Weapons Of War Environmental Impact

The Indian Air Force, from a humble beginning in 1932 with 4 Wapiti aircraft, six Indian officers and 22 hawai sepoys, have traversed a long journey of eighty one years and crossed noteworthy milestones to become the fourth largest air force in the world. While facing several limitations/challenges, IAF have met all the national defence requirements, and made several strategic contributions. With growing economic interests and national aspirations, expanding interests well beyond our territorial boundaries and prevailing internal security challenges, India’s national defence requirements are also increasing. The first Gulf War was a monumental turning point in the war-time employment of aerospace power. Ever since significance of aerospace power in war, crisis and peace time has been gaining ascendency. Kosovo and Libya are the two pertinent examples of the allies virtually relying on aerospace power, without committing any soldiers on the ground. Scrutiny of the emerging global and national trends suggests that employment of the aerospace assets, as well as nation’s expectation from the IAF, will continue to rise. Alongside, there is an unplanned fall in flying platforms, weapon systems and pilot strength of the IAF. This study is an attempt to analyse the history of the IAF in war as well as ‘other than war operations’; to appreciate the emerging trends in geopolitics, aerospace technology and doctrine; and to identify the likely challenges IAF would be facing in the next two decades and beyond. Road map for transformation of the national security framework, indigenous aerospace industry and the IAF has also been suggested.

"This book describes several weapons of mass destruction and examines the extent and duration of environmental damage to be expected from them"--Jacket.

Looks at the environmental impact of munitions testing, maneuvers, storage of chemical and biological weapons, nuclear testing, and nuclear-powered ships

Proving Grounds brings together a wide range of scholars across disciplines and geographical borders to deepen our understanding of the environmental impact that the U.S. military presence has had at home and abroad. The essays in this collection survey the environmental damage caused by weapons testing and military bases to local residents, animal populations, and landscapes, and they examine the military’s efforts to close and repurpose bases—often as wildlife reserves. Together they present a complex and nuanced view that embraces the ironies, contradictions, and unintended consequences of U.S. militarism around the world. In complicating our understanding of the American military’s worldwide presence, the essayists also reveal the rare cases when the military is actually ahead of the curve on environmental regulation compared to the private sector. The result is the most comprehensive examination to date of the U.S. military’s environmental footprint—for better or worse—across the globe.

The purpose of this book is specific and ambitious: to outline the distinctive elements, scope, and usefulness of a new and emerging field of applied ecology named warfare ecology. Based on a NATO Advanced Research Workshop held on the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico, the book provides both a theoretical overview of this new field and case studies that range from mercury contamination during World War I in Slovenia to the ecosystem impacts of the Palestinian occupation, and from the bombing of coral reefs of Vieques to biodiversity loss due to violent conflicts in Africa. Warfare Ecology also includes reprints of several classical papers that set the stage for the new synthesis described by the authors. Written for environmental scientists, military and humanitarian relief professionals, conservation managers, and graduate students in a wide range of fields, Warfare Ecology is a major step forward in understanding the relationship between war and ecological systems.

In recent times, the devastation occurring in places like Darfur has focused the world’s attention on the intertwined relationship of military conflict and the environment—and the attendant human suffering. In War and the Environment, eleven scholars explore, among other topics, the environmental ravages of trench warfare in World War I, the exploitation of Philippine forests for military purposes from the Spanish colonial period through 1945, William Tecumseh Sherman’s scorched-earth tactics during his 1864–65 March to the Sea, and the effects of wartime policy upon U.S. and German conservation practices during World War II.

This book, first published in 1980, examines the extent to which warfare and other military activities contribute to environmental degradation. The military capability to damage the environment has escalated. The military use and abuse of each of the several major global habitats – temperate, tropical, desert, arctic, insular and oceanic – are evaluated separately in the light of the civil use and abuse of that habitat.

The environmental devastation caused by military conflict has been witnessed in the wake of the Vietnam War, the Gulf War and the Kosovo conflict. This book brings together leading international lawyers, military officers, scientists and economists to examine the legal, political, economic and scientific implications of wartime damage to the natural environment and public health. The book considers issues raised by the application of humanitarian norms and legal rules designed to protect the environment, and the destructive nature of war. Contributors offer an analysis and critique of the existing law of war framework, lessons from peacetime environmental law, means of scientific assessment and economic valuation of ecological and public health damage, and proposals for future legal and institutional developments. This book provides a contemporary forum for interdisciplinary analysis of armed conflict and the environment, and explores ways to prevent and redress wartime environmental damage.

"Among the crucial problems that confront mankind today are those associated with a degraded environment. This book examines the extent to which warfare and other military activities contribute to such degradation. The military capability to damage the environment and to cause ecological disruption has escalated, and there is no sign that the level of conflict in the world is decreasing. The military use and abuse of each of the several major global habitats -- temperate, tropical, desert, arctic, insular, and oceanic -- are evalusated separately in the light of the civil use and abuse of that habitat"--Dust jacket.

As weaponry and warfare have become more complex and sophisticated, so the long-term effects have become more deadly. In Planet Earth Rosalie Bertell proposes that the key to understanding the impact of future wars lies in a close analysis of the past. She shows how the quest for military power has destabilized the delicate natural balance of the earth's ecosystem, causing widespread devastation in environmental, economic and social terms and calls for a new approach to security, which rises above national agendas to seek global solutions to a global problem.