As scientists make us believe, and I have no reason not to trust their findings, our carbon footprints are large, far too large for our environment to cope with and therefore need to be reduced. For a number of years now the discussion on how to reduce this footprint centres around reducing heating requirements, reducing dependency on oil based products, flights abroad etc. Again I have no difficulty with the sentiments of these discussions but they do tend to irritate me as these are in my opinion too much focussed on the "common" man and not on businesses.
In the whole discussion I have never come across information or discussion on the carbon footprints of arms for example. No, not the limbs hanging from ones shoulder but those carried around on your shoulders such as AK47' and Uzi's and the bigger ones such as missiles, rockets, bombs, clusterbombs, mines, tanks to name a few. I am sure that a reduction by half would have an enormous positive impact on the environment not to mention humanity. But I am probably very naive to think that the arms producers, sellers and buyers would be open to such a policy by the governments who allow them to exist.
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Yes this is a bit like the elephant in the room, an issue governments with vested interests in the arms industry either manufacturing or consumer would avoid like the plague. It would open such a can of worms, a real Pandora's box. Maybe it's time to highlight the issue, open it up to debate it.
ReplyDeleteAfter all you saw the after-effects first hand in Lao with the land mines and the bombis, they never go away even years after the conflict ends, so that carbon footprint extends to all the land that can't be cultivated, another major factor, aside from the main one of the human impact.
I was watching BBC 4 last night and a really great programme about the economic colapse of the 1930's. Effectively the slump was ended by increased governemnt spending on the armaments industry. They ended with an interview with survivng Chilean nitrate miners who got plenty of work as the demand for nitrate rocketed in the late 30's due to its use as an explosive. Chilling analysis given the present economic mess.
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