Bellum

"Here is no water but only rock." -- T.S. Eliot

Man has fought wars over, about, or with water since the ancient Sumerians. From the 6th century destruction of Roman aqueducts by the Goths to the FARC’s alleged bombing of a Colombian city’s water supply last week, water supply has been at the forefront of geostrategic thinking and military planning. The UN’s 5th World Water Forum, held this week in Istanbul, hammers home the point, warning us all that as demand for water increases, so does the likelihood of conflict. Descending on Istanbul, in addition to the diplomats and scientists, are the requisite protesters, including the UN’s own water czar. The protesters oppose the “privatization” of water, arguing that access to it is a “human right” and chanting, “Water for life, not for profit!” Seventeen were detained yesterday.

To be sure, the subject of future water scarcity is something the national security community takes quite seriously. At one level, we need look no further than Afghanistan: the Kajaki Dam in Helmand province has been targeted by the Taliban, as has the Dahla Dam project near Kandahar. At the macro level, the Joint Forces Command Joint Operating Environment 2008 report discusses the issue extensively:

In short, from a global perspective, there should be more than sufficient water to support the world’s population during the next quarter century. However, in some regions the story is quite different. The Near East and North Africa use far more than the global average of 70% of available water dedicated to irrigation. By the 2030s, at least 30 developing nations could use even more of their water for irrigation.

One should not minimize the prospect of wars over water…Indeed, it is precisely along other potential conflict fault lines that potential crises involving water scarcity are most likely.

Whether the United States would find itself drawn into such conflicts is uncertain, but what is certain is that future joint force commanders will find conflict over water endemic to their world, whether as the spark or the underlying cause of conflicts among various racial, tribal, or political groups. Were they called on to intervene in a catastrophic water crisis, they might well confront chaos, with collapsing or impotent social networks and governmental services. Anarchy could prevail, with armed groups controlling or warring over remaining water, while the specter of disease resulting from unsanitary conditions would hover in the background.

Projected water scarcity, 2025 (National Intelligence Council)

Similarly, the National Intelligence Council’s Global Trends 2025 report concludes:

Experts currently consider 21 countries with a combined population of about 600 million to be either cropland or freshwater scarce. Owing to continuing population growth, 36 countries, home to about 1.4 billion people, are projected to fall into this category by 2025. Among the new entrants will be Burundi, Colombia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Malawi, Pakistan, and Syria. Lack of access to stable supplies of water is reaching unprecedented proportions in many areas of the world and is likely to grow worse owing to rapid urbanization and population growth.

For all the talk of good governance, improved technique, best practices, and so forth, the Water Problem has always been with us. If water is a human right, as the Istanbul protesters declare, will God build the infrastructure? If water is a commodity that should be privatized and sold to take advantage of market efficiencies, are we comfortable letting people die if they cannot pay the proper price? As the answer to both is “No,” we muddle through the discourse with magical thinking, and we at Bellum are reminded of the Ancient Mariner’s lament: “Water, water, everywhere, / Nor any drop to drink.”

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