Note to Congress: Wildfires are disasters

The cost of fighting megafires in Oregon and other western states has skyrocketed in recent years, devouring funds that the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management need for wildfire prevention — including vitally important programs that treat forests to make them less vulnerable to fires.

U.S. Sens. Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, Rep. Peter DeFazio and other members of the Northwest’s congressional delegation have tried without success for years to end a self-destructive budgeting practice, known in bureaucratic parlance as “fire borrowing.” Now, there is reason to hope that Congress will finally end this vicious cycle and recognize that megafires are natural disasters that put forests, property and human life at serious risk.

Last Thursday, the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee passed a bill, sponsored by Merkley, that seeks to preserve money for fire prevention and other vital programs by detaching them from spending to fight fires.

Under the legislation, wildfires would be treated like natural disasters, such as river flooding, hurricanes and tornadoes. Any firefighting costs above an annual level of funding based on a 10-year average of wildfire suppression would be funded through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA.

Congress should waste no time passing this legislation, which comes amid predictions of a catastrophic fire season. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack recently warned that wildfire-fighting costs could run hundreds of millions over budget.

It’s hardly a new situation. With drought-stricken forests burning in devastating wildfires in Western states nearly every year, the costs of fighting fires have decimated Forest Service and BLM budgets. The nonsensical practice of “fire borrowing” has forced the agencies to shift money to firefighting from vital programs such as road maintenance, timber sales, recreation and, most significantly, fire prevention.

In 2013, the Forest Service had to redirect more than $600 million from other agency programs to cover the cost of fighting fires. While last year’s fire season was not as severe as anticipated, experts warn that the intensity, frequency and size of wildfires will continue to increase in coming years as a result of chronic drought conditions and climate change.

Merkley’s bill is similar to legislation introduced in previous sessions by Wyden, a fellow Democrat, and Sen. Michael Crapo, R-Idaho. Those bills would have freed more than $400 million annually for fire-prevention projects.

Under Merkley’s proposal, the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management would receive an annual appropriation equal to the 10-year average spent on fighting wildfires. If a fire season is worse than anticipated, FEMA would be required to cover the remaining cost. In case of a mild fire season, any surplus funding would be returned to the U.S. Treasury.

Thursday’s committee vote inserted Merkley’s measure in a $30.1 billion bill that appropriates money to the Department of the Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency. Ironically, Merkley voted against the larger bill because it contains a number of what he called “unrelated, extreme anti-environmental policy riders.” Hopefully, Merkley’s amendment, which has bipartisan support, will not fall prey to partisan politics as it winds its way through Congress.

It’s time for the federal government to finally change a perverse budgeting system that forces agencies to spend money on fighting fires that’s needed for making federal forests less vulnerable to costly wildfires. Congress should approve Merkley’s proposal as soon as possible.

— The Register-Guard, Eugene, June 22

Winning the war on terror

The U.S. scored a noteworthy victory last week when an American missile killed Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the longtime leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the global organization’s Number Two. Coupled with unconfirmed reports that an F-15 airstrike in Libya killed jihadist mastermind Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the strikes are a reminder that the war on terror continues, whatever the Administration calls it.

Yet the strikes are also a reminder that while killing senior jihadists has tactical and symbolic value—disrupting terrorist networks while underscoring U.S. resolve—they do not turn the tide of war. “Core” al Qaeda was not defeated after Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011, even if it was humbled. Neither was al Qaeda in Iraq beaten after the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in 2006. Killing the kingpins is necessary but not sufficient for victory.

That much was made clear by the way Wuhayshi met his end—near a beach in the Yemeni city of Al Mukalla, population 300,000. Al Qaeda took control of Al Mukalla in April, seizing close to $80 million from the central bank. The group now controls the better part of southern Yemen.

The same goes with Belmokhtar, who orchestrated the 2013 attack on an Algerian gas plant that killed 38 people and had pledged allegiance to al Qaeda’s Ayman al-Zawahiri. If reports of Belmokhtar’s death are confirmed—this wouldn’t be the first time he’s been presumed dead—it’s a tactical coup for the U.S. and a moral victory for the terrorist’s victims. But it does little to change the fact that jihadist groups, led by Islamic State, control significant territory in Libya, including Moammar Ghadafi’s hometown of Sirte.

All of which is to say that the U.S. will not defeat its terrorist enemies by going after them one at a time. This is what makes the recent success of the Kurdish Peshmerga against Islamic State so promising. This week the Kurds defeated Islamic State to take control of the Syrian town of Tal Abyad, on the Turkish border. Now the Kurds are headed south to Islamic State’s Syrian stronghold of Raqqa.

Success in Raqqa would be the most important victory to date in rolling back ISIS, which is why the U.S. should concentrate military efforts in support of the offensive. The Kurds are among our best anti-jihadist allies, and they deserve more support than the U.S. has provided so far.

— Wall Street Journal, June 16