Pentagon Planning More War Games to Prepare for Climate Change

The Pentagon is ramping up its war games and planning exercises to better understand the risks of climate change, two Defense Department officials said Thursday.

Those efforts and others, detailed during a briefing convened by the Brookings Institution, underscore how seriously the Pentagon is taking the issue. The military has maintained that posture for several years—even during the Trump administration, which downplayed the risks of a rapidly warming world.

Some of the military’s ongoing planning exercises contemplate outcomes in case of a natural disaster, foreign political upheaval, or climate-driven migration, said Joe Bryan, the Pentagon’s chief sustainability officer and senior ...