Climate Change and Its Strategic Implications for Iraqi National Security

Abstract

Climate change has become one of the most significant issues in the contemporary world, as it directly affects public health and imposes economic obligations on states. These changes result from both human-induced activities (industrialization, combustion, and pollution) and natural transformations triggered by human behavior (rising temperatures, pollution, reduced rainfall, acid rain, desertification, and more). Today, states face increasing commitments to reduce fossil fuel consumption, rising challenges in fulfilling food security requirements, and complex problems associated with rural-to-urban migration of farmers, leading to increased unemployment in urban centers. Climate change also alters the use and type of agricultural land, disrupts climatic patterns, and negatively affects the public health systems of living organisms. Iraq has found itself confronted with these escalating challenges, which are increasingly intertwined with the fundamentals of national security.

The core of the problem lies in the fact that the impacts of climate change are not limited to rising temperatures or decreasing rainfall. Rather, they extend to issues of food security and dependency on imports, deterioration of public health systems, rising unemployment, and the need for the state to allocate substantial financial resources to mitigate the negative effects of climate change and to provide services that were previously unnecessary under more stable and healthy climatic conditions.