You may have already heard about Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm’s plan to develop and deploy a fully electric American military fleet by the 2030s. And since this is being done to appease the anger of the Climate God, all of the power for these tens of thousands of vehicles will all need to be generated through green energy sources such as wind and solar. We are being assured that this will put us on a solid footing somehow. Well, the good folks at the Institute for Energy Research (who know a few things about electricity generation and related matters) have taken a look at Granholm’s proposal and absolutely panned it for a variety of reasons. We’ll get to the related costs in a moment, but the key factor is reliability. Even if you have never been in combat, served in the military, or even seen a war movie, take a moment to read this and tell me if you don’t find yourself nodding your head in agreement.

Just imagine a son or daughter in an EV military tank operated by enormous and heavy batteries that go dead in the middle of battle with no ability to be recharged quickly or at all, because the opposing side is advancing with modern weapons fueled by petroleum as that country is using the world’s resources to their most suited uses. Can you envision Americans building charging stations behind enemy lines to make these EV tanks usable?

As this example shows, the Biden administration all in one basket (electrification) mentality should make Americans cringe at the sheer absurdity of it. As the Biden administration does all it can to eliminate American energy independence under the guise of “clean” renewable energy, it is creating a national security risk. Further, the Biden administration’s green energy goals rely in many ways upon Communist China—a potential enemy—as that country dominates the battery supply chain and the supply chains of most critical minerals that renewable energy and electric vehicles need.

IER describes Granholm’s plan as “perverse and dangerous.” And that’s because it is. Imagine rolling along in a tank or an armored personnel carrier through some rough countryside, frequently in a place where there aren’t even any roads. And you’re maneuvering to gain an advantage over some enemy forces that are fully intent on killing you if they can. What happens when the battery in your electric combat vehicle goes dead? There won’t be any Tesla recharging stations handy so you’re going to have to have some sort of recharging vehicle in the convoy. But where will that vehicle recharge? And even if it works, anyone who has been within shouting distance of an EV can tell you that they take a good while to charge, far longer than refilling a fuel tank. Good luck with that.

The Army’s plan is at least somewhat better. Unlike Granholm, they draw a distinction between tactical vehicles (vehicles used on the battlefield and in combat support missions) and non-tactical vehicles that are chiefly found on military bases and used for transportation or moving supplies. They can electrify the domestic non-tactical vehicles easily enough I suppose and not cause too much trouble (aside from the cost). But electrifying the tactical vehicles as they still plan to do eventually could be a catastrophe.

And then there is the aforementioned cost. They should have learned something from the Post Office’s disastrous foray into electrification. Replacing or converting that many vehicles is going to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of tens of billions of dollars. Which part of the budget will that money be coming from? Or are we just going to set more magical cash from the money tree in the Rose Garden on fire?

I did a bit of checking and you likely won’t be surprised to learn that Jennifer Granholm has never worked in any sector of the energy industry. Nor has she ever served in the military. She’s about as qualified to be the Secretary of Energy as Pete Buttigieg is to be the Transportation Secretary. And the result thus far has been obvious.

Our adversaries are already looking at us like we’re a joke. It’s hard to blame them. We’re launching schemes that will make our military less reliable and less effective, particularly over longer distances. But hey, we’ll have our lower carbon footprint to comfort us when they start taking out all of our tanks.