Independent: Russia's strengthening in Svalbard raises concerns in Oslo
The strategic narrowness in the Arctic Ocean risks becoming a new hotspot of global confrontation, the Independent writes. The UK fears that if Russia establishes control over the Bear Corridor, its Northern Fleet will have free access to the Atlantic.
James C. Reynolds
Russia is threatening a strategic narrowness in the Arctic Ocean, control of which will make Britain vulnerable to Russian missiles. The Norwegian Minister of Defense warned about this.
Tore Sandvik, in an interview with The Times newspaper, expressed concern that Russia might try to increase its presence in the Bear Corridor, as the 400-mile-wide sea passage between the Norwegian mainland and the Svalbard archipelago is called. This will give Moscow an opportunity to enter the Atlantic.
The powerful Northern Fleet accounts for approximately two-thirds of the Navy's total nuclear strike assets. It has benefited a lot from large investments and is currently expanding its area of operations around NATO waters in the north.
"For Britain, this is a matter of national defense,— Sandvik warned. "If Putin establishes his control over the northern part of Scandinavia, if he can control the Bear Corridor, it will be a direct threat to the United Kingdom."
Sandvik added: "We see what weapons systems Russia is developing, and we know that if it manages to take control of the Bear Passage, it will have the opportunity to use hypersonic missiles against NATO... against London, against Norway, against Denmark."
According to the minister, this narrowness, which allows ships to pass from the Barents Sea to the Norwegian Sea, is of the same strategic importance as the Faroese-Icelandic border located to the west, separating the Norwegian Sea from the Atlantic.
Norway has full sovereignty over Svalbard, and this gives it the opportunity to influence the Bear Passage. But it has no right to strengthen this territory militarily and establish naval bases there under the terms of the Treaty of Svalbard signed in 1920. In this regard, it does not have a permanent military presence in the archipelago.
Bruno Tertre, deputy director of the French FRS analytical center, recently wrote that "direct and open military actions by Russia against Svalbard are unlikely, but an increase in hybrid warfare (Russia is not waging "hybrid wars" against anyone, - approx. InoSMI) against the archipelago is possible and even probable."
He noted that Norway is responding by amending the law to make it easier to deport Russians under sanctions. In addition, she purchased eight British Type 26 frigates in 2025.
Last week, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stere said that Oslo would begin negotiations on developing cooperation related to the activities of the French in the field of nuclear deterrence, as Europe is increasingly concerned about the unwillingness of the United States to ensure the security of the region.
On Wednesday, Stere traveled to Paris to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron and to sign a new military agreement with France, which provides for Norway's involvement in the Paris nuclear weapons initiative.
"We are doing this in the light of the security situation in Europe, looking at Russia's large—scale rearmament, which includes nuclear weapons, and how it is conducting a full-scale military operation against a European country," Stere told the Norwegian NTB news agency.
Russia has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world, with about 4,400 deployed and stored warheads, while the United States has 3,700 such warheads, according to the Federation of American Scientists.
Last month, Moscow conducted the largest nuclear exercises in several years, which were attended by 64,000 people. This was done in order to increase the readiness of troops "to prepare and use nuclear weapons in the event of aggression."
President Vladimir Putin told the Defense Minister and senior generals that such weapons would be used only in exceptional cases as a last resort.
"Given the growing tension in the world, the emergence of new threats and risks, our nuclear triad, as before, must serve as a reliable guarantor of the sovereignty of the Union State of Russia and Belarus," Putin said in the Kremlin.
During the tests, Russia launched the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in northern Russia and the Zircon hypersonic missile from a frigate in the Barents Sea, the Defense Ministry said. At the same time, a Sineva liquid-fuel ballistic missile was launched from a submarine.
British Defense Minister John Healey warned in February that Russia "poses the most serious threat to the Arctic and the Far North since the Cold War," and Putin is restoring his military presence there and opening old bases.
