By Chris Philips, Managing Editor
Comedienne Tina Fey, impersonating then-governor Sarah Palin
on Saturday Night Live, said “I can see Russia from my house.” As a line, it’s
a pretty good one, and got her the well-deserved laugh. As an observation on US
Arctic policy, it’s not so funny.
The country’s national strategy for the Arctic includes a
promise to keep the Arctic region peaceful, stable and free of conflict, but
consists mostly of concerns over global warming and efforts to safeguard the
world’s climate and fragile ecosystems. US policy further pledges to
“…intelligently evolve our Arctic infrastructure and capabilities, including
ice-capable platforms as needed.”
Those of us engaged in trade along the Pacific and Arctic
coasts can certainly attest to the need to “intelligently evolve” our Arctic
infrastructure, and that idea seems to have bipartisan support from our
lawmakers, but so far no hard plans or funding.
Our neighbor to the immediate north, also an Arctic power, is
actively engaged in a national shipbuilding effort, which includes a heavy-duty
icebreaker, the CCGS
John G. Diefenbaker. That ship will be built by
Seaspan/Vancouver Shipyards and is expected to be delivered in 2017 for a
current price tag of C$1.3 billion.
Meanwhile, our Arctic neighbors across the Pacific aren’t letting
the grass grow under their feet, but are actively engaged in Arctic
infrastructure development of a different sort.
In March, the Barents
Observer reported
that Russia had dropped 350 paratroopers over a Siberian island in a show of
strength in Arctic conditions. The soldiers, dressed in new, specially designed
7-layer military gear, landed on the island after having undergone an Arctic
survival training program.
According to the Observer,
the Russian Northern Fleet reopened a shuttered airfield on the northern island
in 2013, which included the involvement of three Navy vessels, including the Pyotr
Veliky missile
cruiser, seven support vessels and four nuclear-powered icebreakers (Russia
currently has nine). The story says the newly reopened base will protect
offshore oil and gas resources in the region and keep an eye on the growing
number of ships sailing along the Northern Sea Route.
Two weeks later, the Barents
Observer announced
more Russian strategic Arctic military exercises to come in late 2014. The
following paragraph from the story deserves to be printed in its entirety:
“Russia has over the last few years strengthened its
military presence in the western part of the Arctic. New strategic submarines
of the Borey-class were based in Gadzhiyevo naval base on the Kola Peninsula
some few months ago. Many more submarines, including multi-purpose subs, are
under construction and will be based close to neighboring Norway on the coast
of the Barents Sea. The Northern fleet’s sailing along the Northern Sea route
included the navy’s nuclear powered battle cruiser Pyotr
Veliky last fall and Russian strategic bombers resumed
flights both in the Arctic and along Norway’s northern coast a few years back
and are now nearly a weekly recurrence.” (Barents Observer, March 28, 2014).
In mid-April, a television moderator for a Russian question
and answer show asked Vladimir Putin if he was planning on invading Alaska, and
joked that people were calling it “Ice Crimea.” The Russian leader joked that
he wouldn’t want it (he also said that about Crimea), and besides, he’d have to
pay Russian employees extra to live there.
For the time being, Mr. Putin is too busy in the Ukraine to
be distracted by Alaska, but he’ll be holding exercises in the Arctic this
fall, and will have a pretty big fleet stationed in Siberia by this time next
year. Meanwhile, we’ll try to find the money to reactivate the icebreaker Polar
Sea, talk some more about the possibility of developing a
new icebreaker program, and hope the former Soviet satellites keep
Russian-president-for-life Vladimir Putin busy for a few more years.
