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Now that “Epic Fury” has started and is expanding from the borders of Iran throughout the Middle East, many historians are drawing parallels between this war and the Vietnam War. I lived through the start and end of the Vietnam War, and I’ve been carefully watching this war progress. With that perspective, I decided to share a few observations on the similarities and differences between the two conflicts, along with some lessons learned. However, before doing so, I feel a “full disclosure” statement is in order.

I am a proud veteran who served as an officer in the United States Navy during the early 1970s when the Vietnam War was raging. When I started college, I, like many, initially bought into the government’s “domino theory” that argued U.S. involvement in Vietnam was necessary to stem the advance of communism in Southeast Asia. I was wrong, and I later became convinced that America’s Vietnam War was a tragic mistake, militarily, economically, and in the significant toll it took on human life.

Whether or not I agree with the mission given to our military by the president and commander-in-chief, I always support the brave men and women who serve their country and all those who aid their efforts. I have no doubt that U.S. armed forces and military commanders are the most highly trained, dedicated, and capable in the world. I also strongly believe that veterans, and particularly those who have been wounded physically or mentally, should be honored and taken care of once their active duty has finished.

I was a moderate Republican for most of my adult life. However, I now consider myself an independent, having voted for Republican and Democratic candidates based on their qualifications, not party affiliation. I strongly disagree with much of what Donald Trump does and says, and I believe he poses a “clear and present danger” to the U.S. and the free world. In addition, I’ll once again repeat my assertion that Pete Hegseth is unfit to be Secretary of Defense, and the rest of Trump’s cabinet members are largely unqualified and inept. I also consider Stephen Miller to be perhaps the most dangerous person ever to hold a staff position of power within the White House.

Turning to Iran, I believe the brutally repressive Islamic theocracy led by the Supreme Leader is a threat to peace in the Middle East and that Iran should never be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. That said, I would not have engaged U.S. forces in active combat operations in Iran and would have preferred the U.S. had provided intelligence to Israel and non-lethal air support if Israel chose to go ahead with their bombing campaign that started on February 28, 2026.

I agree with the intelligence assessments that conclude the air strikes that killed Ali Hosseini Khamenei and other Iranian leaders left a leadership void that resulted in Khamenei’s son, an even harder-line cleric, being selected to succeed his father as Supreme Leader. Finally, understanding that regime change in Iran cannot be achieved (if that remains one of Trump’s unclear and continually changing objectives) without “boots on the ground,” I don’t support American troops being deployed for any “in-country” operations of this type.

In my opinion, there are many useful parallels to be found between Trump’s war in Iran and Johnson’s and Nixon’s Vietnam War.

▶︎ None of the administrations provided a truthful statement of why the U.S. must go to war, nor was a comprehensive exit plan and “post-war” governing approach ever articulated for either Vietnam or Iran.

▶︎ The U.S. administrations assumed both conflicts would be “asymmetric” because the U.S. had overwhelming military and air superiority compared to its opponents.

▶︎ Military operations in both cases commenced with an intense aerial campaign (“Operation Rolling Thunder” on March 2, 1965, and “Epic Fury” on February 28, 2026), followed by deploying a Marine expeditionary force to the region (the 9th Marine Brigade then and the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit now).

▶︎ A swift end to the war was projected following those massive bombing campaigns, but it didn’t happen.

▶︎ Whether purposely or inadvertently, many innocent civilians were killed or injured.

▶︎ Each initial conflict theater rapidly expanded to neighboring countries (e.g., Laos and Cambodia in the Vietnam War, and Middle East countries in the Iranian conflict).

▶︎ Both North Vietnam and Iran proved more resilient and resourceful than originally anticipated, and each became committed to a war of attrition, hoping to outlast the U.S. until public opinion forced a negotiated peace deal.

▶︎ As both conflicts continued, public support for U.S. involvement eroded at home and abroad.

▶︎ Each administration withheld or delayed the release of unfavorable battlefield and economic information from the American public.

▶︎ Both wars’ economic costs were high, and the attendant government expenditures could have been better used to address pressing domestic problems.

▶︎ North Vietnam and Iran both received direct or indirect support from Russia, China, and North Korea.

▶︎ In addition, other “proxy” forces supported American adversaries (East Germany, Cuba, and Albania provided equipment, training, and logistical support to North Vietnam, and Hezbollah and the Houthis supplied drones to strike at US/Israel assets).

There are also some key differences between the Vietnam War and Trump’s war in Iran.

▶︎ President Johnson and Nixon were granted broad authority to conduct military operations in Vietnam after Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution; Trump initiated Epic Fury without formal congressional authorization, and the Senate subsequently defeated efforts to use the War Powers Resolution to limit Trump’s authority.

▶︎ Both LBJ and Nixon enjoyed much better job approval ratings and public support when they inherited the Vietnam conflict from their predecessors than did Trump when he started the war in Iran; in fact, Trump had the lowest job approval rating of any president since public opinion polls on this topic were started by Gallup in 1938.

▶︎ While France encouraged U.S. involvement in Vietnam to protect its interests, it had little influence on the final U.S. decision to commence hostilities there; on the contrary, many believe that Israel and Netanyahu were instrumental in convincing Trump to plan for and launch Epic Fury.

▶︎ Iran’s territory is much larger than Vietnam’s and is characterized by mountainous terrain and vast deserts, presenting many more challenges for any ground occupation than the jungles of Vietnam.

▶︎ Going into the war, Iran possessed a greater arsenal of sophisticated weaponry than North Vietnam; unlike North Vietnam, Iran also maintains a mature, domestic arms industry, a sophisticated network of underground missile silos, and deep, reinforced tunnels.

▶︎ At least for now, the Iran war is being largely waged through surgical air strikes, supported by cyber warfare, satellite imagery, and advanced drone technology rather than the deployment of ground troops, use of conventional armament, and guerrilla fighting that characterized the Vietnam War.

▶︎ North Vietnam had little capability to engage in terrorist threats beyond its borders, while Iran and its proxies have significant capabilities in this area.

▶︎ In the early days of the Vietnam conflict, few believed that it would devolve into the quagmire that was eventually experienced; today, many analysts and most of the American public fear that outcome.

▶︎ The Vietnam War had little impact on global energy prices, unlike the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which has significantly spiked up the prices of oil, fertilizer, helium, aluminum, and other critical commodities, possibly triggering a global recession.

The Vietnam War lasted almost 20 years. Although the 1973 Paris Peace Accords removed U.S. combat troops from Vietnam, the war officially ended on April 30, 1975, when North Vietnamese forces finally captured Saigon, leading to the surrender of South Vietnam and the final evacuation of remaining U.S. personnel. Between 1955 and 1975, approximately 58,000 American military personnel died, over 300,000 were wounded, at an estimated cost of about $168 billion (roughly $1.3 trillion in today’s dollars).

Looking back, and with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, the most important lesson to learn — and the biggest mistake the U.S. made — was initially starting and then escalating the war in Vietnam. Recognizing that many other mistakes were made once the Vietnam War was underway, several stand out and are worth noting as lessons learned for future consideration.

▶︎ Senior U.S. leadership from the president on down failed to understand that the North Vietnamese weren’t fighting to spread communism; they were fighting for their independence, and as such, they were willing to keep fighting in the face of major battlefield losses and high casualties.

▶︎ The strength and popular support of the South Vietnamese government were grossly overestimated, and the resolve and resourcefulness of the North Vietnam and Vietcong fighting forces were significantly underestimated, particularly as the war dragged on.

▶︎ The U.S. never won over the “hearts and minds” of the Vietnamese people; the indiscriminate use of chemical weapons (e.g., Agent Orange, Napalm, white phosphorus) and the continued bombing of local villages further alienated the very people the U.S. said they were there to protect and liberate.

▶︎ Slow escalation in the use of significant U.S. firepower failed to cripple the North Vietnamese ability to respond early on, giving them time to regroup and gain confidence that they could eventually win a war of attrition.

▶︎ More specifically, Operation Rolling Thunder failed to cut critical supply lines along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, demonstrating that U.S. military forces were not invincible and helping to unite more of the North Vietnamese population in opposition to the U.S. invaders and their puppet government in the South.

▶︎ U.S. troops weren’t adequately trained in the local customs or counterinsurgency and counter-guerrilla tactics that were necessary to combat the relative advantage the North Vietnamese Army and Vietcong capitalized on to compensate for their shortcomings in waging large-scale combat with American forces.

▶︎ Battlefield and political assessments were either purposefully or inadvertently inaccurate and based on faulty measurements, giving the false impression that the U.S. was rapidly winning the war when the opposite was true.

▶︎ Misleading, inaccurate, or unequivocally false information reported to the American public by the Johnson and Nixon administrations eroded support, sparked protests, increased distrust, and ultimately made the war politically untenable.

▶︎ As the hostilities progressed, both administrations, and particularly the Nixon administration, failed to recognize that the war could not be won on the battlefield and would need a negotiated settlement.

Let’s hope that the lessons learned in Vietnam, and subsequently during the first 2-year Gulf War in 1990, the 20-year War in Afghanistan, the 8-year Iraq War, and all the other armed conflicts in between, help guide the Trump administration’s future decisions in Iran and the Middle East. They would be well advised to remember the famous quote from George Santayana in his 1905 book, The Life of Reason: Reason in Common Sense, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Will that happen?

Don’t hold your breath, because only time will tell if rising gas prices, other bad economic news, a further drop in his job approval ratings, additional loss of Republican support, rising concerns about the midterm elections, strengthened Iranian resolve to “wait him out,” and more unfavorable developments force Trump to declare victory and retreat from or modify his original objectives, as ill-defined as they were.

In the meantime, Trump risks losing control of his war in Iran because it will become increasingly clear that he badly miscalculated Iran’s resolve and aggressive reactions to the most recent U.S. and Israeli hostilities. The “feeling in his bones” that the war he started at the end of February would end soon was erroneously based on Iran’s limited reaction to the June 21, 2025, “Operation Midnight Hammer,” when B-2 stealth bombers and over 125 aircraft dropped bunker-busting bombs on facilities in Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan, and the short duration of “Operation Absolute Resolve” on January 3, 2026, when U.S. forces captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife.

As the war rages on, expect Trump and his surrogates to continue their attacks on the free press and to intensify threats against reporters and news outlets that accurately report unfavorable news on the war in Iran and other topics. And although Trump neither consulted with nor asked for support from NATO and other allies before he launched Operation Epic Fury, look for him to threaten allies with reprisals if they don’t send warships to help open the Strait of Hormuz and provide other tactical support. And when NATO countries understandably balk at Trump’s request, he’ll likely threaten to pull the U.S. out of NATO, which he can’t do unilaterally without a 2/3rds Senate vote or an act of Congress, or he’ll reverse course and say he doesn’t need their help anyway.

Finally, in light of Trump’s “cozy” relationship with Vladimir Putin, and recognizing that Putin was the big winner when Trump lifted the U.S. oil embargo that the G7 countries imposed on Russia when it invaded Ukraine in 2022, don’t bank on the Trump administration punishing Russia for providing Iran with drone components, satelite imagery, and other vital information regarding U.S. force deployment in the Middle East.

(Sources: Medium)

An important environmental story from China, synthesised from local and international media, March 28, 2026

The central government will reward five city clusters (as yet unselected) with up to CNY 1.6 billion (USD 232 million) each for reaching hydrogen targets like bringing down the price per kg to CNY 25.

The incentive is part of a four-year hydrogen pilot programme launched by three government ministries on 16 March.

Most hydrogen in China is used in oil refining, ammonia production and methanol, with transport accounting for only a minor share, according to the National Energy Administration. 

While previous hydrogen policy focused on transport, the pilot programme reflects real demand by considering a broader range of applications. It invites city clusters to set out plans across transport (such as hydrogen fuel cells), industrial applications (like green ammonia and hydrogen-based steelmaking), as well as emerging areas (including shipping, aviation and mining).

China’s hydrogen sector is approaching a “tipping point” for large-scale deployment, but still struggles to scale commercially and needs national-level support, stated an official from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

The country has already built the world’s largest hydrogen-vehicle system, with nearly 40,000 fuel-cell vehicles and 574 refuelling stations by the end of 2025, according to Xinhua News. The new programme sets a target of 100,000 fuel-cell vehicles by 2030.

However, the sector is heavily dependent on subsidies. In Foshan, Guangdong province, use of hydrogen buses was suspended after local subsidies expired, as refuelling costs were too high, Yicai reported earlier this year.

Lowering costs is a central goal of the new programme. It sets a target of cutting end-user hydrogen prices from CNY 35-50 (USD 4.80-6.90) per kg to below CNY 25 (USD 3.50) by 2030. In advantageous regions with high renewable energy potential, the target is CNY 15 (USD 2.10).

The programme also stresses the need for a genuinely low-carbon supply chain. It bans coal-based ammonia or methanol projects from being labelled “green” and encourages hydrogen production linked directly to renewable power, including off-grid wind and solar projects.

The programme echoes China’s 2026 government work report, released on 13 March, which identifies hydrogen and green fuels as future growth industries, alongside the imminent creation of a national low-carbon transition fund.

As well as decarbonisation, energy security is another key reason for the hydrogen push. The crisis around the Strait of Hormuz is affecting global energy supplies, shipping costs and food prices, highlighting the need for energy autonomy and supply diversification, Lu Chenyu, secretary general of the Zhongguancun Hydrogen Energy and Fuel Cell Technology Innovation Industry Alliance, told Beijing News.

“As a renewable energy source, hydrogen is expected to accelerate the replacement of traditional oil and gas to meet the needs of energy security and carbon reduction. Furthermore, its derivative ammonia industry chain can provide new supply routes for fertiliser production," he said.

(Sources: Dialogue Earth)

Trusted journalism is increasingly vital as the energy transition becomes a defining geopolitical arena, our CEO discovered at a Sustainable Markets Initiative meeting. 

By Marek Pruszewicz, March 24, 2026

It's a huge problem, a real and present threat.”

That was former US secretary of state John Kerry’s answer when I asked him last week about the shrinking space for trusted, fact-based climate reporting.

We were talking at the Sustainable Markets Initiative event in London’s Hampton Court Palace. The line stayed with me, not least because of where I was hearing it: in a Tudor setting, amid an extraordinary concentration of capital and influence.

As I walked through the gates of what was once King Henry VIII’s palace, I found myself thinking about the many gatherings of power it must have seen over the centuries. And I couldn’t help but wonder if any had matched the array of influence, and wealth, that had collected under the aegis of an organisation run by Henry’s great nephew nine times removed, King Charles III. Monarchy may no longer be absolute, but it certainly still has convening power.

In this case, the stated theory of change behind the initiative is clear enough: bring together business, finance and governments to help unlock the trillions needed for a greener future.

But what really struck me, seeing it at close quarters, was not just the scale of the gathering but the certainty of the mood.

The palace was filled with more than 200 global CEOs. In the first session I attended, three senior figures from the nuclear industry were making the case for nuclear as part of a carbon-free portfolio. Googling quickly I found that they likely represented, conservatively, around USD 100 billion of capital between them.

The message repeated, again and again, was that the transition to a clean, profitable future is no longer a matter of aspiration. For many in the room, it is already strategic and commercial fact.

That is what made Secretary Kerry’s warning about climate journalism so striking. Because we are living in an increasingly fractured world: geopolitically, economically, informationally. Public space for reasoned, fact-based reporting is shrinking. Think of the cuts at the Washington Post including most of its award-winning climate team, or the closure of Thomson Reuters Foundation’s Context Newsroom as two examples. And this contraction is occurring just as climate becomes more deeply entangled with war, trade, industrial policy and great-power rivalry.

A few minutes after the session from the nuclear executives, Secretary Kerry made a point that’s been heard often over these past few tumultuous months but bears repetition. The war in the Gulf could accelerate the clean energy transition. “There is no security if you are dependent on the Strait of Hormuz,” he said. “You need energy independence.”

The argument was clearly resonating. Repeatedly, fossil fuel dependence was described not just as an environmental liability, but as a strategic vulnerability. Renewable energy, by contrast, was framed as resilience: a route to sovereignty, stability and long-term economic advantage.

“We stand here at a point of very considerable opportunity; we have a breakdown in an order which has had its day… I see fossil fuels as a weapon of war. Renewable energy is a weapon of peace.” That quote came not from a Green politician, but from Andrew Forrest, founder and executive chair of Australian mining giant, Fortescue.

The geopolitics of the transition were visible in another way too: the prominence of China.

There were two panels dedicated to green partnerships with China. Forrest spoke about Fortescue’s agreement with Chinese steel group Tisco on green steel technology. Chinese participants, led by Ren Hongbin of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, stressed China’s role as a partner in global sustainability.

In a conversation with me, Kerry put it clearly and succinctly: “Climate is a universal issue and everyone in the world has an interest in what the two largest economies and the two largest emitters are doing, not to mention the dominant country in clean energy.”

For all the confidence in the room, the real test of this transition will not be whether it can command applause at elite gatherings, but whether capital, technology and political attention flow to parts of the world where the stakes are highest. That means the Global South: where climate vulnerability is greatest, energy demand is rising, and where a “just transition” will mean very little if finance remains slow, conditional or out of reach.

There was also a conspicuous absence at the gathering. There were very few business figures from the United States in attendance, and no political representation that I could see. Given Washington’s current direction, that absence was understandable. What was more interesting was how little it seemed to trouble the people present.

The prevailing view appeared to be that the transition would move forward anyway – that capital, industry and geopolitical necessity are already pushing it on.

Let’s hope so. But that is precisely why Kerry’s first warning matters so much.

If the sustainable transition is becoming a defining arena of economic and geopolitical power, then the need for trusted journalism only grows. We need reporting that can do more than cheerlead: reporting that can explain, scrutinise, humanise and connect the dots in a world where climate is no longer a siloed issue, but bound up with security, trade and power.

At Hampton Court, I saw plenty of confidence that the transition is coming. I left thinking just as much about who will explain it honestly to the wider world.

The ultra-high-voltage technology is ready, but policy and planning need to catch up, write three energy experts. 

By Yu Aiqun, Huang Ye, Christine Shearer, March 25, 2026

China’s network of ultra-high-voltage (UHV) transmission lines is often described as a pillar of the country’s clean-energy transition. With relatively low losses, it can move power thousands of kilometres, from renewable energy megabases in the country’s north and west, to demand hotspots along the populous eastern seaboard.

But much of the electricity it carries still comes from coal. A system widely seen as essential for delivering clean power, now risks locking in fossil fuel.

With China set to invest roughly RMB 5 trillion yuan (over USD 700 billion) in its power grid by 2030, the next five years are a critical window to raise the renewable share on these UHV lines. The technology to do so exists – from storage to more flexible grid configurations – but the outcome will depend on whether policy frameworks in China shift to support its deployment.

Built for distance, not decarbonisation

No country has deployed UHV technology on a comparable scale to China. According to our research at Global Energy Monitor, by the end of 2025, the country had commissioned 45 UHV lines, totalling 52,300 km and with a transmission capacity of about 300 gigawatts (GW). This accounts for over 70% of China’s inter-regional and inter-provincial power-transmission capacity.

The huge scale of UHV development reflects China’s geography as much as its climate ambitions. Energy resources are concentrated in the north and west, while electricity demand is highest in the east and south. UHV has therefore become the backbone of China’s long-standing “west-to-east power transmission” strategy.

But China’s UHV system was not originally designed for wind and solar. Early projects were built mainly to transmit hydropower, with a small share of coal. Both of these sources offer stable, high-output electricity well suited for transferring large amounts of electricity over long distances.

A major shift came in 2014, when severe air pollution in northern cities prompted the government to plan 12 “air pollution control transmission corridors”. The strategy sought to reduce coal-fired power generation in eastern regions by relying on electricity imports from the west.

Nine of these corridors were built as UHV projects and eight of those were designed to transmit coal-fired electricity. According to our Global Coal Plant Tracker, between 2016 and 2019, they were commissioned alongside nearly 50 GW of new supportive coal capacity, more than a quarter of China’s coal additions during that period.

The UHVs did help shift pollution away from cities in the east, but they also locked coal into long-distance power flows. Even today, wind and solar account for only around one-fifth of electricity transmitted through UHV lines – a share that has barely increased since 2021, despite the rapid growth of renewables nationwide.

Under China’s 14th Five Year Plan, for 2021-2025, new UHV corridors were required to carry at least 50% renewable electricity. That represented significant progress from the current average of 21%, yet it means new corridors still could remain heavily backed by coal. Planned electricity output is often split evenly between fossil and renewable sources, making it difficult for renewables to dominate the transmitted power.

Policy and market need to accommodate renewables

Long-distance UHV power transmission typically involves sending regions, receiving regions and transmission operators that often belong to more than one power grid. Adding more wind and solar power necessitates increasingly complex coordination, including flexibility on both ends of the grid, “demand-side response” and greater use of power markets to trade electricity across regions and balance supply and demand in real time.

The higher the share of renewables, the more difficult and costly system dispatch, grid management and cross-regional coordination become.

By contrast, transmitting coal power remains a familiar and simple solution, easing grid operators’ accountability burden of operational safety, supply security and price affordability.

The Qing-Yu UHVDC line highlights these complexities. Commissioned in 2020, it was the world’s first UHV corridor designed to transmit 100% renewable electricity, from Qinghai to Henan. Yet it has never delivered more than half of its designed annual transmission volume of 41.2 terawatt-hours.

Pricing in Henan – which is based on subsidised local coal power, including “capacity payments” plus a fixed transmission tariff – systematically disadvantages renewable power delivered through the line.

Meanwhile, local flexibility resources are dominated by coal units, which struggle to absorb variable renewable output, limiting Qing-Yu’s potential to deliver more.

Technology is not the real constraint

From a technical perspective, this reliance on coal is not inevitable. High shares of renewables can create stability challenges for UHV systems, especially at the sending end, where local grids are weak. But coal is only one way to stabilise volatility and support the grid.

Alternatives such as pumped-storage hydropower, battery storage and concentrated solar power (CSP) with thermal storage can provide flexibility with minimal emissions. CSP plants usually use molten salt to store heat from concentrated sunlight, can ramp output faster than coal and provide stable generation after sunset.

The Lu-Gu UHVDC line linking eastern Inner Mongolia to Shandong shows what is possible by strengthening the AC grid at the sending end. Commissioned in 2017, the line does not rely on dedicated coal plants. Instead, it draws support from the wider north-east grid, allowing the flexible dispatch of thermal, hydro and renewable sources. In 2024, wind and solar supplied nearly 59% of the electricity transmitted, making Lu-Gu the only UHVDC corridor in China that achieves both high transmission volumes and a high share of wind and solar.

Beyond strengthening local grids, voltage-source converter (VSC) HVDC technology offers another approach. VSC-HVDC can operate without strong AC grid support and respond to power fluctuations in milliseconds. Unlike conventional UHVDC systems, which rely on robust local grid support, VSC-HVDC enables large-scale transmission and high levels of wind and solar integration.

China has already demonstrated this potential. The Zhangbei ±500 VSC project supplied the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics with 100% renewable electricity. Yet some newer UHV projects with VSC technology – for example, the Gansu–Zhejiang UHV-DC project currently under construction – continue to add large amounts of coal capacity, reflecting planning choices rather than technical necessity.

Unlocking renewable potential in China’s UHV grid

By 2030, China’s wind and solar megabases are expected to reach around 455 GW, equivalent to the total utility-scale wind and solar installation capacity across the Americas as of February 2026. Of this capacity, 315 GW is planned to be transmitted to the east through UHV transmission. Under current planning assumptions, delivering that electricity would require 104 GW of additional coal capacity at the sending end, 8% of China’s current operating coal capacity, effectively making renewables a driver of new coal construction.

On the receiving end, provinces importing large volumes of electricity continue to approve new coal plants to strengthen the regional grid and balance variability associated with imported electricity. An analysis published in November 2025 by Xue Xiaokang, a Green Finance campaigner at Greenpeace East Asia, describes this dynamic as “dual coal lock-in”: coal expansion at both the sending and receiving ends of UHV transmission, driven by risk-averse planning rather than system-wide optimisation.

China plans to add 15 new UHVDC lines, bringing total operating transmission capacity to over 420 GW by 2030. As wind and solar capacity soars, UHV transmission needs to become greener, allowing fewer UHV lines to carry more renewable energy. The technology exists. What’s needed now is a decisive shift in priorities across technology, policy and market. Done right, UHV can help phase out coal rather than lock it in, and play a pivotal role in China’s energy transition and climate goals.

Chinese environmental films trying to bring viewers closer to nature are struggling to win the attention game. 

By Jiang Mengnan, March 18, 2026

Last year, a short play in a Chinese variety show sparked debate. The Sheep Comes! seemed to be an absurdist sketch with talking animals firing off one-liners and rapid retorts. But it reached into more serious themes, including animals’ changed behaviour in nature reserves and how humanity and wildlife relate to each other.

This is not something commonly seen in China. Art with nature-related themes abound, but film and performance pieces exploring environmental topics are rare. All you’ll find on the subject in mainstream channels are official news reports and analysis of the “dual carbon” goals. The situation is different overseas. Last year, a play about the 1997 Kyoto climate talks ran in London’s West End. In 2023, a production depicting reflections and anxieties about the climate crisis debuted in Australia, with a Singapore adaptation.

Some people are trying to fill this gap, including Ding Dawei, who founded the Beijing International Short Film Festival (BISFF) in 2017. The festival includes environmentally themed works in its programming, and has since 2023 maintained a dedicated environmental section, hoping to attract new audiences with films responding to the times.

Dialogue Earth interviewed Ding, as well as Wang Jue, a public and culture campaign specialist at Greenpeace’s Beijing office, to find out about the role film is playing in communicating climate and environmental issues in China.

What’s right vs what’s easy

In 2025, there were 23 films shown under BISFF’s environmental section, “Future Ethics”. One story, My Name is Oil, is told in the voice of an offshore drilling rig. Another is about a woman who leaves the city to spend time with a tree, and writes a journal documenting it. A film about traditional willow weaving, shot on Super 8, explores how crafts rely on natural materials.

“A wide variety of people came to watch the environmental films, including young people from big internet firms and older retirees,” Ding notes. He chose the films based on a gap he had noticed. Over the past ten years, films coming out of Europe and the US were focusing more and more on the changes the Earth is going through, as well as ecosystem relationships and silence on climate issues. An increasing number of works were re-examining how people and nature relate, but these themes were still considered niche in China.

Ding thinks people are realising the importance of protecting the environment but finding it hard to act in their already busy lives. “Everyone knows excessive packaging is a form of waste, but when you’re rushed, takeaway food wrapped up in plastic bags and boxes remains the easiest option.”

He says that disconnect comes down to a lack of real-life experience. “You need to go touch a tree. Feel a cow’s breath, feel its heartbeat. Only when you have that lived experience, rather than just ideals, will your thinking change.” Films can come closer to providing that lived experience.

The festival team prepared some “climate postcards” to get attendees to stop and think. The question on the most popular postcard, the one which brought the biggest response, was: “Does picking up a camera and filming nature mean you have changed nature?” Feedback received by the BISFF team discussed in detail the conflict between the “eternity of film” and “the limited Earth”.

In search of micro-narratives

A line in a famous Chinese road comedy film goes: “I’ve heard all the advice and I still can’t live right.” Chinese audiences have a similar attitude to nature and climate topics. BISFF used a popular online joke as the title of one of its social media posts: “Never mind zero carbon, I’m struggling to get to zero stress.”

Ding said that too much of the discussion around environmental topics is confined to professional circles: “The public know how important it is, but they struggle to access those circles and can’t participate in the debate or the action.”

This year’s BISFF is being held in partnership with Greenpeace’s Beijing office. Wang Jue of Greenpeace told Dialogue Earth she thinks narratives that focus on life instead of national policy are vital to reduce people’s sense of alienation from environmental topics. “Climate change is often seen as something political and technical, happening over long timescales in faraway places. People feel it has nothing to do with them. By focusing on specific stories and details, films can create direct links between the topic and people’s lives and cultural identities.”

One example is The Tigress of Manchuria, from Chinese director Huang Jiayi. The film connects the lives and cultures of the people of the north-east with the local tiger population as it retraces the route of a Russian author in exile.

Wang also points out that in the past, short environmental films tended to hold up examples to be followed. But a heroic tale of someone spending decades planting trees or saving wildlife only has brief motivational value. They create concern but no action, as audiences quickly return to their – very different – day-to-day lives. Film should reflect the complexities of reality, with ordinary people telling relatable stories to create empathy and longer lasting conversations, Wang says.

She also mentions some more down-to-earth climate content that Chinese audiences have taken to: global warming’s impact on the prices of coffee and lemons, and how it extends the pollen season; the impact of the shifting seasons on agriculture; the dangers delivery riders face working during extreme weather events; and the damage humidity causes to cultural heritage sites.

The fight for attention

When it comes to mass audiences, the climate still has to fight it out with other economic and cultural issues.

Open a social media app or site and you’ll find pages filled with posts about luxury lifestyles and adverts for all kinds of products, telling stories of how to be a better you. Those might bring momentary intrigue, but they also increase the longing for a life that is faster and more optimised – and, accordingly, more anxiety-filled.

Asked how to combat that type of excessive consumption, Wang says people need to draw energy from nature and choose a simpler and more environmentally friendly lifestyle. That energy can also come from short films: one of those showing at BISFF, Fabulous Cow Ladies, chronicles three generations of cows being tenderly cared for by three women vets. “From nature we can draw simpler, more basic experiences.”

But the dazzling array of information we are presented with in our daily lives makes it harder for us to make our own choices. Getting away from the screen and into nature is no easy task for most.

Looking for discussion on the BISFF environmental section on social media is also disappointing – there is barely any. One audience member told Dialogue Earth: “I was really interested in the environmental section, but I missed it. I hope to catch it next time.” That person, along with others who posted online, were more interested in films in the feminist and international competition sections.

The festival reflects real life: when there are so many pressing issues to worry about, the climate and nature are always told to wait their turn.