By Sergio Rodriguez Gelfenstein
Until recently, little was known, and even less was said about the Arctic Ocean. It was associated with a compact and impregnable mass of ice near the North Pole, where peaceful people lived their lives in communion with nature and scientists from all over the world who carried out research. All of this has been altered and, what is worse, some global powers have set their sights on the region for military purposes.
Arctic territory is considered to be an area which, measured from the North Pole to the Arctic Circle (latitude 67° north of the Equator), extends over some 20 million square kilometers of sea and land surface, of which 15.5 million correspond to the Arctic Ocean.
The “eternal” ice of the past has begun to disappear following the seemingly unstoppable advance of climate change. This has opened up access to previously unknown mineral resources, while the possibility of establishing maritime traffic along a route that was announced – only a few years ago – as extremely complex for navigation is beginning to emerge.
As for resources, it is worth noting that currently 90% of Russia’s gas production and 60% of its oil production is produced in the Arctic. The region has 60% of Russia’s gas and oil reserves. It is also rich in coal, diamonds, gold, nickel, cobalt, copper, palladium, platinum, zinc and rare earths.
In another area, Arctic shipping greatly shortens the trade route between China and Asia with Europe and offers an alternative to the Suez Canal and the Strait of Malacca, which could be blocked by a US naval force in the event of a global conflict.
Russia considers the Arctic to be an internal waterway, which poses a problem not so much because of its use as a commercial route, but because, in the event of an opening, the United States and NATO could assume that their warships can freely transit through a territory that is under absolute sovereignty of Russia. This has generated controversies within the framework of maritime law, since, protected by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, even countries such as Germany, Japan and South Korea, which carry out intense commercial maritime traffic, claim the right of international passage.
Moscow has made the route accessible thanks to its fleet of 40 icebreakers, including four nuclear-powered ones and a new numbers in planning. It also plans to develop the region as a tourist area and plans to build new cities, ports, airports and develop scientific and information technology centers there.
In the case of China, although it is not an Arctic state, it has made some claims under international law in the region. Within this framework, it claims rights related to scientific research, navigation, overflight, fishing, the laying of submarine cables and pipelines in the high seas and other relevant maritime areas in the Arctic Ocean, and rights to the exploration and exploitation of resources in the area. In an attempt to consolidate the route as an alternative route, in 2012, a Chinese icebreaker made a complete transit through the Arctic to Iceland.
The Arctic region includes sovereign territories of Russia, the United States (Alaska), Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Norway and Iceland. Some of these countries claim part of the territory of this region: the United States (10%), Canada (25%), Denmark (20%), Russia (50%) and Norway (5%).
More recently, US President Donald Trump has set his sights on the region, stating his desire to seize Greenland, the world’s largest island, which is now under Danish colonial rule. Trump has also revealed his desire to seize another important Arctic territory when he said that Canada should join the United States. In doing so, he has put pressure on two of his closest allies, both of whom are NATO partners.
The relevance of the Arctic as a matter of global security is not new, since countries that have territory on its coasts have tried to preserve their presence there, but it has only recently gained unusual prominence, establishing a strategic rivalry never seen before: on the one hand, Russia and China and on the other, the United States and NATO.
The United States has deployed long-range radars in Alaska on the assumption that a conflict in the region could impact other scenarios. According to Christopher Rierson, captain of the US Special Operations Command North, a deliberate absence from the Arctic could affect his country “by disrupting power projection infrastructure, which could compromise the deployment of advanced capabilities in the Indo-Pacific and other scenarios.” For this reason, Washington plans to expand its Thule air base in Greenland, which hosts the US Space Force and a global network of missile warning sensors.
To this extent, the US military presence has been growing rapidly. In February 2023, it held a month-long military exercise Arctic Forge 23, Defense Exercise North and Joint Viking in the Arctic . These little-publicized joint exercises with Finland and Norway were intended to “demonstrate readiness by deploying a combat-credible force to increase NATO’s northern flank,” according to information provided by the U.S. Department of Defense’s European Command. Members of the armed forces of the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland and Norway participated.
In this context, Robert O’Brien, who was National Security Advisor during Donald Trump’s first administration, stated that Greenland is “a highway from the Arctic to North America,” adding that the Arctic “is going to be the critical battlefield of the future because as the climate warms, the Arctic is going to be a route that may even reduce the use of the Panama Canal.” Perhaps this is the common thread between two issues that Trump has given great importance to when fine-tuning his foreign policy priorities.
Russia’s presence in the Arctic is significant, given that its northern border lies on its territory. This has led it to modernize its military bases, improve its submarine fleet and expand its icebreaker fleet like no other country. Russian and Chinese investments in the region have also grown.
In another area, this territory has not been exempted from territorial disputes, not only between countries that possess land or sea spaces over the Arctic and that have claimed sovereignty over parts of it. Others, such as Sweden, Finland and China, which do not have sovereignty, have entered into a controversy that points to the difficult task of defining the limits of the continental shelf and delimiting maritime spaces.
A treaty signed in Paris in 1920 established sovereignty over the region for five countries: Russia, the United States, Denmark, Norway and Canada. But the 1987 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea changed the parameters on which the Paris Treaty is based, which says nothing about the sectoral division of the territory. Russia ratified the Convention in 1997, but the United States has not yet done so.
In 1996, the Arctic Council was established as an intergovernmental forum for discussing issues facing the governments of Arctic countries and representatives of indigenous peoples in the region. In 2022, following the start of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, the seven Western members (Norway, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Sweden and the United States) decided to operate without Russia. This decision eliminated any possibility of cooperation in the area.
The United States has decided to increase its military and diplomatic presence in the region by creating the post of “Ambassador on special mission for the Arctic region” and has also begun developing its Army’s Special Operations Forces for the Arctic.
In particular, the situation of the region’s indigenous peoples must be considered: the Inuit (commonly called Eskimos) who live in Alaska, Greenland and Canada (a total population of 180,000 people) and the Sami who live in other countries (20,000 in Sweden, 50,000 in Norway, 8,000 in Finland and 2,000 in Russia). It seems that any debate on the region ignores the consultation of these people, who are the true owners of the territory.
Both peoples have an organization that goes beyond national states, coordinating actions based on their identity and common interests. The Sami have a council made up of three parliaments representing the indigenous peoples of Sweden, Norway and Finland. The Russian Sami are represented by NGOs but have been divided over their support for the Russian military operation in Ukraine, after those who supported Moscow were excluded from the body.
In geopolitical terms, the recent closeness between Russia and China is a cause for concern for the United States and the West in general. Given that Russia’s northern border occupies more than half of the ocean’s coastline, the alliance with Beijing offers the Asian giant a maritime route for its trade with Europe. On a smaller scale, beyond other consequences, the repercussions for the European economy of the closure of Russian airspace to ships from countries of the Old Continent in retaliation for a similar measure taken by Europe have been seen. A similar decision on maritime routes would cause great economic damage to Europe.
In short, the situation in the Arctic has become highly explosive, especially because of the new US president’s intention to force his way into the region. Following the accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO, Russia must now confront the expansion of this war-mongering organization also in this region, which is crucial for its strategic geopolitical interests.
Ruesch’s two novels, “The Land of Long Shadows” and “Return to the Land of Long Shadows”, seems to have no place in the future. The growing military presence and expansionist ambition of the United States and NATO threaten to upset the balance carefully maintained even during the Cold War. It is to be hoped that common sense (so rare and far removed from the diplomatic scenarios of recent times) will prevail and the Arctic can continue to be a space of harmony for the peoples of the region and for the entire world.