Zootonic diseases to wildlife trade: Here’s how ecological disruptions threaten national security
When the natural environment is stretched beyond its ability to meet basic human needs for food, clean air, drinkable water, and shelter, it is not just a humanitarian concern for the world community. Research shows that these crises are a matter of national security for the U.S. and other countries.
The Pentagon and the U.S. intelligence community have long paid close attention to the influence of climate change on national security. Although recent intelligence reports of the Trump administration have omitted any mention of climate change, prior intelligence reports have shown how climate change can generate flash points for global conflict, affect how troops and equipment work, and influence which defense locations are vulnerable.
The effects of ecological disruptions on national security get less attention. But they, too, can cause social and political instability, economic strife and strained international relations. Ecological disruptions occur when ecosystems that provide natural resources are compromised and can no longer meet basic human needs. Examples include overfishing, human disease, and environmental crime.
Protecting access to fish
Some 3.2 billion people worldwide rely on fisheries as a major source of protein. Overexploitation of ocean fisheries is a common root of international conflict.
From the 1950s to the 1970s, intermittent conflict broke out between British and Icelandic fishermen over the Icelandic cod fisheries, which had been depleted by overfishing. The Icelandic government sought to ban British trawlers from a broader area around the country’s coast, but the British continued to fish. The result was standoffs between fishing boats and Icelandic gunboats, and even the intervention of the British Royal Navy.
These “Cod Wars” broke diplomatic relations between Iceland and the United Kingdom for a time. Iceland even threatened to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and close a U.S. military base in Iceland. The U.K. ultimately agreed to abide by a 200-mile territorial limit on fishing around Iceland. Decades later, in 2012, the British government issued an apology and offered 1,000 pounds each in compensation to 2,500 British fishermen for the loss of jobs and livelihoods that resulted from abiding by the 200-mile limit.
More recently, China’s rampant overfishing of its own coastal waters has meant expanding fishing in the South China Sea and using fishing fleets to assert new territorial claims. Indonesia has responded by blowing up more than 40 Chinese vessels accused of fishing illegally in its waters and stealing more than $4 billion per year in Indonesian profits.
The U.S., Australia, New Zealand, and Britain have stepped up naval patrols against illegal fishing in the waters of Pacific island nations. Conflicts have arisen with Chinese coast guard vessels that routinely escort fishing fleets entering other countries’ waters without permission.
China’s fishing fleets have expanded their activities off the coasts of Africa and South America, depleting fish stocks and creating political instability in those regions, too. In 2024, the U.S. Coast Guard and Argentinean navy began joint exercises to combat illegal Chinese fishing in the Atlantic Ocean.
Public health crises
The best-known examples of ecologically related public health crises that jeopardize national security involve what are called zoonotic diseases, which spread from animals to humans as a result of close contact between people and wildlife. More than 70% of the world’s emerging infectious diseases—uncommon or newly identified infectious diseases—stem from contact with wild animals.
The risks of animal-to-human disease transmission are especially high for those who handle or eat wild meat.
A recent example is the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus responsible for the COVID-19 global pandemic. Epidemiological and genetic studies suggest that SARS-CoV-2 first spilled over to humans from wild animals sold in the Huanan live animal market in Wuhan, China. Although the specific animal that served as the original host is still under investigation, bats and other mammals are considered likely natural reservoirs of SARS-CoV-2 because they harbor other coronaviruses with closely related genomes.
Following the zoonotic spillover event, the pathogen spread rapidly across the globe, killing more than 7 million people and causing acute disruptions not only to global markets and supply chains but also to social cohesion and political stability. Countries with high COVID-19 mortality rates had elevated levels of civil disorder and fatalities caused by political violence as the trust of citizens in the ability of governments to protect them eroded.
Many other zoonotic diseases caused by human-wildlife contact, such as Zika, Ebola, SARS, and West Nile virus, have similarly generated international political and economic crises that have activated security measures within the U.S. government.
Environmental crime
Illegal poaching and trade of wildlife and forest products is valued at $91 billion to $258 billion per year. That makes environmental crime one of the world’s largest crime sectors, comparable with drug trafficking, at $344 billion, and human trafficking, at $157 billion.
Exorbitant black market prices for rare wildlife specimens and body parts provide funding for terrorist groups, drug cartels, and criminal organizations.
Illegal logging helps finance terrorist groups such as Al-Shabaab in Somalia, where trade in charcoal has become a critical revenue source. Money from illegally cut trees turned into charcoal and sold to markets in the Middle East has funded al-Shabab-linked suicide bombings in Mogadishu, the 2013 Westgate mall attack in Nairobi that killed 67 Kenyan and non-Kenyan nationals, and the 2015 massacre of 147 university students in Garissa, Kenya.
Those and other terrorist activities funded through environmental crime have contributed to the destabilization of countries throughout the Horn of Africa.
These examples make clear how ecological disruptions to nature increase national security risks.
National security is not just a matter of military strength. It also depends on the ability of a nation to maintain productive and stable ecosystems, resilient biological communities, and sustainable access to natural resources. Sovereign nations already develop and protect physical infrastructure that is essential to security, such as roads, communication networks, and power grids. The natural world plays an equally vital role in social and political stability and, we believe, deserves more attention in planning for national security.
Bradley J. Cardinale is a professor of ecosystem science and management at Penn State.
Emmett Duffy is a chief scientist at the Tennenbaum Marine Observatories Network and MarineGEO at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center at the Smithsonian Institution.
Rod Schoonover is an adjunct professor at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.