030 Climate Change

In my diagram, I illustrated the idea behind the Copenhagen Accord and ways in which the U.S. tried to gain the support of countries who did not want to cooperate. Climate change is a major issue and I wanted to make this clear by making it the head of all of the other points. Due to the climate change, the Copenhagen Accord was proposed by the U.S. This meant that the U.S. needed a supporting cast of allies to have their back. Getting allies wasn’t easy however and the U.S. had to bribe countries so that they would join them in their plan. The U.S. targeted countries which were significantly affected by the climate change and offered them large sums of money. If they did not accept the offer, then the U.S. threatened to discontinue communication between the countries. Countries like Ethiopia were put in tough situations because they did not want to form the alliance and join the Copenhagen Accord but because of the U.S.’s threat to stop all further communication, they had no choice but to join. This was almost always a lose situation for countries like Ethiopia because they rely on the U.S. and even if they didn’t the U.S. used confidentiality cables to spy on countries that did not cooperate. Eventually 140 countries pledged to support the Copenhagen Accord. This was what the U.S. aimed for and it accounts for about 80 % of the greenhouse emissions. When it was brought to the U.S.’s attention that WikiLeaks leaked information about the U.S. using these cables to spy on opposing countries they lost all trust for the opposing countries. This destroyed relationships with the U.S. and several other countries that are still not 100 % fixed yet.

The United States did not handle this situation very professionally at all. This was a very shady and unethical approach which should have been handled with more care. As an American, I was not happy to learn about this and it was sickening to hear that they went through with the idea and embarrassing to know that they actually got caught. However, I think that it serves them justice and that the information being leaked was right. Nations with less money are less fortunate and have fewer resources to deal with climate change alone. They need the help of a bigger and stronger country like the U.S. but the U.S. acted like bullies and these countries were not given many choices. The U.S. should have found a way to be more open and sympathetic towards these countries. The Copenhagen does not seem to be too successful either so at the end of the day, the U.S. ruined some important relationships for nothing. I believe that the U.S. tries to do too much sometimes. While it is hard to always do the right thing as such a major player in the world and with the spotlight always on you, this is one failure that is just unacceptable. The U.S. does a lot of good for the world and often times does protect smaller countries, especially with our large and powerful military. However, it is the failures that people remember and this was a big mistake. I hope that the U.S. learns from the mistakes that it made in this situation and does not repeat these mistakes ever again.