Environmental Aspects of International Agreements Bill Nicholls ODUSD (I&E) ER&S Workshop on Environmental Considerations in Military Operations/Global Basing

Environmental Aspects of Int’l Agreements History Pre-90’s (NATO SOFA; LBA; Def of Iceland; ROK…..) German SA?? US-Japanese JS - 2000 Korean SOFA Re-negotiations/MOSU - 2000/1 Spanish DCA - 2001/2 Korean LPP “TAB A” - 2003 Greenland Defense Agreement 2004 ROMEX 05 - 2005 Romania DCA (& IAs) 2005/6 Bulgaria DCA (IAs) 2006 Djibouti SOFA (2006) Kyrgyzstan SOFA (2006) Iceland DOI Treaty/NASKef Closure (2006) Pre – 1990..little or no environmental language…..”respect HN law”……EO12088……comply with (substantive) HN law…… ROMEX 05 – derailed US-RO talks August 2005!!! (Craig) Newer agreement contain binding language……legal obligations – good and bad Workshop on Environmental Considerations in Military Operations/Global Basing

Environmental Aspects of Int’l Agreements Negotiations Strategy: Past - Deal from a position of power Get the “best deal” we can New Approach - Include environmental language Reciprocal obligations Enable the mission Protect the force Spend US dollars wisely Limit future US liability Demonstrate appropriate environmental stewardship Power - We “won” – sign here or our presence was extremely desirable… Best deal was – no language or ambiguous language – the old “respect” thing – much abused Let’s identify our obligations either in binding language or as “compelling” language – Service and CoComs must understand the agreements. Goal is to have “common” language to extent possible (no us vs them). Ensure HNs understand that they have obligations as well – not one way. Basel…..Sustainablity….. “do we get to come back?” What is our reputation….. Panama. .Philippines….Bermuda…..Korea….Greenland….Iceland Workshop on Environmental Considerations in Military Operations/Global Basing

Environmental Aspects of Int’l Agreements Challenges: Revise policy to meet changing global posture Liability is more than fiscal Understand “global” nature of our actions DoDI 4715.5….flexible and scalable…must be able to meet our obligations… Develop “standard” language – communicate obligations to CoComs and MilDeps (Funding); Liability is poilitical…..as well We are a global community…our performance in Romania can affects our access to Indonesia…..Australia….Poland etc Workshop on Environmental Considerations in Military Operations/Global Basing