Warns of dangers, high costs of inaction
A national television ad released Monday July 19th by Vote Vets reminds us why clean energy reform is so crucial to our national security. The ad, running in North Dakota, Arkansas, Virginia, and West Virginia, reminds us that our dangerous addiction to oil is a threat to our troops and national security:
Brigadier General Steven Anderson (Ret.), Chief of Logistics in Iraq under General David Petraeus, featured in the ad, warns us of the dangerous costs of our addiction:
Our troops are getting killed moving fuel we wouldn’t need if our military was more efficient — and our enemies know we’re hooked on their oil…. That’s why breaking our addiction must not only be a military priority, but America’s mission, and why the Senate needs to pass a clean energy climate plan.
He concludes,
It’s time for our senators to choose: Pass a clean energy climate plan that makes us more secure… or let America keep paying the price.
Recent polls show that Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans overwhelmingly support clean energy and climate legislation.
In addition to our dangerous dependence on oil addition, climate change is broadly regarded as a threat to national security within the security community. The Department of Defense’s February 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review argued that climate change is a “destabilizing agent” and the Center for Naval Analysis convened a board of military officials who concluded in 2007 that climate change is a “threat multiplier.” The 2010 Joint Operating Environment (JOE) report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command (USJFCOM) pinpoints climate change as a top 10 security issue: “one of the ten trends most likely to impact the Joint Force.”
Related Posts:
- Vote Vets ad ties BP with national security
- Vote Vets tough new ad: Everytime oil goes up $1, Iran gets another $1.5 billion to use against us.
Previous in TP Climate Progress
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http://www.earthpolicy.org/index.php?/indicators/C52/carbon_emissions_2010
From the Earth Policy Institute:
” . . . the manufacture of goods imported by the United States was responsible for 190 million tons of carbon emissions per year. If emissions totals were adjusted to account for Chinese exports and U.S. imports, the United States would again be the world’s leading emitter.”
Saw this add in New York City.
Very interesting indeed.
Susan,
An economy-wide cap-and-trade program for carbon emissions has been in trouble ever since Senator Lindsey Graham bailed on the policy back in April – the moment the Senator walked from the table was the moment America lost any real chance of reducing the amount of oil it imports from foreign countries. Environmental groups have started focusing on a smaller cap that would only apply to electric utilities. But without incorporating industries under a cap and/or without placing a tax on carbon fuels, we simply don’t the reduction in imported oil – which means this ad only creates a misleading perception of the legislation the Democrats are forced to pass since no Republican will come to the table. In the end, if a bill passes, it only hurts the Democratic party more – by failing to meet expectations.
If we’re going to get anything done, the public is going to have to put the heat on Republicans; otherwise, we’ll always be dependent on the same energy sources that threatens the lives of our troops.
I saw this ad in Washington State last night. Hope it’s nation wide.
This ad has been playing on MSNBC so I think it is possible to see it in any state. We have plenty of national security reasons to get off oil but to equate the clean energy bill, whatever bill ends up going for a vote, with changing how military vehicles are powered is just wrong! NONE OF THE ENERGY BILLS ADDRESS MILITARY FUEL EFFENCY! I’m sure the military is experimenting with alternative fuels, and possibly electric, but THAT FUNDING COMES FROM MILITARY SPENDING. This ad seems to be for increased military spending for fuel efficiency.
Iran makes 100 million a day because of the US military? Really!? Does the President Obama know? Is this like the Iran/Contra scandal? Who is secretly importing Iranian oil to the US? Is Oliver North involved?
Now Iran makes plenty of money selling oil to China and India but the US DOES NOT IMPORT OIL FROM IRAN.
Many in the military and many many US civilians want the US off oil but to equate US military deaths to our dependence on foreign oil is completely immoral. If the fuel used in Iraq or Afghanistan ALL came from the US the enemy would still attack our convoys! The terrorists do not care where we get our oil!
General Anderson says, “It’s time for our senators to choose: Pass a clean energy climate plan that makes us more secure… or let America keep paying the price.”
WE WILL ONLY STOP PAYING THAT PRICE WHEN THE TROOPS COME HOME!
“Iran makes 100 million a day because of the US military? Really!?”
Oil Trade With Iran Thrives, Discreetly
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2518593/posts
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703691804575254554231664686.html?KEYWORDS=iran+BP+Shell+Oil
Transocean, BP’s drilling partner, linked to Iran, Syria
Transocean, the world’s largest drilling company and owner of the exploded Deepwater Horizon drilling rig leased by BP, conducts business with some pretty bad people. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/7/8/882606/-Transocean,-BPs-drilling-partner,-linked-to-Iran,-Syria
BP Profiting From Iran — Threatening our National Security. “BP, in a 2009 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, said it had interests in and was the operator of two fields and a pipeline located outside Iran in which the National Iranian Oil company had an interest.” http://thinkprogress.org/2010/04/30/bp-greenwashing-drill/
One oil tanker does NOT account for $100 million A DAY. We buy oil from several highly questionable governments but they used Iran in the ad because Iran is considered evil while Nigeria is not so well known. Why didn’t they say N Korea or Somalia? Oh yeah those countries do not have oil fields.
The ad implies that if we did not get oil from foreign countries our soldiers in supply convoys would be safe. THAT IS JUST NOT TRUE! Is says the lack of fuel efficiency is the cause. Even if a Humvee got 50 mpg we would still have supply convoys! Fuel efficiency for military vehicles IS A MILITARY ISSUE AND THE CONGRESS WILL ONLY VOTE ON MILITARY FUEL EFFENCY IF IT COMES UP IN THE MILITARY BUDGET!
From the Wsj link
“companies like Shell and BP PLC continue to do a brisk business buying Iranian oil products. BP declined to comment.”
Sleeping with the Enemy: BP’s Deals with Iran
In the last five years, BP has begun extracting around 4 million cubic meters per day of natural gas from a field in Britain’s North Sea in a 50-50 joint venture with Iran, worth $1 million a day at June 15, 2010 spot prices. And BP operates one of the world’s largest gas fields in Azerbaijan in a joint venture with Iran and other foreign oil companies, producing 8 billion cubic meters of gas per year, worth up to a reported $2.4 billion per year.
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1996921,00.html#ixzz0uFB5817w
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1996921,00.html#ixzz0uFAu74SW
We ALL know BP has a history with Iran but that is NOT WHAT THE AD IS ABOUT. Shell works with Nigeria. That is not what the ad is about. The ad is clear, listen to it. If you believe that fuel efficiency will save lives in a war zone I have no power to change that. However, the troops HAVE TO LIVE WITH THE REALITY OF CONSTANT ATTACKS ON THEIR SUPPLY CONVOYS. The military needs more than fuel but only fuel is mentioned because they want to link deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan with oil.
The deaths are independent of what is transported in a supply convoy. It could be a convoy of water and it would still get attacked and Americans would die.
Michael Tucker, Iran earns a lot from their international & national oil cooperation businesses. Fuel is a logistic nightmare for the military. And why don’t you google yourself :)
Prokaryotes,
Very common name…
So you maintain that if the military had all electric vehicles they would have no supply convoys and no one would die that way? Please!!! But, I’m glad you are convinced that a climate bill will save lives in our two misguided wars.
It would be much more secure, because it is more efficient, safer and better to setup and handle. The point is that we need to get off of dirty fossil energy and that the pentagon is the biggest user of oil.
And that iran and all the orient zone has adapted to provide cheap energy for the world – and less demand would help to curb emissions.
Again climate change is a global challenge.
VoteVets.org
Well done, I’m glad to see people coming out that
way and saying so much that was hidden from the
public. Things have come a long way.
Military men are mostly Republicans, and have figured out how stupid it is to risk our security and watch our men get killed over the need for imported oil.
This shows just how insane the oil companies’ capture of the Republican Party really is. It has nothing to do with free enterprise or even taxes, and everything to do with campaign funding and under the table and indirect cash.
Our best hope may be for a move within the Republican Party to break the grip of hillbilly hookers like Mitch McConnell, who enforces party “discipline” by telling Senators to vote for the oil companies all of the time. Republicans are not all that dumb, and an awakening- including recognition of global warming- is long overdue.
The underlying premise of the ad is that the war in Iraq was about securing oil supplies. That’s what connects dead soldiers in Iraq to clean energy legislation in the Senate. It’s true that the ad nominally hangs that connection on fuel convoys, and Michael Tucker is right that that doesn’t actually make much sense. But the real narrative that drives the ad, and that has been driving the entire dialogue about “addicted to oil” and “foreign oil” for years now, is the widely recognized reality that our foreign policy generally and the Iraq war specifically were about securing oil supplies. Blood and treasure for oil.
It’s a great ad. And the exploding oil tanker is one hell of a metaphor. It doesn’t work as a logical proposition, but as a visual metaphor, oh man.