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Ian Explains: Alaska is not just a state, it's a geopolitical outpost
Amid Russia's growing territorial aggression and a fast-warming Arctic, Alaska's physical place in the world has become more geopolitically relevant than ever. Alaska's northern coastline makes the US one of six countries with exclusive economic zones in the Arctic Circle. And while no country owns the North Pole—it isn't even land—it is constantly shifting sea ice, which is going to melt. But as that happens, the Arctic is opening up, and countries are now racing to lay claim to untapped deposits of oil, natural gas, and rare earth minerals, newly accessible shipping routes, and strategic military positions between North America and Eurasia.
Russia is winning by most metrics. The Russian government has more than three dozen polar icebreakers in its fleet, compared to two, not two dozen, two in the United States, giving it a strategic and operational advantage. Russia accounts for nearly half the Arctic population, more than half its coastline, and the Arctic industry. Moscow has spent years building up military outposts in the region as polar ice melts and its northern waters become exposed.
Russia's also increasing cooperation in the region with China, which sees the Arctic as an important part of its strategic economic and environmental interests. China is believed to be exploring a military presence there. NATO countries suspended political-level meetings with Moscow, and all international research projects have been put on hold. Until Arctic states can find a way to work together, rising tensions and a zero-sum game of territorial ambition will give the most remote part of the planet a lot more of our attention.
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DOD in Photos: 2020 This collection showcases the work of U.S. military photographers in 2020, when U.S. service members continued to conduct around-the-clock training and operations worldwide to ensure the nation's security, even while responding to the coronavirus pandemic. The USS Toledo (SSN-769) arrives at Ice Camp Seadragon on the Arctic Ocean kicking off Ice Exercise (ICEX) 2020. ICEX 2020 is a three-week, biennial exercise that offers the Navy the opportunity to assess its operational readiness in the Arctic and train with other services, partner nations and Allies to increase experience in the region, and maintain regional stability while improving capabilities to operate in the Arctic environment. U.S. Navy Photo by MC1 Michael B. Zingaro Where: United States When: 04 Mar 2020
US adopts a new Arctic strategy
Climate change is already reshaping US and Canadian defense policy. Melting Arctic ice raises the chances of natural disaster, and it’s also leading to an increased military presence in the north — from the US and Canada, but also Russia and China.
In response, the Pentagon has adopted an Arctic strategy that includes working with allies like Canada on interoperability while building defense capacity in the north. It includes new surveillance, reconnaissance, and communications in the region as well as training in the area.
This comes on the heels of the US signing the ICE Pact – an Arctic cooperation plan with Canada and Finland that includes an emphasis on building icebreakers. It also accompanies a Canadian security push that includes more spending on defense and a push to hit NATO’s 2% of GDP target in the next decade.
Canada recently bought a hangar in the Arctic next to a NORAD airbase after months of US urging, just as China and Russia were expressing interest in the property.
The flurry of Arctic defense news isn’t likely to diminish. In fact, on Wednesday night, Sen. Lisa Murkowskishared that she was briefed by Pentagon officials on Russian and Chinese bombers that were intercepted in Alaska’s air defense identification zone. She thanked the US-Canada integrated response and called the move by Russia and China an “unprecedented provocation by our adversaries.”
Arctic powers have been fighting over the region for years; as ice melts and shipping routes and potential defense vulnerabilities open, countries will be watching the region closely and angling for dominance.
A Canadian flag is pictured on Frobisher Bay in Iqaluit, Nunavut February 23, 2012.
Canada flexes a little Arctic muscle
Amid criticism that it is not spending enough on defense, Canada has bought a hangar in the Arctic for CA$8.6 million – an installation that sits next to a NORAD air base.
Russia and China both reportedly expressed interest in the property, which the Canadian Armed Forces had previously leased. The United States pressed Canada to buy up the hangar for more than a year – and Ottawa finally decided they were on to something.
In 2023, Canada’s intelligence agency, CSIS, warned that China was looking to purchase properties near sensitive locations, spurring espionage concerns. In recent months, Canada has adopted a new defense policy that invests in northern security, as it looks to shore up its Arctic capacities in light of threats from China and Russia, something the US has been pushing for.
The Arctic security push will include attempts to boost armed forces personnel numbers, installing maritime sensors, building operational support hubs in the north, and purchasing new helicopters, airborne early warning aircraft, and, most notably, as many as 12 new under-ice submarines.
On Thursday, the US, Canada, and Finland announced an “Icebreaker Collaboration Effort,” to be known as the ICE Pact, which will focus on Arctic security and economic cooperation and include an emphasis on building icebreakers.
Alongside the ICE Pact and a brand new plan to reach NATO’s military spending target of 2% of GDP, Canada’s evolving – that is, growing – Arctic and general defense plan may begin to quell ally criticisms that the country doesn’t take defense seriously. The efforts may even help prepare it for a second Trump administration, as the former president takes aim at countries, including Canada, that he sees as military alliance freeloaders.
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Putin-Xi “friendship” threatens Arctic
A new report quoted in the Globe and Mail suggests how Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping’s “friendship without limits” is progressing: Russia is giving very generously in exchange for China buying its oil.
The report by Strider Technologies says China is gaining a major foothold in the Arctic as Russia shifts its defense priorities to the war in Ukraine. Since Putin’s invasion, 234 Chinese-owned companies have registered to operate in the Russian-controlled Arctic, Strider said, an 87% increase on the two years prior. Besides resource exploitation and investment aimed at developing Russia’s Northern Sea shipping route, the two have been deepening security ties in the form of joint exercises in the Bering Sea.
A report by Canada’s Senate Committee on national security, defense, and veterans’ affairs last year noted the worrying implications of increased collaboration in the Arctic by Russia and China.
Canada has committed to spending $38.6 billion over 20 years to modernizing the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, including investing in new over-the-horizon radar installations, and infrastructure to house the 88 F-35 Lightning fighter jets it has on order from the US.
In the first of its 23 recommendations, the committee called on the government to include an Arctic section in its imminent defense policy statement that recognizes the situation in the North is deteriorating and offers a plan to deal “on an expeditious basis” with threats that could enter North America through the Arctic.
Graphic Truth: Russia's icebreaker fleet dwarfs US & Canada
When you think of an island nation, what comes to mind? Maybe the vast archipelagoes of Indonesia and the Philippines? Or Japan, which discovered over 6,000 more islands in its territory this year thanks to advancements in satellite cartography?
Probably not Canada, right? Well, the fact is with over 52,000 islands, Canada has more than three times as many as any of the above countries. What’s more, three of the 10 largest islands on earth are found in Canada’s arctic archipelago, which results in Canada having – by far – the longest national coastline in the world.
The problem, of course, is that more than 70% of that coastline borders the icy waters of the Arctic, rendering it inaccessible much of the year. Or at least it used to be inaccessible. Climate change is steadily opening more of the northern waters to navigation in warmer months, but the use of icebreakers is still crucial to navigation.
And there’s the strategic rub. Canada and the United States have between them fewer than 20 active icebreakers, both public and privately owned, while on the other side of the North Pole, Russia can field more than 50.
Ottawa and Washington aren’t ignorant of the imbalance. The US Coast Guard is trying to replace its aging squadron of icebreaking cutters, but delays and inexperience on the part of US manufacturers in the specialized engineering required have delayed the first ship’s delivery to 2027. The Canadian navy is faring somewhat better: The HMCS Harry DeWolf was launched in 2018 as the lead model of six planned icebreaking patrol ships, all of which are already either in service or under construction.A NASA satellite image from September 16, 2007 and released on September 21, 2007, shows Arctic summer sea ice. Arctic sea ice melted to its lowest level ever this week, shattering a record set in 2005 and continuing a trend spurred by human-caused global warming, scientists said on September 20, 2007.
Rising temps and tensions in the Arctic
As leaders convene in Reykjavik, Iceland, for the Arctic Circle Assembly, geopolitical tensions are rising as fast as the Arctic’s sea level.
Historically, Arctic diplomacy has been shielded from external matters. But melting sea ice is opening up new military, trade, and extraction opportunities up north, pitting NATO Arctic countries against China and Russia, which have been proactively showing dominance in the region.
China’s Arctic presence is focused on resource extraction and faster shipping routes to Europe. It has teamed up with Russia, which chairs the Arctic Coast Guard and has begun operating joint military vessels off the coast of Alaska.
Canada and the US have been criticized for underinvesting in Arctic security, but NATO’s presence in the region is strong. Finland recently joined NATO and Sweden is close behind, making seven of the eight Arctic countries NATO members.
Since invading Ukraine, Russia has been withdrawing from intergovernmental bodies in the Arctic, including the Nuclear Arctic Safety Program and the Barent Euro-Arctic Council. Representatives at this week's meeting are expected to decide the future of the most important Arctic institution, the Arctic Council. The US has pushed to reintegrate Russia into the forum, but other NATO members have been unwilling to include Russia in since its invasion.
Representatives from China will be in attendance, but Russia will be absent, raising practical questions about what Arctic forums can achieve without the largest geographical stakeholder.
Other items on the assembly’s agenda include environmental preservation, mineral extraction, and expanding food production as temperatures rise – eliminating traditional food sources but making agriculture more feasible.
line graph of shipping volume through the arctic
The Graphic Truth: Shipping volume through the Russian Arctic
Climate change has opened Arctic shipping channels that can be navigated by freighters without icebreakers for several months a year – and year-round with icebreakers. Canada and Russia dominate the region, but Moscow is much more aggressively exploiting the economic opportunities there.
Taking the high-latitude route over Russia can shave 5,600 miles off a voyage from Europe to China, and as sea ice melt accelerates, the economic viability grows. Total shipping volumes along the Arctic route rose steadily between 2019 and 2020, and immediately after Russia invaded Ukraine, despite the frigid March conditions, the Arctic corridor saw its highest-ever volume of shipping in 2022.
Canada and the United States, meanwhile, have faced criticism for underinvestment in Arctic security. Canada, for example, lacks sufficient early warning systems to detect missile attacks coming over the North Pole — which is dangerous, given that the Arctic is essentially split between Russia and NATO countries.
We look at trade passing through the Russian Arctic corridor above.
Russia's Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu inspects remote Arctic garrisons.
Northern exposure
Russia’s been nothing if not provocative this week – from Putin’s virtual BRICS address and the fiery death of Yvegeny Prigozhin to showboating in the polar region. Scientists this week stretched a 1,400-square-metre Russian flag on the Arctic ice to mark Russia’s Flag Day.
The Arctic University of Norway Professor Gunhild Hoogensen Gjørv told The Barents Observer that the move was a provocation: “They are not just raising a flag. It’s a massive flag. It’s a sign of dominance. And I suspect it’s a sign of defiance,” she said, noting how Russia likely feels emboldened to flex its muscle while the work of the Arctic Council is halted, owing to the war in Ukraine.
“The flag is a signal to indicate that they are still big boys on the block,” she added.
The stunt is a reminder of the important work the eight Arctic nations do to coordinate and cooperate on their work in the region via the council, which focuses on climate change, shipping, Indigenous rights, and other trans-Arctic issues. But Russia’s northerly neighbors are increasingly worried about a military threat. The group has been on hiatus since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but Washington recently signaled that it wants to continue cooperation with Russia on technical issues in the Arctic.
Since the invasion of Ukraine, the Nordic countries have put a new emphasis on northern defense. Finland joined NATO, and Sweden is trying to follow suit while the Swedes, Norwegians, Finns, and Danes are working to link their air forces.
What has changed in the climate? Scientists now believe the first ice-free summer may arrive in the Arctic in the 2030s. As polar ice recedes, the Arctic Ocean is increasingly being eyed as a shipping route. Case in point: In March, Russia announced plans to cooperate with China on shipping in Russia’s northern waters. The routes are not necessarily reliable, however, as two Russian crude tankers en route to China have been delayed by thicker-than-expected ice in recent days.
Still, since military vessels can go wherever commercial ones can, the increased thawing and commercial activity in the Arctic, especially by Russia, is raising security concerns for Arctic nations.