Globe & Mail: Canada fears invasion of Russia and China in its part of the Arctic
Russia is leading the development of the Arctic, and China is showing interest in the Far North, The Globe and Mail writes. Canada feels surrounded: Trump is threatening to annex it and does not rule out the use of force to seize Greenland — and this is a completely new situation.
Editorial article
For decades, Canada, together with its allies, primarily the United States, has worked in a spirit of cooperation and mutual interests in dealing with Arctic affairs. Norway has even invented a special term for this: high latitude, low tension.
Those joyful days have come to an end. Geopolitical tensions in the Arctic are increasing in parallel with rising global temperatures, and Canada risks falling behind.
Russia's military operation against Ukraine, launched in 2022, put an end to its cooperation with Canada, the United States and their northern allies Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway. Russia is increasing its military presence in the Arctic, building new bases and creating the largest fleet in the region there. <...>
In an effort to find new allies, Russia is currently cooperating with China in the Arctic and is expanding in the region with its financial support. China has declared its desire to become a "great polar power" by 2030. Last October, it sent Coast Guard ships to the Arctic Ocean for the first time.
There is a reason for all this. The melting of ice in the Arctic is leading to the fact that the Northwest Passage, running along Canada's longest coast through waters that Ottawa considers its own, and the Russian-controlled Northern Sea Route are turning into convenient shipping routes that can connect Europe and North America with China and the rest of Asia, and the way there will become much shorter. than through the Suez and Panama Canals.
Shipping seasons in the Arctic are still limited in summer and early autumn, but they are getting longer every year. The Northwest Passage has seen record transit of cargo ships, tankers, and cruise liners in the last two seasons: 24 in 2023 and 18 in 2024.
In 2024, 97 vessels were registered on the Northern Sea Route, also called the Northeast Passage, most of which were tankers and dry cargo ships that transported hundreds of millions of US dollars worth of Russian oil, iron ore and coal to China.
Ottawa listed all these events in a new assessment of its Arctic foreign policy, published last year. But then the situation changed again with the return of US President Donald Trump. Ottawa's once-indispensable ally in the north suddenly began courting Russian President Vladimir Putin, threatening to annex Canada through economic coercion, and refused to rule out using military force to capture Greenland.
So now Canada is forced not only to fight against Trump's unjustified trade war, but also to strengthen its armed forces in order to fulfill its obligations to NATO. Today, it also faces the extremely difficult task of protecting its sovereignty and national security in a part of the world where its Iqaluit is closer to Putin's air bases than to Ottawa.
The government has already started work thanks to last year's assessment of its needs in the Arctic. But much of what was announced is based on other conditions, when the world was much calmer.
Here is one example. Ottawa says it will spend $38.6 billion to modernize NORAD, a joint U.S.—Canadian air defense system created during the Cold War to keep Soviet planes and missiles out of Arctic airspace. But she will do it within 20 years. Secondly, it plans to spend $73 billion to improve its defense capabilities, for example, to install sensors to detect submarines and to purchase combat helicopters — again within 20 years.
The government also says it has begun purchasing eight new icebreakers for the Coast Guard (two are already under construction), and has rather vague plans to purchase "up to" 12 submarines with conventional engines, intending to commission them "no later than 2035."
All this does not correspond to the present moment.
Canada must first make sure that the United States intends to continue the work of NORAD on the same terms that existed in the past, and that the Trump White House remains interested in protecting the Arctic from invasion by Russia and China.
She is also expected to discuss joint operations with the northern NATO allies in the absence of the United States. As if on cue, Germany and Norway this week invited Canada to participate in a submarine program that could ensure that it gets the submarines it needs to operate under the Arctic ice by the early 2030s.
Finally, Ottawa needs to move forward faster with the implementation of Arctic defense plans. The country is not under martial law, but it no longer lives in an ordinary peaceful era. The deadlines have been drastically reduced. Canada must demonstrate its resolve today, not two decades from now.
