The skinny on ENMOD (hostile weather treaty)

[CornField]

Link to text of treaty

Background Info

The Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques (ENMOD) prohibits using the environment as a weapon in conflicts. Adopted by the UN General Assembly on Dec. 10, 1976 and opened for signature on May 18, 1977, ENMOD entered into force on Oct. 5, 1978.

ENMOD was inspired by global opposition to the use of Agent Orange and other environmental modification technologies during the Vietnam War and also by fears - in the 1970s - that technology was rapidly reaching the point that deliberate catastrophic environmental changes could be triggered as a weapon for hostile use.

To date, ENMOD has been ratified nearly seventy countries, including major powers such as Russia and the United States. Relatively few Southern states have ratified the treaty. Two Review Conferences have been held, in 1984 and 1992.

Bit o' History

Conflict has changed since the Cold War Era, but not necessarily the laws which govern such engagements. Traditional "army versus army" confrontations have been replaced by complex combinations of law enforcement, peacekeeping, economic and military measures.

The War on Drugs is one example of the difficulty encountered when defining contemporary conflict in Cold War terms. Countries such as the US see drugs as not only a criminal problem but also a threat to national security. This security assessment is used not only to justify militarization of this peculiar and bloody conflict but to justify entry into other countries' internal disputes, such as counterinsurgency operations in Colombia, or to justify hostile conflicts between governments, such as that between the US and Afghanistan's Mujahideen. (Sounds familiar, doesn't it?)

Arms control treaties were tailored to suit the Cold War, not the 21st century. The Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques was intended to address technologies capable of modifying the environment for hostile purposes. The treaty’s preventative approach is both visionary and remarkable, considering that, at the time of negotiations, the technology to achieve many of the weapons contemplated was in its initial stages or entirely nonexistent.

Activities that could violate ENMOD include:

• Triggering earthquakes
  
• Manipulating ozone levels
  
• Alteration of the ionosphere
  
• Deforestation
  
• Provoking flood or drought
  
• Use of herbicides
  
• Setting fires
  
• Seeding clouds
  
• Introduction of invasive species
  
• Eradication of species
  
• Creation of storms
  
• Manipulation of El Niño / La Niña
  
• Destruction of crops
  

Much more on ENMOD, for those interested, is available from:
here and here