Including military in climate action incentivises cooperation over conflict, says water expert [Interview]

For the first time in history, India held the Indus Water Treaty – a 1960 water sharing agreement with Pakistan – in abeyance amid border tensions following a terror attack that killed 26 people in the state of Kashmir. Though both countries have agreed to a ceasefire after days of military action, India has said the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) will remain in abeyance.

Suspending the treaty as a punitive measure introduces a new dynamic in India’s conflict with Pakistan – one whose long-term impacts could become more unpredictable with climate change. Across the world, conflicts are emerging at a time when extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense due to global warming. Conflict also increases pressure on natural resources, often exacerbating scarcity and degrading the environment.

Ashok Swain, Professor and Head of the Department of Peace and Conflict Research and UNESCO Chair on International Water Cooperation at Uppsala University, Sweden, draws the links between climate change and conflict in his new book Climate Security, published by Sage Publications. Across eight chapters, Swain argues that climate action should be put on an equal footing with national security issues when governments make policy decisions.

Multilateral processes under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which produced the Paris Agreement, are “far from being sufficient,” Swain writes in his book, because despite the commitment to limit global warming to well below two degrees above pre-industrial levels, “countries continue to ignore that environmental degradation and climate change take away basic human security.” Reframing the climate crisis as a national security issue can bolster support for long-term climate action.

The book sweeps across topics including climate migration, how climate change is shifting national borders, and the changing nature of water agreements. Mongabay India spoke to Swain about the book and his views on some of the climate security issues facing India today.

Mongabay India: You argue that it’s important that the climate crisis be framed, or reframed, as a national security issue. How does that framing change anything?

Ashok Swain: I have argued that the environment should be part of the larger security debate since the 90s, but this is always met with the same response: that it should not be framed as a national security issue.

I have been going to the (climate) Conference of Parties (COP) meetings quite often, where climate action is debated year after year. After seeing what happens in the COP negotiations I decided not to go again because I think it’s just a lot of time being spent without actionable results. The Paris Agreement left a lot to be desired, and you even have countries withdrawing from it.

Political leaders like Joe Biden, who wanted to be a climate president, allocated far more resources for the Ukraine war than for climate change. Even countries like Sweden and Germany, whose leaders are not climate deniers, are reluctant to take hard actions similar to those perceived to be of the national security level. Sweden spent billions of dollars to join NATO, because it was apprehensive following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Developing countries are most affected by climate change, but still there fails to be resources allocated towards climate adaptation. Countries in the Global South won’t hesitate to spend on weapons and militarisation, but expect Europe and the U.S. to provide finance for climate action.

Ultimately, prioritising climate action has to be a political decision taken by the state, because they’re the primary actors with the capability to do it. Political leaders need a tool to convince their electorates that investing in climate change is worthwhile. Unless climate mitigation and adaptation is framed as a national security issue, it is not going to happen. Framing it as a national security issue can lead to more resource allocation for climate mitigation and adaptation.

Mongabay India: Couldn’t framing climate action as a national security issue also run the risk of governments misusing this framework to push other agendas?

Ashok Swain: Yes, there is a legitimate concern that framing climate change as a national security issue could be misused by states to pursue unrelated political or developmental agendas. However, it is important to clarify that the call for climate security to be treated with the same seriousness as national security is not a call to ignore human security or climate justice. On the contrary, it aims to elevate the urgency of the climate crisis to a level where it commands real political will, resource allocation, and policy coherence.

In many countries, national security receives immediate attention and budgetary priority. By aligning climate action with national security, the goal is to unlock political legitimacy and momentum for concrete measures in both mitigation and adaptation, particularly in sectors like energy transition, food systems, disaster preparedness, and climate-resilient infrastructure.

Mongabay India: How do you view the recent escalations between India and Pakistan, where the Indus Water Treaty was kept in abeyance for the first time?

Ashok Swain: The Indus Water has not been politicised despite the wars of 1965, 1971, and 1999. In December 2001, when the Parliament building was attacked, Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the Prime Minister and India put half a million troops on the border. Even then, a meeting between Pakistani and Indian officials proceeded as part of the Indus Water Treaty agreements.

The IWT only started to get politicized in 2016, after the Uri strike. Perhaps the threat to suspend the treaty is a form of political showmanship, because India doesn’t have the storage facilities to stop the river water from flowing in Pakistan. The only way to do that is to build dams with storage for hydropower projects. We’ve seen that in Uri, in the ’90s, two hydropower projects were attacked by militants and two Swedish engineers were even kidnapped. Similarly, a project in Wular was also attacked by militants.

Those were small projects. If bigger projects are built against Pakistan, they will likely be exposed to militancy, as we’ve seen in the past. Once you make the political decision to weaponise water, dams become a genuine target in war. This could be one of the reasons why previous leaders chose not to weaponise the IWT. Perhaps the reason it is being brought up today is because it’s seen as a measure that will satisfy a constituency which believes this is the correct measure to give India an upper hand.

Mongabay India: What could the long-term ramifications of holding the agreement in abeyance be? Does this, in a way, exemplify why climate should be factored into decisions about national security?

Ashok Swain: When water is weaponised, it not only exacerbates geopolitical tensions but also undermines the cooperative frameworks that are essential for dealing with the unpredictable impacts of climate change, such as glacial melt, shifting monsoons, and water scarcity. The best way forward is to reframe the IWT not as a static Cold War-era treaty but as a living agreement that must evolve to address climate-induced hydrological changes.

Unlike most treaties, the IWT is more like a partition agreement which gives each country control over three rivers each. The nature of the agreement is also why it hasn’t led to different forms of cooperation between the two countries over time.

In the long term, keeping the IWT in abeyance could erode one of the most resilient water-sharing treaties globally and further complicate India’s image as a reliable partner in transboundary water management. Trust, once lost, is difficult to rebuild. For smaller South Asian neighbors that also share rivers with India, such as Nepal and Bangladesh, this move may reinforce concerns about asymmetry, unilateralism, and a declining commitment to rules-based cooperation. This reputational cost could hinder future negotiations, regional climate cooperation, and India’s diplomatic standing in multilateral water governance platforms.

Mongabay India: One of the most interesting parts of the book is when you discuss the role of the military — its exclusion from climate talks as well as its contributions to emissions worldwide. Why should the military concern itself with climate mitigation?

Ashok Swain: The maximum amount of money that any organisation, has spent on climate research is the Pentagon, the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense. The military is directly affected by climate change and natural disasters. Hurricanes, cyclones, heatwaves, and other natural disasters affect their activity. Not only is their equipment affected and their bases affected, but they’re also exposed to different types of diseases due to a changing climate.

Countries like the U.S., which have 100 military bases across the world and 700 bases within their own country, are interested in tracking climate change to know what kind of challenges are coming and how they should prepare. Before Sweden joined NATO, it saw itself as a peacekeeper in Southern Africa, and consulted me on a project about climate risks there. Countries do this for their own military preparedness, equipment, operations, and missions.

Recently, there has been pressure, especially on the American military, to reduce its emissions. They started projects trying to create solar operated tanks. Similar initiatives have been talked about in India and Kenya, but ultimately this is greenwashing. Militaries are interested in tracking climate change, but their greenwashing is not working, because they continue to be large emitters that also unleash environmental devastation. The military directly, indirectly, actively and passively contributes to our fight against climate change.

When countries are in active conflict, especially involving their militaries, the space for climate cooperation shrinks dramatically. Cooperation is not just a moral imperative but a strategic necessity in the climate era. Involving the military in climate action, like disaster response, infrastructure adaptation, and emissions reduction from defence operations, can create an incentive for nations to keep channels of communication open even in times of tension.

In that sense, climate cooperation can become a soft conduit for diplomacy and a deterrent against escalation. It is not about militarizing the climate response, but rather recognising that the military can be a stakeholder in both stability and sustainability. When militaries value climate resilience, they indirectly value peace, because conflict undermines both.

Unfortunately, environmental and climate movements exclude the military in their campaigns because speaking critically about the military anywhere in the world could result in a strong state response. It’s one of the elephants in the room that needs to be looked at.

Mongabay India: You talked about how the COP negotiation process has been disappointing in terms of moving the needle. If we are to move into a regime or a framework where climate is equated with national security, what role do you think multilateralism would play?

Ashok Swain: The Paris Agreement doesn’t go full force on climate action, but there has been progress. Almost 200 countries came together to sign an agreement, which is not something that generally happens, and I think that’s a good thing.

Last year the world spent more than $2.2 trillion in the military. How many years did it take developed countries to reach the $100 billion goal, which they had promised to pay in 2009? It’s not a big amount, but it still took almost 15 years. Do we really expect developed countries to live up to their promises and pay adequately for climate finance?

Pakistan particularly has taken a leading role in demanding funding for loss and damage due to climate change. But what measures have they taken by themselves to improve flood protection and desertification? How much are countries in the Global South prioritising their own adaptation? Political elites are using the COP as a platform to assign blame. Climate mitigation and adaptation need global partnership — there’s no doubt about it. But in elevating climate action to national security levels, it will force countries to do what they’re supposed to, and not use the COP as a platform to absolve themselves.

Mongabay India: The book dedicates a chapter to how climate change can worsen water conflicts. What are some of the challenges in designing transboundary water sharing agreements?

Ashok Swain: There have been more than 300 major transboundary river system agreements. A series of agreements were signed in the 1990s — for the Mekong river system, the Ganges, Jordan, and the Nile to some extent. In the last 20 to 25 years, however, there has rarely been a major river agreement signed.

I think the uncertainty around water supply and demand due to climate change has a role to play. Countries are apprehensive about this, even if they don’t accept climate change as a factor, because they can see that weather patterns are no longer the same. Ascertaining quantity in river basins is the most difficult part of developing water agreements. Historically, you would take an average of flow data from a certain period in the past to formulate the agreement, as was done in the Ganga Water Treaty between India and Bangladesh. Climate change is making it increasingly difficult to make such measurements, because now you can’t really take that average data into account.

Changing weather patterns, rising demand for water, and changes in population and in agricultural practices — all of this has also changed the dynamics of water demand and supply. Existing agreements are in danger because of such uncertainties. Countries need to forge a basic sense of trust that water will not be weaponised in times of conflict.

Mongabay India: How should India navigate hydropolitics and dam building with China over the Brahmaputra?

Ashok Swain: The Chinese have already built three dams on the Yarlung Tsangpo (Brahmaputra in India) and plans are under way to build a large one, which will be three times the size of the Three Gorges Dam. India is also building a dam on its side of the same river. Without a water agreement in place, this may not be the best solution. Without an agreement, there are risks of dam breakage on the Indian side if our reservoir is full and water is released from the Chinese dam upstream. China could certainly use its own dam to blackmail India.

Given this situation, I think India should strengthen cooperation with the other lower riparian states to then negotiate with China. If not Pakistan, then at least with Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan. The same thing has been done with the lower Mekong countries since 1955. Instead of building a dam without any agreement, India should start working together with Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh to find a common ground.

Read more: Border village farmers navigate conflict and survival

Banner image: An aerial view of villages in Bihar affected by floods in August 2008. Swain says that developing countries are most affected by climate change, but a lack of resource allocation towards climate adaptation persists, with militarisation being prioritised. Image by Press Information Bureau, Government of India.