global warming could trigger an ice age at any time

Now the Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us =B7 Secret
report warns of rioting and nuclear war =B7 Britain will be 'Siberian'
in less than 20 years
=B7 Threat to the world is greater than terrorism Mark Townsend and Paul
Harris in New York Sunday February 22, 2004 The Observer
Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global
catastrophe costing millions of lives
in wars and natural disasters..
A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The
Observer, warns that major
European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged
into a 'Siberian' climate by
2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting
will erupt across the world.
The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet
to the edge of anarchy as
countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food,
water and energy supplies.
The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say
the few experts privy to its
contents.
'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes
the Pentagon analysis. 'Once
again, warfare would define human life.' The findings will prove
humiliating to the Bush administration, which has repeatedly denied that
climate change even exists. Experts said that they will also make
unsettling reading for a President
who has insisted national defence is a priority. The report was
commissioned by influential Pentagon defence adviser Andrew Marshall,
who has held
considerable sway on US military thinking over the past three decades.
He was the man behind a
sweeping recent review aimed at transforming the American military under
Defence Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld.
Climate change 'should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US
national security concern',
say the authors, Peter Schwartz, CIA consultant and former head of
planning at Royal Dutch/Shell
Group, and Doug Randall of the California-based Global Business Network.
An imminent scenario of catastrophic climate change is 'plausible and
would challenge United States
national security in ways that should be considered immediately', they
conclude. As early as next
year widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major
upheaval for millions.
Last week the Bush administration came under heavy fire from a large
body of respected scientists
who claimed that it cherry-picked science to suit its policy agenda and
suppressed studies that it
did not like. Jeremy Symons, a former whistleblower at the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA),
said that suppression of the report for four months was a further
example of the White House trying
to bury the threat of climate change.
Senior climatologists, however, believe that their verdicts could prove
the catalyst in forcing Bush
to accept climate change as a real and happening phenomenon. They also
hope it will convince the
United States to sign up to global treaties to reduce the rate of
climatic change.
A group of eminent UK scientists recently visited the White House to
voice their fears over global
warming, part of an intensifying drive to get the US to treat the issue
seriously. Sources have told
The Observer that American officials appeared extremely sensitive about
the issue when faced with
complaints that America's public stance appeared increasingly out of
touch.
One even alleged that the White House had written to complain about some
of the comments attributed
to Professor Sir David King, Tony Blair's chief scientific adviser,
after he branded the President's
position on the issue as indefensible.
Among those scientists present at the White House talks were Professor
John Schellnhuber, former
chief environmental adviser to the German government and head of the
UK's leading group of climate
scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research. He said
that the Pentagon's internal
fears should prove the 'tipping point' in persuading Bush to accept
climatic change.
Sir John Houghton, former chief executive of the Meteorological Office -
and the first senior figure
to liken the threat of climate change to that of terrorism - said: 'If
the Pentagon is sending out
that sort of message, then this is an important document indeed.' Bob
Watson, chief scientist for the World Bank and former chair of the
Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change, added that the Pentagon's dire warnings could no longer
be ignored.
'Can Bush ignore the Pentagon? It's going be hard to blow off this sort
of document. Its hugely
embarrassing. After all, Bush's single highest priority is national
defence. The Pentagon is no
wacko, liberal group, generally speaking it is conservative. If climate
change is a threat to
national security and the economy, then he has to act. There are two
groups the Bush Administration
tend to listen to, the oil lobby and the Pentagon,' added Watson.
'You've got a President who says global warming is a hoax, and across
the Potomac river you've got a
Pentagon preparing for climate wars. It's pretty scary when Bush starts
to ignore his own government
on this issue,' said Rob Gueterbock of Greenpeace. Already, according to
Randall and Schwartz, the planet is carrying a higher population than it
can
sustain. By 2020 'catastrophic' shortages of water and energy supply
will become increasingly harder
to overcome, plunging the planet into war. They warn that 8,200 years
ago climatic conditions
brought widespread crop failure, famine, disease and mass migration of
populations that could soon
be repeated.
Randall told The Observer that the potential ramifications of rapid
climate change would create
global chaos. 'This is depressing stuff,' he said. 'It is a national
security threat that is unique
because there is no enemy to point your guns at and we have no control
over the threat.'
Randall added that it was already possibly too late to prevent a
disaster happening. 'We don't know
exactly where we are in the process. It could start tomorrow and we
would not know for another five
years,' he said.
'The consequences for some nations of the climate change are
unbelievable. It seems obvious that
cutting the use of fossil fuels would be worthwhile.' So dramatic are
the report's scenarios, Watson said, that they may prove vital in the US
elections.
Democratic frontrunner John Kerry is known to accept climate change as a
real problem. Scientists
disillusioned with Bush's stance are threatening to make sure Kerry uses
the Pentagon report in his
campaign.
The fact that Marshall is behind its scathing findings will aid Kerry's
cause. Marshall, 82, is a
Pentagon legend who heads a secretive think-tank dedicated to weighing
risks to national security
called the Office of Net Assessment. Dubbed 'Yoda' by Pentagon insiders
who respect his vast
experience, he is credited with being behind the Department of Defence's
push on ballistic-missile
defence.
Symons, who left the EPA in protest at political interference, said that
the suppression of the
report was a further instance of the White House trying to bury evidence
of climate change. 'It is
yet another example of why this government should stop burying its head
in the sand on this issue.'
Symons said the Bush administration's close links to high-powered energy
and oil companies was vital
in understanding why climate change was received sceptically in the Oval
Office. 'This
administration is ignoring the evidence in order to placate a handful of
large energy and oil
companies,' he added

Is what they are talking about when they say "climate change" is that
they mean global warming could trigger an ice age. I can't find the
articles about it because I read them a couple of weeks ago. The low
down is that as temperatures rise, we get more rain and melting of polar
ice caps which lets more fresh water into the atlantic ocean. This
decreases the salinity of the atlantic ocean and it is thereby not heavy
enouph for the top water to sink. Thus the cold water stays on top. If
it does not sink, then you get an ice age. It is not just the sun that
keeps us warm and the atmosphere, but the sinking of cold water in the
atlantic.
Ian

(Ian Beardsley) wrote in message ...

Is what they are talking about when they say "climate change" is that
they mean global warming could trigger an ice age. I can't find the
articles about it because I read them a couple of weeks ago. The low
down is that as temperatures rise, we get more rain and melting of polar
ice caps which lets more fresh water into the atlantic ocean. This
decreases the salinity of the atlantic ocean and it is thereby not heavy
enouph for the top water to sink. Thus the cold water stays on top. If
it does not sink, then you get an ice age. It is not just the sun that
keeps us warm and the atmosphere, but the sinking of cold water in the
atlantic.
Ian


Have no fear. We can retain Sun's warmth by increasing the
concentration of heat-retainig (greenhouse) gases in the
atmosphere. By switching all power generation to fossil fuels,
it may be possible to raise the concentration of CO2
(currently 0.035%) to levels sufficient to prevent the snowball
earth. John Curtis

Boy am I glad I posted this, or I would have been sitting around
thinking civilization was over because they say the condition of the
gulf stream due to global warming is remarkably similar to how it was
during the last ice age. What you say makes sense. In other words,
though the atlantic is no longer pumping warmth into the northern
continents, green house gases are compensating for the effect they have
on the atlantic pump by retaining more of the heat we recieve. Perhaps
we could use some of the techniques of increasing CO2 in the atmosphere
that they want to use to warm mars when it comes time to colonize it.
Great news!!!
Ian