Jane's Intelligence Review. Forces of nature - The impact of natural disasters on global security

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1 Jane's Intelligence Review Forces of nature - The impact of natural disasters on global security [Content preview Subscribe to IHS Jane s Intelligence Review for full article] Extreme environmental events over the past decade have highlighted the threat these pose to security, and their links to conflict and civil unrest. Jeffrey Mazo explores the dynamics at work and the potential ramifications of these unpredictable hazards. Typhoon Halong made landfall on the Japanese island of Shikoku on 10 August, causing the evacuation of more than 1.6 million people from its potential path, including military personnel and family members living in communities adjacent to United States Marine Air Corps Station Iwakuni, in Yamaguchi Prefecture. Overall, insured damage alone from Typhoon Halong could amount to more than USD1 billion, according to international insurance firms. Around the same time, the Hawaiian Islands were facing two hurricanes in succession. Iselle made landfall on 7 August as the strongest tropical cyclone on record to hit the Big Island, while Julio passed north of the islands on 10 August. Nine months earlier, Typhoon Haiyan had affected more than 11 million people and caused more than USD3 billion of damage in China, Vietnam, and particularly the Philippines, according to figures from the Philippine government. In the Philippine city of Tacloban, 90% of structures were damaged by wind or storm surges of up to five metres, and there was widespread looting and civil unrest that hampered evacuation and assistance efforts. Military personnel, aircraft, and ships from 14 countries were involved in international relief efforts. Storms such as these are typical of environmental hazards that pose increasing national and global security risks. Tropical cyclones are extreme events, but Japan and the Philippines can expect several per year. Even as a Category 5 'super typhoon' (the highest-category storm on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale), Halong was not untypically strong, and had weakened significantly by the time it hit Japan. Haiyan, in contrast, was the strongest tropical cyclone at landfall ever recorded. The economic and social effects of these two storms were influenced not just by this difference in intensity, but by the two countries' contrasting resilience. Hawaii's disaster planning, response, and early-warning systems are on a par with Japan's, but Hawaii had not experienced a hurricane since These differences illustrate some important factors that determine whether an environmental event turns into a catastrophe. Extreme environmental events Extreme events, by definition, fall outside normal experience, and hence often outside society's ability to anticipate or adapt. Also by definition, extreme environmental events are unexpected; their frequency or 'return time' can be estimated to varying degrees of accuracy, but they are Page 1 of 6

2 impossible to predict and difficult to plan for. The more unlikely an event, the less prepared a society or country is likely to be. Natural disasters are low-probability, high-impact events, and the lower the probability, the higher the expected impact. For every one-point increase in the magnitude of an earthquake, for example, the frequency of earthquakes drops by a factor of 10; so an 8.0-magnitude earthquake (such as the 2008 Sichuan quake in China, which killed 70,000 people) is 10 times as likely to occur as a 9.0-magnitude earthquake (such as the Tohoku quake). Similar 'power-law' relationships have been observed for hurricanes, droughts, heatwaves, and other climatic events. Two simultaneous crises in 2011, driven in part by extreme environmental events, showed these complex dynamics at work. The tsunami defences and infrastructure in Japan's Fukushima Prefecture, including the nuclear power plant, were designed to cope with a 7.5-magnitude quake, to which Japanese government scientists had assigned a 99% probability over a 30-year period. An event as intense as the 2011 quake was expected on average only once every 30,000 years. In part this miscalculation reflected inadequate data and scientific models; in part bureaucratic inertia in incorporating advances in understanding; and in part simply bad luck. Devastation following the 11 March 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami in a neighbourhood in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, on 30 March The earthquake and tsunami was ranked the costliest natural disaster in terms of economic losses since (PA) Growing exposure According to insurance company Munich Re, the frequency and severity of natural disasters more than quadrupled globally in the second half of the 20th century, and seven of the 10 costliest events Page 2 of 6

3 since 1980 occurred after The frequency and severity of most extreme environmental events have not increased significantly over the past six decades. However, population increases and economic growth mean that exposure to a given hazard has increased in most parts of the world. For example, an event such as a flood or earthquake that might have had little impact in 1950 could now be a major disaster. Munich Re's figures are based on overall economic losses, so disasters in the advanced industrial countries are over-represented. Of the 10 costliest events, the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami tops the list, with the 1995 Kobe earthquake in Japan in third position. Four events on the list - Hurricanes Katrina (2005), Ike (2008), and Sandy (2012), and the 1994 earthquake in Northridge, California - affected the United States. The countries most exposed to extreme environmental events, by virtue of their economic vitality, are not necessarily at greatest risk. Risk is a function of hazard, exposure, and vulnerability, and economic development tends to go hand in hand with increased resilience to external shocks. Munich Re calculated that natural disasters cost the wealthiest countries around 2% of GDP between 1985 and 1999, compared with 13% for the poorest countries. In some cases, moderate disasters can have positive effects on economic activity through investment in reconstruction, but severe disasters almost always have a negative impact. Economic metrics are only part of the story. Advanced economies are more resilient to the human and social impacts of extreme events. Hurricane Katrina, the United States' worst natural disaster in economic terms in the post-war period, led to 1,322 fatalities. The 26 December 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean, in contrast, led to at least 230,000 deaths and had important social and geopolitical consequences, but its macroeconomic impact was limited. The deadliest tropical cyclone on record, the 1970 Bhola Cyclone in what was then East Pakistan, killed at least 300,000 people. It led in part, through protests against the authorities' inadequate assistance efforts and a government backlash, to the civil war that resulted in Bangladeshi independence in 1971 at the cost of three million lives. Yet direct economic damage in real terms from the storm was less than 1% of that caused by Katrina. Hot spots Different types of environmental hazards present different risk profiles. The tectonic hazard varies significantly from region to region, depending on geology, while cosmic hazards (such as intense solar storms) are uniform or will have a global impact. Weather and climate hazards, like tectonic hazards, are unique for each region, but are further complicated by anthropogenic climate change, which will lead to regional changes in the likelihood and severity of extreme weather events. A global risk analysis of natural disaster hot spots by the World Bank in 2005 noted that detailed probabilistic data on frequency or severity did not exist for any natural hazards at the global level. The historical record can nevertheless provide an indication of the degree and nature of the threat. Major volcanic eruptions with global climatic consequences lasting for years, on the scale of Krakatoa (Indonesia) in 1883 or Mount Pinatubo (Philippines) in 1991, occur around once a century. The Krakatoa eruption caused cool summers and unusual weather well outside the normal annual variations for several years, leading to crop failures in many parts of the world; Pinatubo caused Page 3 of 6

4 similar cooling and disruption but came against the backdrop of long-term climate change, so its impact on agriculture was less pronounced. The 1815 eruption of Mount Toba in Indonesia, an order of magnitude more powerful than Pinatubo, led to 'the year without a summer' in the northern hemisphere, with crop failures, food price spikes, and famine in parts of Europe. Volcanic events on such a scale occur around once a millennium. According to the United States Geological Survey, 81% of major earthquakes occur in the 'Ring of Fire', or circum-pacific belt, running along the west coast of South America and adjacent waters through Central America; the west coast of North America including the Aleutian Islands; the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East; Japan; the Philippines; the Southwest Pacific; and New Zealand. Another 17% occur in a belt running west from Java and Sumatra (Indonesia) to the Himalayas, Iran, Anatolia, and the Mediterranean. Of the 17 quakes since 1900 with a magnitude greater than 8.5, four occurred in South America (three in Chile); five in Indonesia; three in Alaska; three in Kamchatka or the Kuril Islands; one in Tibet/Assam; and one - the Tohoku quake - in Japan. Among extreme environmental events, the threat from cosmic impacts and solar storms is the least well understood and predictable. Estimates of the likelihood of such impacts differ by a factor of 10 depending on the data and methods used. The most recent and most pessimistic study, published in the journal Nature 10 months after the February 2013 meteor strike in Chelyabinsk, Russia, concluded that impacts on such a scale were to be expected three or four times a century, with 10- megaton-scale events, such as the 1908 'Tunguska event' in Russia, predicted to occur every 200 or 300 years. The odds of a devastating impact in a densely inhabited area are correspondingly lower. Global threats The implications of climate change have received greater focus from the security community than other environmental events, both because climate hazards are evolving and because change itself is a hazard. In a May 2014 report, the national security risks of climate change were analysed by a group of retired admirals and generals from all branches of the US military (and the UK's Royal Navy) convened by CNA Corporation, a non-profit research and analysis organisation located in Alexandria, Virginia. The report concluded that climate change would affect military readiness, with forces increasingly called on to deal with the consequences of extreme weather events, limiting their ability to respond to other contingencies. The report noted that training would become more difficult and more expensive, and there would be greater strain on military logistics, transportation systems, and base infrastructure. Climate change would also increase the threat to critical national infrastructure, including energy, transportation, and agriculture; energy systems in particular tend to be located in low-lying or coastal areas where they are exposed to extreme storms and flooding. Other key systemic elements of national power and resilience, such as economic vitality and non-military disaster response systems, would also be affected. The report concluded that these trends would affect the ability of the US to project power and protect its interests. At the same time, the Military Advisory Board noted that "climate change impacts are already accelerating instability in vulnerable areas of the world and are serving as catalysts of conflict". The report advised that US and allied forces would increasingly be called upon not just for HADR Page 4 of 6

5 missions, but for military interventions like NATO's Operation Unified Protector in Libya or France's 2013 Operation Serval in Mali, or for peacekeeping and post-conflict stabilisation missions. However, none of the specific and systemic security impacts of climate change are unique to the US or to other advanced economies. Weak or fragile states and developing economies characterised by varying degrees of poverty and inequality; ethnic divisions; weak, corrupt, or bad governance and institutions; high population growth and rising expectations are correspondingly more vulnerable to extreme climate hazards. The risk of state failure is driven by an interaction among all these drivers, so an increase in the frequency or severity of extreme weather events becomes a threat multiplier. Civil conflict and state failure create ungoverned spaces in which radical ideologies, terrorist organisations, piracy, and transnational organised crime can thrive. A US military Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopter drops sandbags in New Orleans on 24 September 2005 in an effort to shore up a breached levee following Hurricane Katrina. Military resources are often needed for humanitarian and disaster relief, and many militaries have contingency plans in place. (PA) Page 5 of 6

6 Outlook In the introduction to the UK Ministry of Defence's Global Strategic Trends - Out to 2045 report published in July 2014, the authors noted, "There is, unavoidably, a huge degree of uncertainty in what we describe. We will have got some things wrong, there will be unidentified shocks and surprises, as well as phenomena that we had not envisaged." Low-probability, extreme natural disasters are just such shocks and surprises. By their very nature it is impossible to predict such events, but it is reasonable to forecast that some such events will occur, and it is possible to identify regions where natural hazards and socioeconomic volatility combine to create elevated levels of geopolitical risk. In November 2013, insurance company Swiss Re looked at the threat of major natural disasters on the scale of Tohoko or Haiyan to 616 urban areas comprising 25% of the global population and 50% of the global economy (the long-term trend towards urbanisation means these numbers are only likely to increase in future). Almost all the cities or megacities at greatest risk are in East or Southeast Asia - especially China, Japan, the Philippines, and Taiwan - and many of these are at high risk from multiple hazards.this is also a region with a high potential for conflict. Among the scenarios that most worry planners are a state collapse of nuclear-capable North Korea; a military confrontation between China and Taiwan; fighting between China and Japan over territorial claims in the East China Sea; and fighting between China and Vietnam, the Philippines, or Malaysia over claims in the South China Sea. Any of these, but especially the first two, could draw in the US. North Korea is a fragile state, and a severe drought or typhoon could well be the trigger that leads to the collapse of the regime. A major earthquake, storm, or typhoon that seriously affected Japan or one or more Southeast Asian states could embolden China to assert its territorial claims while its opponents were distracted or prevented from responding because of damage to military capabilities. On the other hand, a Fukushima-like nuclear disaster, damage to a large-scale water engineering project, or a major storm and flood in a coastal city could slow, halt, or even reverse China's rapid economic rise, one of the most significant geopolitical trends of the 21st century. Copyright IHS Global Limited, 2014 For the full version and more content: IHS Jane's Military & Security Assessments Intelligence Centre This analysis is taken from IHS Jane s Military & Security Assessments Intelligence Centre, which delivers comprehensive and reliable country risk and military capabilities information, analysis and daily insight. IHS country risk and military capabilities news and analysis is also available within IHS Jane s Intelligence Review. To learn more and to subscribe to IHS Jane s Intelligence Review online, offline or print visit For advertising solutions contact the IHS Jane s Advertising team Page 6 of 6