Operation FREE Covered by The Pitch

Oct 19, 2009

By Operation Free

New veteran group says global warming is as dangerous as terrorists

By Carolyn Szczepanski

Whether it was the light drizzle, crisp temperatures or their military training, the veterans on the big, blue biodiesel bus got right to the point when they stopped at Liberty Memorial last week.

“Climate disruption is a clear and present national security threat,” Rafael Noboa, a former Army sergeant from Colorado, said. “The U.S. cannot afford to wait.”

The small crew of military veterans are on a 21-state tour, trying to convince citizens — and Congress — that global warming is a threat to national security, just like terrorists or the Taliban. Their group, Operation Free, is a new alliance of former service members pressing legislators to strike against climate change and invest in renewable American energy before the ugly international consequences of global warming become a colossal problem for the U.S. military.

But the Operation Free veterans weren’t just blowing through town on their two-week tour. One of the guys who helped kick start the campaign in Washington, D.C., lives right here in Kansas City.

Duane Enger grew up in “the middle of nowhere Montana,” the son of a cop and a school teacher. To secure money for college, he joined the Army. “It was the best decision I ever made in my life,” he says. He traveled the world, served his country — and became an accidental environmentalist.

In September 2003, he shipped out to Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade. When he arrived, one of the first things he saw was a mile-long line of Iraqis, pushing their cars into a gas station that was out of fuel. In Mosul, he dealt with brigade logistics, which meant he ordered and distributed provisions for 10,000 soldiers. Several times every day, he scheduled fuel convoys that, he says, turned soldiers into targets. “We’d have convoys and we knew it was an opportunity for attacks, for road side bombs, but we have to get the fuel to these places,” he says.

“So, my experience in Iraq really opened my eyes to the supply chain of fuel that we take for granted,” he continues. “Before I’d walk to Pep Boys or Wal-Mart and think, ‘OK, I need some oil,’ and it would be there be in a clean can in a well-lit store at a perfect 71 degrees and I’d walk home and think nothing of it. Then I realized, wow, this is where it comes from; these dirty places with fuel and diesel and oil just all over the ground with people walking through it.”

When he got out of the Army in 2005, it wasn’t easy finding a job. “The big question for Army guys getting out is, ‘What am I going to do?’” he says. “Being an expert marksman doesn’t really get you too many jobs.” He dabbled in real estate but it was unfulfilling. Then Enger got involved in the construction of a wind power development in upstate New York, which led to a job Trade Wind Energy, a wind power company based in Lenexa. He’s been in Kansas City for three years now.

It’s a perfect fit, he says. Though he’s not wearing a uniform anymore, he still feels he’s serving his country. “It’s a for-profit business but, at the end of the day, I’m taking resources that were untapped and turning them into something real: electricity for homes, power that has no pollution, no third-order effects overseas,” he says. “And I find great value in that.”

So joining Operation Free and traveling to Washington, D.C., in early September to press for energy legislation was an organic fit for the green vet.

“We’re trying to say that the environmental movement is not a bunch of hippies,” he says. “Guys like me are joining the chorus to say, hey, climate change has huge potential to drain our military resources almost immediately when we have to start worrying about humanitarian aid and extremist groups pulling from disillusioned and disappointed populations. The Operation Free movement is saying climate change is a big deal. Yeah, to prevent it is going to be expensive, but I can tell you first hand, the cost of a human life is immeasurable. Anything we can do to protect our guys from going overseas is what we should do.”

Like the guys on the 21-state bus tour, who touched down at Liberty Memorial last week, Enger stresses the urgency of the issue.

“In the early ’70s, you had somebody knocking on your door saying, ‘We’ve got an oil crisis,’” Enger says. “But then the economy improved and gas became cheap. SUVs were plentiful and we, as a nation, said ‘Well, we’ll worry about it later,’ Well, I’m later. My parents passed on that tough decision and I refuse to pass it on to my kids. I don’t want my 3-year-old daughter and my one-year-old daughter and my son, who’s going to be born in few weeks, to have to go and do anything in Iraq.”