Why Energy Dominance Is Now a National Security Imperative

While it may have escaped widespread notice, President Donald Trump’s newly released National Security Strategy signals a long-overdue return to seriousness in American defense thinking. For years, Washington has issued strategies heavy on green buzzwords and light on reality.

The message from this White House is different. It confronts a dangerous world with a simple, clarifying message at its core: what strengthens America’s security and prosperity, and what doesn’t.

Two themes stand out for anyone concerned about energy and national defense.

First, the strategy is blunt about the need for the United States to develop and control its own resource pipeline, especially energy. Second, it marks a clean break from the notion that “climate change” and “net zero” should be guiding principles for our national security.

Rebuilding the American Energy Resource Pipeline

This new strategy makes one point clear: energy security is national security. It states that America can no longer rely on foreign powers for the critical minerals, components, and energy that underpin both our economy and our defense. Instead of relying on global supply chains run by potential adversaries, the new strategy calls for reindustrializing the country, reshoring production, and using tools like tariffs to ensure we can produce what matters here at home.

At the center of that effort is energy dominance. The strategy elevates oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear production as top strategic priorities—linking abundant, affordable energy to good jobs, lower costs for families, a revived industrial base, and the technological edge needed for fields like AI and advanced manufacturing. A national defense built to win depends on a reliable energy system behind it.

Europe is failing to understand this troublesome dynamic. Even though the Russian invasion of Ukraine is nearly four years old, the European Union still spent €21.9 billion on Russian energy last year or €3.2 billion more than the EU gave to Ukraine in aid during the same period. Relying on adversaries for energy is not an option for rational countries.

In a crisis, energy becomes leverage. By expanding U.S. energy exports, the Trump Administration’s strategy strengthens our alliances and limits the ability of adversaries to pressure other nations. When our partners can buy fuel from America, they are less vulnerable to Moscow, Beijing, or Tehran.

Saying Goodbye to “Net Zero Defense”

The second major shift is equally important. The new strategy does something previous documents refused to do: reject the idea that “climate change” and “net zero” should have any place in security planning.

For years, our military was told to treat carbon emissions as a central planning metric. Bases were evaluated on “sustainability” scores while China built coal plants, constructed the world’s largest navy, and locked up mineral supply chains. NATO conferences spent as much time on climate pledges as ammunition stockpiles. Europe’s rush into intermittent energy left it dependent on Russian gas.

The Trump strategy correctly recognizes energy as a tool of power to be utilized, not a moral liability to be minimized at any cost. The first responsibility of national defense is to deter and, if necessary, defeat real adversaries—not manage artificial global temperature targets.

A More Serious View of a More Dangerous World

Rebuilding America’s resource base and abandoning climate ideology is a far more serious view of the world.

This is the language of a country returning to first principles: defend the homeland, protect the economy, preserve freedom of action, and work with allies from a position of strength—not dependence. It validates what America’s energy workforce has understood for years: no nation can defend itself on unreliable energy. You cannot run a navy, power advanced manufacturing, support data infrastructure, or maintain the most capable military on earth with wishful thinking. You certainly cannot counter adversaries who exploit every fossil-fuel advantage while you voluntarily surrender your own.

Our adversaries aren’t confused about their priorities. They are investing in hard power and securing energy supplies while Western governments chased “net zero” targets as if they were a strategy. This new National Security Strategy puts energy, industry, and sovereignty back at the center of defense policy and finally acknowledges that green fantasies are no substitute for steel, fuel, and deterrence.

For the first time in years, we have leadership willing to say what servicemembers, energy workers, and ordinary citizens have always known: a strong America runs on reliable energy, not slogans.

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.