Climate change denial and the jeopardised interest of the United States in the Freely Associated States of Micronesia Sara E. Cannon * Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, 1984 West Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, V6T 1Z2, Canada. Email: s.cannon@oceans.ubc.ca. Abstract: The Compacts of Free Association (COFA) are agreements between the United States of America and three Pacific Island countries: the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) and Palau, collectively the Freely Associated States (FAS). COFA provides the FAS financial assistance to build their economies and foster financial independence; in exchange, the United States has regional military control. The United States is the world’s second largest emitter of greenhouse gases, while the FAS produce few emissions but are vulnerable to climate impacts. I highlight inconsistencies in U.S. policies from within its own paradigm by ‘seeing like an empire’ to show how contradicting priorities jeopardise American interests in the region. Aid provided by COFA has done little to build infrastructure supporting the FAS’s economically indepen- dence, and climate change diverts economic resources to funding climate adaptation. The United States is cur- rently battling China to maintain hegemony in the Pacific, making the FAS strategically important for national security. Meanwhile, climate change threatens U.S. military installations in the FAS. It is in the United States’ best interests to limit emissions to protect its investments in the FAS, but this requires a policy change to prioritise its commitments in Micronesia over climate change denial. Keywords: climate change, Compacts of Free Association, Freely Associated States, Micronesia, Pacific geopolitics, United States Introduction The Compacts of Free Association (COFA) are agreements governing the relationships between the United States of America and three Pacific Island countries (PICs): the Republic of the Mar- shall Islands (RMI), the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) and Palau, herein collectively referred to as the Freely Associated States (FAS). Per the agreements, COFA provide economic aid to assist these nations in building their econ- omies and eventually becoming fully indepen- dent. COFA also gives citizens of the member nations the option to work and study in the United States without needing a visa, and gives the United States military and security rights and responsibilities in the region (United States Department of State, 1984). The FAS are in the region of Micronesia (Fig. 1). Each have different cultures, geogra- phies and economies, but are united by shared histories of colonialism and their status as some of the world’s most susceptible nations to the impacts of climate change (The World Bank, 2017). They are all affected by sea-level rise, increasing storm and drought intensities and coral bleaching (Nurse et al., 2014). The FAS may be able to adapt to these impacts, if the major producers of greenhouse gases take swift action to limit their emissions (Betzold, 2015; Barnett, 2017), but will incur significant costs in the process, which will challenge their ability to become economically independent and undermine the goals of COFA. The goal of COFA, to promote economic independence in the FAS, is at odds with the United States’ quest for military dominance in the Pacific. Micronesia holds strategic impor- tance for the United States’ security interests, and the United States sought to solidify its con- trol of the region after World War II. COFA allowed the United States to keep a military presence in the FAS without drawing the ire of the United Nations or the sovereignty Asia Pacific Viewpoint 2020 ISSN 1360-7456 © 2020 Victoria University of Wellington and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd doi:10.1111/apv.12295