Editor’s note: MWI research fellow Troy Bouffard and colleagues from across various organizations recently published a study, “Arctic Narratives and Political Values: Arctic States, China, NATO, and the EU,” commissioned and released by the NATO StratCom Centre of Excellence. The study examines the official narratives and related political values of eleven actors in the Arctic: the eight members of the Arctic Council, NATO, the European Union, and China.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022, has sent shock-waves across the Arctic. While Russia has not signaled any similar aspirations for military conquest in neighboring Arctic countries, the world has witnessed further spillover of international tensions into circumpolar affairs, and the Kremlin has shattered its credibility as a peaceful, law-abiding actor. Maintaining peace and stability in the Arctic, within a world of heightened uncertainty, has forced NATO allies to reevaluate threats, strategic responsibilities, and opportunities for deeper collaboration as Arctic partners.
Resurgent competition between the great powers and the war in Ukraine have reinforced how Russia and the other seven Arctic states are not like-minded and are engaged in competition for international legitimacy. Russia’s brutal further invasion of Ukraine prompted the other Arctic states to expand their diplomatic and economic sanctions against the Kremlin. In effect, this means that Russia’s actions outside the Arctic have undermined the regional Arctic governance regime. The most direct Western actions have been to suspend cooperation with Moscow in multiple regional governance forums involving Russia, including the Arctic Council, the Euro-Barents Arctic Council, and the Arctic Coast Guard Forum. On the economic front, several Western business interests have withdrawn their investments in Northern Sea Route (NSR) developments and key oil and natural gas projects in the Russian Arctic. While the Kremlin seeks to compartmentalize the region from any further spillover effects of its war in Ukraine, Russia has weaponized its energy and food exports as tools of geopolitical coercion, while at the same time insisting that it will turn to “non-Arctic states” (particularly China) to forge ahead with its regional development plans. With Russian President Vladimir Putin noting in December 2022 that ending the war may be a “long process,” few experts expect that geopolitical conditions will facilitate the resumption of “normal” circumpolar affairs involving Russia anytime soon.
Read the full study, commissioned by the NATO StratCom Centre of Excellence, here.
Troy Bouffard is the director of the Center for Arctic Security and Resilience at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and an MWI research fellow.
P. Whitney Lackenbauer, PhD, is Canada research chair in the study of the Canadian North and a professor in the School for the Study of Canada at Trent University, Ontario, Canada.
Elizabeth Buchanan, PhD, is head of research, Royal Australian Navy in Canberra, Australia and codirector of MWI’s Project 6633.
Adam Lajeunesse, PhD, is the Irving Shipbuilding chair in Canadian Arctic marine security policy and an associate professor at the Brian Mulroney Institute of Government, St. Francis Xavier University.
Marc Lanteigne, PhD, is an associate professor of political science at UiT: The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, specializing in China, East Asia, and polar regional politics and international relations.
Sergey Sukhankin, PhD, is a senior fellow at the Jamestown Foundation, an advisor at Gulf State Analytics (Washington, DC), and a postdoctoral fellow with the North American and Arctic Defence and Security Network (Trent University, Canada).
The views expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect the official position of the United States Military Academy, Department of the Army, or Department of Defense.
Image credit: Sgt. Antonino Mazzamuto, US Marine Corps