Saving Whales and the International System

Hendrick Hertzberg has a strange-but-true post on a new Navy sonar program that's going to have potentially devastating consequences for the world's whale population: "The study will take at least two years, during which our Navy—and the Russian and Chinese navies, too, among others—will continue to drive many of these sublime, highly intelligent animals to their deaths. And, no matter what the findings, it does not seem likely that the Navy will go all PETA on us and decide to get along without its way cool gadgets."

He suggests that this might be a good time for the US, Russia, and China to try to negotiate some submarine-related arms control agreements rather than spending money on new whale-killing ways for us to track each other's subs. Obviously, an issue like that's embedded in larger questions, but if you read my posts from yesterday on Russia and China you'll be able to guess that I agree. The biggest threats we face -- climate change, nuclear proliferation, transnational terrorism -- are all things that can only be tackled through cooperation among the major powers. The good news is that the major powers have good reason to want to cooperate on those issues. The bad news is that all of those countries have internal constituencies invested in legacy conflicts and the legacy budgets they fuel.

Photo by Flickr user Hisgett used under a Creative Commons license

Comments

Here's the guy on whales and sonar: http://nrdc.org/media/pressreleases/031013a.asp.

This press release seems to be quite old; but Reynolds is still on the case. He's a very sharp guy.

Posted by anmik | October 17, 2007 1:00 AM

Sorry, the above link is correct if you cut out the final period, which was intended as punctuation, not part of a URL.

Posted by anmik | October 17, 2007 1:29 AM

This is a big problem, especially here around Puget Sound.

That said, I am pretty sure that whales don't get the bends, contrary to the article. Whales, of course, hold their breath, which means that no extra oxygen is put into their bloodstream while sumbmerged (as opposed to SCUBA divers). This, so far as I know, makes getting the bends impossible, although there are other reasons they might be dying.

In any event, there have been a series of mass beachings and odd deaths amongst orcas and other whales off the coast of WA over the past years, all of which seem to have something to do with sonar tests.

Posted by abject funk | October 17, 2007 1:38 AM

This is quite depressing. Maybe time for everyone to write their Congressman.

Posted by Ben Cronin | October 17, 2007 3:24 AM

Hertzberg "pretty exact undersea parallel" is anything but. Naval sonar is in no way at the same level of energy as a flash from a hydrogen bomb. The flash from a big (1MT+) hydrogen bomb would cause fatal 3rd-degree burns and start raging forest fires for miles around each test. Sonar tests are nowhere near this destructive. His parallel doesn't work even if we ignore thermal effects because, strangely enough, eye damage from a nuclear explosion is not as common as one would think, at least if the Japanese experience is any guide (see previous link for details).

Now, I don't want to argue Hertzberg's larger point -- that these sonar tests are damaging to some pretty rare wildlife and are not really necessary, and therefore we should probably not be undertaking them -- but his comparison is way, way off.

Posted by josephdietrich | October 17, 2007 6:21 AM

The last paragraph is a non sequitur. Even if you assume that the Chinese government has good reason to want to cooperate with the U.S. on climate change, there's no particular reason for them to do anything for the whales. There's no evidence that the Chinese government shares the Upper West Side sentimentality for animals, which is mostly a product of not actually spending any time around animals.

Posted by y81 | October 17, 2007 12:22 PM

Eiiiiiiii-ck-ck! CweeeeeeEEEEEEEcscscsc. Kkkkkkkkkkkshhhhh. Ck-Ck-Ck-Ck.

Posted by Flipper | October 17, 2007 1:38 PM

y81, the Chinese and Russians are less likely to waste their money on new and better subs and sonar if we stop fueling that particular arms race.

Posted by bob | October 17, 2007 3:07 PM