alongside our annual global emissions, like an ant compared to an elephant.
Today, humanity emits about 40billion tonnes of CO2 every year, perhaps more than all these wars combined. Astonishingly, the carbon emissions released during the entire Vietnam War are now equivalent to less than one week of current global output.
If carbon emissions alone do not convince you, then perhaps the human toll will.
Consider this: the Vietnam War claimed more than 3million lives over two decades. The Russo-Ukrainian conflict has killed or wounded about 1million people to date.
This is a profound tragedy. Yet the casualties of climate change, though less visible, are no less devastating.
In 2022, a single summer heatwave resulted in the deaths of over 61,000 individuals across Europe within a few months.
Meanwhile, climate-intensified floods and storms take thousands of lives annually. The catastrophic 2022 floods in Pakistan, for example, killed over 1700 Pakistanis and devastated the lives of more than 33million others.
Perhaps the most dangerous killer is the air we breathe. Air pollution, driven mainly by the burning of fossil fuels, kills an estimated 7million people every year worldwide, according to a World Health Organisation report.
These annual fatalities are on par with the average yearly death toll during World War 2, the deadliest war in human history. World War 2 ended in 1945.
However, the environmental war continues silently and relentlessly, its victims often neglected.
Like passengers aboard a modern-day Noah’s Ark, we, as humanity, rise or fall together. This planet is our only lifeboat for the foreseeable future. There is no alternative. On this ark, our destinies are bound together. Survival requires co-operation, not competition.
We need a global alliance — a coalition of individuals, businesses and states working in concert — to confront the escalating environmental crisis.
Individually, we should reconsider our lifestyles and consumption patterns to adopt more eco-friendly habits that support environmental sustainability.
Nationally, we must transition our economies to green energy and preserve the ecosystems that have nurtured us for thousands of years.
Internationally, we need to share knowledge and green technology across countries.
Victory will not be achieved by individual actors acting alone. Victory is possible only when we fight together to end the war on our environment.
- Manh Tuan Ngo is a master of international studies student at the University of Otago.
