The crises of the environment care nothing for human squabbles and timetables and are proceeding apace on their own schedule. Nature’s clock keeps ticking. Indeed, the human enterprise is looking like a great Shakespearean tragedy in which an internal struggle distracts from a far greater external crisis that threatens all sides. To use an idiom from the 1990s, it will be the mother of all crises.

At this point, the West appears to be sleepwalking toward Armageddon via a dangerous proxy war. By supplying precision munitions, training Ukrainians in their use, and sharing actionable intelligence, NATO is doing everything short of actually pushing the launch buttons. The West is essentially at war with Russia already. This is madness.