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General (Ret.) Laura J. Richardson, Former Commander, U.S. Southern Command; Sherri Goodman, Former DUSD for Environmental Security and author of “Threat Multiplier”  

Defense Writers Group

18 June 2025

Moderator: Thank you all for coming to a very special Defense  Writers Group on climate security in our hemisphere and beyond.  
Our guests, of course, are well known to you. We have Laura J.  Richardson, retired General. Her last command was U.S. Southern  Command which she retired from last year. And Sherri Goodman,  former and I think the first Deputy Under Secretary of Defense  for Environmental Security and author of a wonderful book,  “Threat Multiplier.” 
Those of you that have spent time with me in the last couple of  years know that I am absolutely obsessed with climate change and  national security, and I truly believe this should be a  bipartisan, nonpartisan, apolitical issue. It’s not red/blue,  it’s not left/right, it’s not Republican/Democrat.  


Think about it. Mitigating the crisis of rising sea levels on  our coastal military installations? That’s not a political  question. Dealing with increased Great Power competition in the  Arctic made possible by melting ice caps? That should be an  apolitical problem. Climate induced migration from south to  north? Well, if the border security is important to anybody,  and we know it is, we can’t deal with that without talking about  the underlying issues of migration forced by climate security. 


We’re grateful to The Rockefeller Foundation for their support  in hosting us in this lovely space, for all their hospitality. 
A small shout out before we get started to Andy Hoehn, my friend  and co-author of our book “Age of Danger,” which came out three  years ago. It was in that research that I really began to  understand the link between climate change and national  security. One of the people we interviewed, I won’t say she’s  the godfather of climate security, she’s the godmother of climate security. Sherri’s book came out last year, an absolute  must-read if you're interested in the topic. And just like  Sherri helped Andy and me with our book, General Richardson  figures prominently in Sherri’s book. So let me just read you  one paragraph before we get started. 


“Leaders such as General Richardson and her SOUTHCOM team are  performing the vital work of deterring threats from China and  other maligned actors in the region and helping the Western  Hemisphere become more resilient to climate change. That is the  work of converting the threat multiplier of climate change to an  opportunity multiplier for action. Storms, floods, droughts and  other extreme weather events are, after all, disasters that  require immediate action and are long term threats to stability.  For the U.S. and its southern neighbors alike, climate  resilience is an all-hands-on-deck mission.”  


Well said. 


So General Richardson, first of all, thank you for what you’ve  done throughout your career in keeping our nation safe. I  wanted to ask you to just reflect upon your time at Southern  Command dealing with these issues that Sherri so accurately  discussed. Then we’ll turn to Sherri for opening comments  before we open it to a discussion. 


Gen. (Ret) Richardson: Thank you for the invitation to be here  today, and thank you all for being here. Certainly this time is  yours, so Sherri and I will be happy to answer as many questions  as you have. 
My time in U.S. Southern Command, I’m very honored to have been  the commander there for three years. You only get three years  in the seat. That’s a really short time if you really think  about it.