The US military announced the cancellation of a series of climate change studies, what is the reason?

The US military is moving to cancel more than 90 studies, including some that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called "useless" about climate change.

US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. (Source: Reuters)

Reuters news agency reported that in a post on social network X on March 9, Minister Hegseth made it clear: "The Department of Defense does not do useless things about climate change." Later, the official X account of the Pentagon reposted a screenshot of an article quoting Mr. Hegseth's statement with the comment: "Confirmed true."

In a separate statement, the US Department of Defense said it would cancel 91 social science-related studies on topics ranging from global migration patterns and the impact of climate change on social trends, noting the move would save $30 million in a year.

Among the canceled studies are the topics "Social and institutional determinants of vulnerability and resilience to climate hazards in the African Sahel" and "Food wars: War narratives and identity reconstruction in ongoing conflicts".

Over the past decade, US military and intelligence officials have identified potential security threats from climate change, including natural disasters in densely populated coastal areas and damage to the country's military bases around the world.

A 2018 Pentagon study found that nearly half of US military bases are threatened by weather related to climate change.

Under the previous administration of President Joe Biden, the Pentagon announced it would incorporate climate change risks into military simulations and war games. However, current US President Donald Trump has taken a different stance.

Immediately after taking office on January 20, Mr. Trump announced that he would once again withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement on climate change, taking the world's largest emitter out of the global effort to combat climate change for the second time in a decade.

On January 28, the United Nations confirmed that it had received notification from Washington about withdrawing from the Paris Agreement on climate change.

Last week, Washington withdrew from the board of the United Nations climate damage fund, which is intended to help poor and vulnerable countries cope with climate change.

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