Arctic Security

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization will be celebrating its 75th birthday in 2024 and its role is more relevant than ever. NATO has a vested interest in the Arctic through its members: Denmark, Iceland, and Norway are three of the eleven founding members of NATO. They have a special arrangement: no permanent military bases, no nuclear warheads, and no uninvited military exercises in their territories. The USAF Thule airbase in Greenland is an exception allowed by Denmark. Finland and Sweden applied for full NATO membership following Russia's invasion of Ukraine earlier this year. Twenty-eight of thirty NATO members have ratified their applications, while Turkey and Hungary have complicated and delayed the process for domestic political reasons. Last week the new Chair of the NATO Military Committee, Admiral Bauer of the Netherlands , was in Iceland for the Arctic Circle Assembly . While there he pointed out that when Finland and Sweden finish their application process, all Arct...

The Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada is a great resource on that nation's relationships and objectives in the region. One of the issue areas they track is Strategic Asia , and they occasionally check in on Arctic issues as they did in 2018 with a four-part series on China's Polar Silk Road . The author of that series, Sebastian Murdoch-Gibson, also did a 2018 write-up of China's interest in Russia's Yamal LNG plant. Earlier this year the Foundation published A Canadian Arctic Policy for the Indo-Pacific , a hefty eighty-six page report that is required reading on the topic. The report is constructed in three parts: historical perspective, individual nation profiles, and recommendations. The nation profiles are for Japan, South Korea, China, and Singapore. Each has the same format, also in three parts, treating the nation's priorities, engagement approach, and actors. The last section for each nation, on actors, is particularly useful. It is divided into governmen...

The National Security Strategy is a report mandated by Section 603 of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986 ( Public Law 99-433 ). The report is due every four years, but in reality the deadline is treated in a somewhat elastic manner. Previous reports were released in 1987-88, 1990-91, 1993-2000, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2015, and 2017. President Biden released an interim guidance  document in 2021, and on October 12 he released his 2022 National Security Strategy - brief  fact sheet here - which is already receiving  mixed reviews . It should be noted that mixed reviews are essentially all it ever gets, and about the best you can hope for in today's political environment. Within its forty-eight pages the Arctic gets an honorable mention in a section titled, "Maintain a Peaceful Arctic," that reads in its entirety: The United States seeks an Arctic region that is peaceful, stable, prosperous, and cooperative. Climate change is making the Arct...

Updated with announcement of 2022 National Strategy for the Arctic Region.  During the Obama and Trump administrations there was concern in some quarters about a stagnation of US Arctic policy , even as other nations were stepping up their interest and activities in the region - including a doubling in 2013 of the number of Arctic Council observer states  that included China. Fast-forward just a few years and the situation has changed rapidly, beginning with the 2019 release of the Department of Defense Arctic Strategy and the subsequent releases in 2020 and 2021 of Arctic strategies for the Coast Guard, Army, Navy, Air Force, and the Department of Homeland Security. President Biden's August 2022 announcement that an Arctic ambassador will be appointed, followed by his October release of an updated National Strategy for the Arctic Region , leave no doubt that Arctic security policy is front and center for some time to come. A visual representation of key documents and events...

Hot of the press, the White House has released its 2022 National Strategy for the Arctic Region. The fifteen-page strategy outlines four pillars: Security Climate Change and Environmental Protection Sustainable Economic Development International Cooperation and Governance Work on the pillars will be guided by five principles Consult, Coordinate, and Co-Manage with Alaska Native Tribes and Communities Deepen Relationships with Allies and Partners Plan for Long Lead-Time Investments Cultivate Cross-Sectoral Coalitions and Innovative Ideas Commit to a Whole of Government, Evidence-Based Approach A brief fact sheet was also provided which explicitly acknowledged increased competition with Russia and China in the region: "This strategy, an update of its 2013 predecessor , addresses the climate crisis with greater urgency and directs new investments in sustainable development to improve livelihoods for Arctic residents, while conserving the environment. It also accounts for increasing...

The Arctic is hot these days, and it's not just the climate. The United States in particular has accelerated its policy activities as we covered in a recent timeline analysis . A mere week after we published that article came the announcement by the Department of Defense that it is establishing an Arctic Strategy and Resilience Office , with an affiliated Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense to head it. The new office announcement itself follows on the heels of two big announcements, just a month prior: the opening of the Ted Stevens Center for Arctic Security Studies , and a new Ambassador-at-Large for the Arctic Region. The proliferation of offices and roles for Arctic policy set our heads spinning, so we did what we do best, and that was to create a map of the Arctic policy ecosystem as we understand it. This is our first draft, and we will see how it proofs out over time: One of the first things we figured out early was that we needed to choose a perspective or else end up wi...