War contributes greatly to global warming, which shouldn't

The words of Alice Walker — “War contributes greatly to global warming, which shouldn't surprise us. All those bombs going off, all those rockets, all those planes and helicopters. All that fuel of various kinds being used. It pollutes the air and water of this very fragile and interconnected planet.” — call us to see beyond the battlefield, into the hidden scars left upon the earth itself. We often think of war in terms of human suffering — the dead, the wounded, the displaced — yet Walker reminds us that war is also a war against the planet, a tearing of the very fabric of creation. The smoke of bombs does not vanish; it clings to the skies. The fuel of tanks and aircraft does not disappear; it stains the air and poisons the waters.

To connect war and global warming is to pierce the illusion that destruction is contained. War is not a storm that passes over and leaves the world the same; it is a furnace that burns through land, air, and sea. Explosions release toxins, burning oil wells choke the sky with black clouds, and bombed cities bleed chemicals into the rivers. The planet itself becomes a casualty. Walker teaches us that in our age — an age of climate crisis — we must recognize that war does not only slay men and women; it strangles the earth that sustains us all.

History bears witness. In the 1991 Gulf War, retreating Iraqi forces set fire to hundreds of Kuwaiti oil wells. For months, pillars of flame and towers of smoke darkened the sun, blotting the heavens and poisoning the air. Black rain fell on the desert sands, and the earth was scarred with oil lakes that suffocated life. It was not only an act of war, but an act of war against the planet itself. In those days, humanity saw how easily conflict could ignite ecological catastrophe.

Nor is this truth bound only to modern times. During the Vietnam War, the spraying of Agent Orange stripped forests bare, poisoned the soil, and left generations of children deformed by its toxins. The war may have ended, but the land bore scars for decades, and the people who lived upon it still carry its wounds. The lesson is clear: the weapons of war never strike soldiers alone; they strike the living earth, the animals, the rivers, and the generations yet unborn.

Walker’s words also remind us of our interconnectedness. The earth is not divided as men divide it. The smoke of bombs drifts across borders. The poisoned waters of one land flow into the seas of another. The warming caused by endless engines of destruction raises the temperature for all, whether victor or vanquished. War cannot be isolated; its poison spreads through the veins of the planet. To wound the earth in one place is to wound humanity everywhere.

The deeper meaning, then, is that the fight for peace is not only the fight for human lives but the fight for the planet itself. To reject war is to defend not only the soldier and the civilian but also the forests, the seas, the skies, and the soil. War is the enemy of sustainability, the ally of climate destruction. And thus, those who care for the earth must also become warriors for peace, for the two are inseparable.

The lesson for us is clear: to care for the earth, we must resist the engines of war. In our daily lives, we can act by opposing the glorification of conflict, by supporting leaders who seek peace rather than conquest, and by remembering that the true strength of a nation is not in its bombs but in its harmony with the planet. We must learn to count not only the human cost of war but also the cost to the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the ground we walk upon.

Thus let Walker’s words echo across generations: war is not only a human tragedy, but an ecological one. The planet groans under the weight of our conflicts, and its voice calls us to live differently. If we would survive, if we would thrive, then we must turn our weapons into tools of healing, and our wars into labors of peace. For only then can both humanity and the earth itself be renewed.