'IT is idiotic to waste our dwindling carbon budget on war,' researchers from the United States and United Kingdom warned in a recent report revealing that the two countries' armed forces owe huge sums of money in climate compensation as they continue to involve themselves in wars and conflicts globally. Such conflicts are accompanied by widening carbon footprints and serious environmental destruction.

The report, published by UK-based think tank Common Wealth and the US-based Climate and Community Project, revealed that the American and British militaries 'owe' at least $111 billion in reparations to communities most threatened by their planet-heating pollution, through a 'social cost of carbon' framework calculation used to assess the climate damage done by each additional ton of carbon in the atmosphere.