Seems the former Chief of the Australian Defence Force agrees with Prince Charles that climate change is a significant security threat.
"TIM PALMER: As world leaders prepare to meet for climate change talks in Paris next week, the Prince of Wales has warned of links between climate change and terrorism.
Prince Charles says one of the main reasons for the conflict in Syria, and the terrorism that it's spawned, is climate change and drought.
An Australian terrorism expert and a former defence chief agree.
Simon Lauder reports.
SIMON LAUDER: The conflict in Syria has killed hundreds of thousands of people, displaced millions more and helped the group Islamic State gain ground.
Prince Charles believes the conflict has been driven by climate change. He spoke to Sky News UK.
PRINCE CHARLES: There is very good evidence indeed that one of the major reasons for this horror in Syria was a drought that lasted for about five or six years, which meant that huge numbers of people in the end had to leave the land.
And increasingly they came into the cities, and this combined to create a very difficult situation.
REPORTER: Are you suggesting that there was a link between climate change and conflict and terrorism?
PRINCE CHARLES: Absolutely.
SIMON LAUDER: That interview was recorded several weeks ago, and has been released ahead of the Paris climate talks - now just a week away.
Many climate scientists are cautious about linking individual weather events with climate change, so the suggestion that climate change is responsible for the Syrian crisis is open to debate.
But it's not the first time it's been suggested. A paper published in March in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concluded that climate change exacerbated the country's drought and contributed to Syria's conflict.
Professor of global Islamic politics at Deakin University, Greg Barton, says the drought was a contributing factor.
GREG BARTON: This is a very sensible position. It's been widely put around over the last year or so that the drought in Syria from 2006 to 2009 which pushed up food prices added significantly to social stresses, and that was one of the precipitating factors in the civil war breaking up.
So, actually Prince Charles was entirely sensible.
SIMON LAUDER: In a more general warning just a few months ago, the US defence department said global climate change threatens stability in a number of countries because it aggravates problems such as poverty, social tensions, environmental degradation, ineffectual leadership and weak political institutions.
The former chief of the Australian Defence Force, Professor Admiral Chris Barrie, says climate change is a significant and growing national security threat.
CHRIS BARRIE: Of course there are a whole range of reasons why that conflict broke out. We simply argue that climate change consequences was one of the impacts, but interestingly enough, even though a major effort was made in 2008 to try and resurrect the problem over food, now the consequences of the civil war are making the situation even worse.
SIMON LAUDER: Do you think there is a growing awareness of this link between climate change and its effects and global conflict?
CHRIS BARRIE: Somebody like me - I am a member of the Global Military Advisory Council on Climate Change, we've been at this for several years now. To have somebody like the Prince of Wales talk about something elevates that conversation to a much higher level.
SIMON LAUDER: And of course since the assaults on Paris earlier this month, there's been intense focus on terrorism. Do you think that will take away from efforts to address climate change?
CHRIS BARRIE: People who are going to Paris for COP21 are going to experience a high level of security, and along with that, some nervousness about things that are going on.
Whether that will detract, I think, from the negotiations that will take place, both in the public forums and behind closed doors, I doubt that because to be honest I think my read is people are now taking this seriously.
They realise that the game is up and the planet and all of us - I mean all of us - have to really start doing something much more drastic in order to try and contain the impacts.
SIMON LAUDER: The climate conference opens in Paris on the 30th of November.
TIM PALMER: Simon Lauder reporting."
