The environment is an important part of the Intelligence Community
agenda. Today I would like to explain what we mean by the term environmental
intelligence, why the Intelligence Community is involved in this work, and why
our involvement is, important for citizens of the United States and the world.
I also want to demonstrate that environmental intelligence is not a new or
expensive area of endeavor for the Intelligence Community.
The Intelligence Community's job is to ensure that our senior policymakers
and military commanders have objective information that will allow them to make
better decisions. Through our collection and analytic effort, we compile
intelligence reports that give our country's leadership insight into how events
in all parts of the world will unfold and how these events will affect our
national security.
Environmental trends, both natural and man-made, are among the underlying
forces that affect a nation's economy, its social stability, its behavior in
world markets, and its attitude toward neighbors.
I emphasize that environment is one factor. It would be foolish, for
example, to attribute conflicts in Somalia, Ethiopia, or Haiti to environmental
causes alone. It would be foolhardy, however, not to take into consideration
that the land in each of these states is exploited in a manner that can no
longer support growing populations.
Environmental degradation, encroaching deserts, erosion, and overfarming
destroy vast tracts of arable land. This forces people from their homes and
creates tensions between ethnic and political groups as competition for scarce
resources increases. There is an essential connection between environmental
degradation, population growth, and poverty that regional analysts must take
into account.
National reconnaissance systems that track the movement of tanks through the
desert, can, at the same time, track the movement of the desert itself, see the
sand closing in on formerly productive fields or hillsides laid bare by
deforestation and erosion. Satellite systems allow us to quickly assess the
magnitude and severity of damage. Adding this environmental dimension to
traditional political, economic, and military analysis enhances our ability to
alert policymakers to potential instability, conflict, or human disaster and to
identify situations which may draw in American involvement.
Some events have already dictated that environmental issues be included in
our intelligence agenda. When Moscow initially issued misleading information
about the accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, US leaders turned to
the Intelligence Community to assess the damage and its impact on the former
Soviet Union and neighboring countries.
During the Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein used ecological destruction as a
weapon, policymakers and the military called on the Intelligence Community to
track the movement of smoke from burning oilfields and the flow of oil released
into the gulf. They asked whether damage to Iraq's Tuwaitha nuclear complex
posed a danger to troops and local population.
In each of these cases, our answer to these questions was not and could not
be, "the environment is not an intelligence issue," Our answers were
classic intelligence: analysis based on our data from collection systems and
open sources. We were able to assess the magnitude of the Chernobyl accident;
we were able to tell US troops how to avoid lethal hydrogen sulfide from oil
fires; and we were able to tell military planners that damage to the reactor was
not a threat.
I would like to emphasize that the environment is not a new issue for the
Intelligence Community. For years we have devoted resources to understanding
environmental issues. Much of the work that now falls under the environmental
label used to be done under other names--geography, resource issues, or
research.
For example, we have long used satellite imagery to estimate crop size in
North Korea and elsewhere. This allowed us to forecast shortages that might
lead to instability and to determine the amount of agricultural products a
nation would need to import--information valuable to US Department of
Agriculture and to America's farmers. We have also tracked world availability
of natural resources, such as oil, gas, and minerals.
We have for many years provided the military with information on terrain and
local resources. As our forces embark on military, peacekeeping, and
humanitarian operations in remote and unfamiliar territory, they will need even
better information on environmental factors that could affect their health and
safety and their ability to conduct operations.
Diplomacy will be ever more concerned with the global debate over
environmental issues. As Secretary of State Christopher said in April, "our
ability to advance our global interests is inextricably linked to how we manage
the Earth's natural resources." He emphasized that we must put environment "in
the mainstream of American foreign policy."
Intelligence has long supported diplomacy in this area, particularly in
regard to key international environmental treaties and agreements. Here I would
draw an analogy to the role of intelligence in negotiating the arms control
treaties. Such treaties could not have been signed and ratified without
intelligence to monitor compliance.
Likewise, the Intelligence Community monitors compliance with environmental
treaties, such as the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the
Stratospheric Ozone Layer and the London Convention that regulates the dumping
at sea of radioactive and other wastes. Further, intelligence support should
begin with the negotiation process, so that US diplomats have the benefit of the
best available information in framing effective and enforceable treaties in the
future.
Environmental intelligence will also be a part of our support to economic
policymakers. They need to know, for example, whether or not foreign
competitors are gaining a competitive advantage over American business by
ignoring environmental regulations. Intelligence can provide valuable
information.
In short, the demand on the Intelligence Community for information on
environmental issues will grow. As the world population expands and resources
such as clean water and arable land become more scarce, it will become
increasingly likely that activities of one country will have an environmental
impact that goes beyond its borders. US policymakers will need warning on
issues that are likely to affect US interests and regional stability.
Maintaining a capability for environmental intelligence will allow us to
answer important questions that are likely to come from our consumers in the
future. For example, China's rapidly growing population and booming economy
will translate into a tremendous increase in demand for the world's natural
resources, including oil and food, What impact will this have on world markets?
As in the past, we must be prepared to answer such questions.
We should also be willing to provide data from our collection systems to
help experts answer less traditional questions, for example: what impact will
increased burning of fossil fuel have on the global environment?
As I have mentioned, the Intelligence Community has unique assets, including
satellites, sensors, and remote sensing expertise that can contribute a wealth
of information on the environment to the scientific community. We also have
mechanisms in place to share that information with outside experts. This effort
will add significantly to our nation's capability to anticipate environmental
crises.
In 1991, then-Senator Gore urged the Intelligence Community to create a task
force to explore ways that intelligence assets could be tapped to support
environmental research. That initiative led to a partnership between the
Intelligence and scientific communities that has proven to be extraordinarily
productive for both parties.
The Environmental Task Force found that data collected by the Intelligence
Community from satellites and other means can fill critical information gaps for
the environmental science community. Furthermore, these data can be handed over
for study without revealing information about sources and methods.
For example, imagery from the earliest intelligence satellites--which were
launched long before commercial systems--can show scientists how desert
boundaries, vegetation, and polar ice have changed over time. These historical
images, which have now been declassified, provide valuable indicators of
regional and global climate change.
Some of the scientists who participated in the Environmental Task force now
make up a group called MEDEA. MEDEA works with the Intelligence Community to
establish what we call the "Global Fiducials Program." Under this
initiative, during the next decade we will periodically image selected sites of
environmental significance. This will give scientists an ongoing record of
changes in the earth that will improve their understanding of environmental
processes. More importantly, it will greatly enhance their ability to provide
strategic warning of potentially catastrophic threats to the health and welfare
of our citizens.
At the same time, we do not see the Intelligence Community becoming a center
of environmental science expertise or directly sponsoring research in that area.
In this case, our job is to acquire the data and allow the scientific community
to use them. Their work, quite properly, is sponsored by others, such as the
National Science Foundation, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, National Aeronautics and Space Administration and academic
institutions. We will continue to work with environmental experts to assure
that their knowledge is brought to bear on what data we collect or retrieve from
our considerable archives.
Our interaction with MEDEA is not only valuable for the environmental
community, it also has had direct benefits for the Intelligence Community.
MEDEA has worked closely with our analysts to develop techniques that have
enhanced our ability to collect and interpret data from our collection systems.
Combining Intelligence Community data and expertise with knowledge from the
scientific community can produce a better intelligence product for policymakers.
Scientists from MEDEA worked with our analysts to respond to requests for
information on environmental issues and problems--such as a series of oil spills
in the Komi region of Russia. The Komi oil spill is just one example of how
intelligence satellites and sensors can provide valuable information quickly
after a natural or man-made disaster. In this case we could tell that large
amounts of oil were not getting into the Arctic rivers.
In the United States, the Intelligence Community provides support to the
Federal Emergency Management Agency and other civil agencies when there is a
natural disaster. Using data from a variety of sources, within hours after a
disaster strikes we can assess and report the nature and scope of the
damage--conditions of roads, airports and hospitals; and the status of potential
secondary threats such as dams and nuclear facilities. Here I would like to
make two points:
First, we only provide this support upon request, To image US territory,
we must first get permission.
Second, we provide unclassified products generated from classified
information. We have a Disaster Response Team that can quickly produce
unclassified maps and diagrams that show the damage resulting from an
earthquake, fire, flood, hurricane, oil spill, or volcanic eruption.
To give you a recent example of how well this system works, just a few weeks
ago (June 5), the US Forest Service requested our help in tracking the wildfires
raging in Alaska. In this instance, they did not have enough planes to
adequately chart the extent of the fires. Within 24 hours of the initial
request, we delivered a map depicting the fire perimeter, smoldering fires, and
the most intense blazes. This information was more comprehensive and detailed
than data collected from overflights by civil aircraft and it was also available
much more quickly than would have otherwise been possible.
We can also use our capabilities to provide warning before a disaster
strikes. And we do share this information with foreign governments. For
example, when a volcano on the Caribbean Island of Montserrat awakened in 1995,
we monitored significant changes and alerted U.S. and British West Indies aid
and military authorities so that they could prepare for a possible evacuation of
the island's residents. Recently we noted a change within the volcano crater--a
fissure had opened up, indicating that the risk of an eruption had increased
dramatically. We quickly sent out a warning that allowed authorities on
Montserrat to evacuate 4,000 people to a less dangerous area of the island.
These activities lie outside our traditional intelligence mission, but we
believe it is important to provide aid when the capabilities would not otherwise
be available. This effort costs us very little, and yields tremendous benefits
to relief agencies, disaster victims, and potential victims whose lives could be
saved by a timely warning.
Vice President Gore has been a leader in advocating the use of intelligence
information to improve environmental knowledge on an international level, for
example to better monitor oil spills and chemical waste streams through
international water ways.
The US-Russian joint Commission on Economic and Technological
Cooperation--the Gore-Chernomyrdin Commission--has established a productive
exchange of information between the US and Russia.
This exchange has brought us unique and valuable data from Russia's
intelligence programs. For example, the Russians have collected extensive data
on the Arctic Ocean. This information is critical to our understanding of
oceanographic and atmospheric processes, which are, in turn, critical to our
ability to predict global climate change. Together with Russia, we have
produced a CD-ROM atlas of the Arctic Ocean. It contains more than two million
individual observations collected from 1948 to 1993 by Russian drifting
stations, ice breakers, and airborne expeditions, as well as observations from
US buoys. This once-restricted data will now be available on the Internet
through the World Wide Web and will more than double the scientific holdings of
oceanographic data available to T-TS scientists.
The Arctic data are not only critical to scientific studies of climate
change. They can also help us chart the movement of pollutants. The great
rivers of Russia flow north into the Arctic. With them, they carry a heavy
burden of waste from Russian industry, including chemicals, heavy metals, and
organics, as well as radionuclides from Russia's defense programs. For example,
3 million curies of radioactive waste from Chelyabinsk, dumped into the Techa
River years ago, have migrated to the Arctic Ocean, over 1,500 kilometers from
the plant, Russian oceanographic data can help them and us to determine where
radioactive materials and pollutants will travel once they reach the Arctic and
whether they will affect US and Canadian waters.
Early this year, Russia and the United States exchanged declassified
imagery-derived diagrams of environmental damage over a 25-year period at Eglin
Air Force Base in Florida and Yeysk Airbase in southwestern Russia. This
ongoing exchange will help both countries clean up their toxic and radioactive
sites. The techniques used to create these maps could help us identify
potential sources of contamination in the future. Such information-sharing has
proven a low-cost and highly effective way to build good will and strengthen
international relationships. We should seek new opportunities to share
information with other countries.
I would like to make one more key point about our work on environmental
issues--the costs are small and the potential benefits enormous. The resources
allocated to environmental intelligence are modest, perhaps one tenth of a
percent of the intelligence budget for collection and analysis. We are using
intelligence capabilities that are already in place. This important work
requires no new capital investments.
Nor does environmental intelligence require us to divert collection systems
from our priority targets or get involved in areas where we do not belong. The
imaging of sites under the Global Fiducials program, for example, can be done
during non-peak hours of satellite use. It will not interfere with collection
against our highest priority targets, including the proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction, terrorism, drug trafficking, and the activities of rogue
states.
In sum, the environment will continue to have an important place on the US
intelligence agenda.
Environmental factors influence the internal and external political,
economic, and military actions of nations important to our national security.
Our intelligence customers, including the policy and military communities,
need--and ask for--support on environmental issues and problems.
The Intelligence Community has unique technical collection resources and
analytic expertise that can fill critical information gaps for environmental
scientists or help relief agencies cope with natural disasters.
Through a productive partnership with the scientific community, we can
provide strategic warning of environmental hazards that could endanger our
health and welfare.
These activities do not threaten our traditional missions.
The vital work I have described requires only a modest commitment of
resources.
I think it would be short-sighted for us to ignore environmental issues as
we seek to understand and forecast developments in the post-Cold War world and
identify threats to our national welfare. just as Secretary Christopher promised
"to put environmental issues in the mainstream of American Foreign policy,"
I intend to make sure that Environmental Intelligence remains in the mainstream
of US intelligence activities. Even in times of declining budgets we will
support policymakers and the military as they address these important
environmental issues.
