Arctic Actors

Of the eight Arctic nations, Russia is by far the most regionally active. Vladimir Putin, in 2010 still the real head of the Russian state, recognizes the strategic and economic significance of the Arctic. Accordingly, in 2007 he established the United Shipbuilding Corporation with the express intent of increasing Russia's Arctic operational capabilities by investing in its shipbuilding industry. Russia currently operates between fourteen and eighteen icebreakers in the region, more than the seven other Arctic nations combined; a Russian icebreaker named Kapitan Khlebnikov now operated by a Vermont tourism company, Quark Expeditions, has already transited the Northern Sea Route, which runs above Russia’s northern coast, twelve times; the vessel will retire from service following the 2010 season.  Additionally, Russia is pushing the concept of an Arctic Bridge – a sea passage – that would connect the Russian port of Murmansk with the Canadian port of Churchill. Duma member Artur Chilingarov's privately financed but state-supported flag-planting on the Arctic sea bed is indicative of Russia's aggressiveness in the Arctic. Indeed, Chilingarov's videotaped endeavor was a public display of symbolic support for Russia's claim to the 1200-mile-long underwater mountain known as the Lomonosov Ridge.  If approved, this claim would justify, based on the 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone outlined under UNCLOS, Russian sovereignty in the Western Arctic up to and including the North Pole, which is currently governed by the International Seabed Authority out of Kingston, Jamaica.

The Russians, as the French, British and Americans, have long operated submarines in the Arctic region without announcing their presence. Additionally, Russian officials have expressed a belief that military security in the Arctic region is tantamount to Russian national security. Indeed, according to a 2009 document published on its national security council website, Moscow expects the Arctic to become its main resource base by 2020.  Given that Arctic researchers funded by the European Union and the National Environmental Resource Council now think recent data indicates we should rely on models that predict the total melt of summer Arctic sea ice closer to 2030-2040 rather than the longer timeline that predicted total summer ice melt by 2080, Russia has a significant leg up on its competitors.  As a resurgent nation a hard-line bargainer behind the scenes in Putin, significant interests in the Arctic region and economic as well as political clout, Russia is likely to be that toughest Arctic nation to negotiate with. After all, with geographic claims as yet not ratified by UNCLOS and an economy largely dependent on natural resources production for growth, Russia has much to lose and much to gain in the Arctic. By 2020 Russia plans to create a new Arctic division of the Russian armed forces so that it is prepared to do all it can to protect its own Arctic interests.

Canada has long asserted claims of sovereignty in the Arctic region, particularly within the Arctic Archipelago and along the Northwest Passage. Due to the wending of the coast and the islands in the Arctic Archipelago, it is necessary to use the straight baselines method to outline Canada's Arctic territorial sea.  The straight baselines method is also employed by four of the five other claimant Arctic states and lent support in the Canadian case by historical claims of the Inuit people around the Amundsen Gulf and Lancaster Sound.

Despite claims of sovereignty, however, any pragmatic observer can easily discern that Canada has little capacity to enforce policies in its own territorial waters. In 1977, it instituted the NORDREG reporting system for ships transiting the area – but on a voluntary basis only.  The Canadian navy has not regularly operated an icebreaker in the Arctic since the 1950s and most of the five icebreakers used by the Canadian Coast Guard are nearing the end of their 30-year useful service life.  Canada, in effect, has no operational capabilities in Arctic waters covered by significant ice. It is unable to enforce environmental mandates, perform search and rescue in the region or even to effectively monitor shipping traffic. Canada signed UNCLOS in 2003, so it has only four years remaining – until 2013 – to submit its geographic claims in the Arctic.  Since some of the passages between the islands of the Arctic Archipelago are about sixty miles wide and the territorial sea limit is only twelve miles wide, it is foreseeable that Canada might lose legal control over shipping in a region the Canadian national anthem refers to as “The True North, Strong and Free”.  Canada has for too long neglected its Arctic waters, relying on the United States for anti-submarine warfare defense and not expanding operational capabilities that would allow it to enforce environmental and shipping regulations in the region.  As such, even if the waters of the Arctic Archipelago are deemed internal waters, Canada might lose a degree of its territorial sovereignty in the region if it is established that the Northwest Passage or other routes connecting the high seas through the region are international straits. In any case, Canada’s lack of resource commitment to the Arctic leaves it with a weakened hand at the negotiating table.

The United States' is in an uneasy situation in the Arctic. Geographically speaking, the United States has the most of any country to gain via ratification of UNCLOS, not just in the Arctic but off its other coastlines. However, it has not done so. The Reagan administration opposed deep-sea mining and technology transfer provisions contained in the 1982 draft of UNCLOS; however, in 1994 revisions satisfactory to ex-Reagan administration officials were made. Despite a unanimous vote of confidence from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2004 and support from groups as diverse as the Joint Ocean Commission Initiative, the Pew Oceans Commission, energy and environmental as well as fishing lobbies and the US military, a small group of radical right-wing legislators continue to stonewall ratification of UNCLOS on the ill-conceived premise that ratification would necessarily involve “the encroachment of UN rules on what they regard as the United States' rights as a sovereign nation.”  This means that the United States’ rights at sea continue to lack international recognition until ratification and that the United States does not even have a seat at the negotiating table for any issue, including Arctic ones, presented to UNCLOS.

The United States' Arctic infrastructure is, as the US Coast Guard reflects, a decade of strong investment from capably meeting our responsibilities in the Arctic. As Commander Arthur Brooks states, though, it is easy to see why the Arctic will be important in the decades to come. The interest in exploiting the Arctic's mineral, oil and gas reserves is substantial: in the winter of 2008, leases in the Chukchi Sea were put up for bid. They were expected to fetch in the neighborhood of $600 million; instead, bids came in at $2.66 billion.  The United States is an Arctic nation, with obligations to its native Arctic peoples. At present, the USCG cutter Healy is in the region mapping the ocean floor; however, it is the only one of the three US icebreakers is within its thirty year service time and the Coast Guard estimates it will take eight or more years – and $800 million – to build another icebreaker.  Additionally, the Healy is only capable of operating at speeds of 3 knots in ice up to 4.5' thick, while the two other US icebreakers, the Polar Star and the Polar Sea, are theoretically capable of operating at 3 knots in up to 6' of ice.  US Arctic infrastructure investment is low enough that the Polar Star was placed on indefinite non-operational status with a skeleton crew in Seattle after a gas turbine failed during a 2006 mission.  Nearly four years later, the Coast Guard announced that it had resolved funding issues which will allows the Polar Star to return to operation for a limited period of time after repairs are completed in 2013.  Additionally, the US must constantly have one of its two icebreakers committed to resupplying the Antarctic McMurdo station.  As Admiral Thad Allen reflected in testimony to Congress, the average age of US High Endurance Cutters (which are not icebreakers) as of 2008 was 39 years old.  If the United States wants to influence the rules or guidelines that could affect its gas hydrates outside the 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone and take a leadership role in the management of the world's oceans, it needs a seat at the table of the Continental Shelf Commission, which would require ratification of UNCLOS. In short, the United States needs to sign UNCLOS and invest in its commitment to Arctic operational capabilities in order to protect United States interests in the Arctic region.

Through the semi-autonomous Greenland and the Faroe Islands, Denmark also has claim to a significant Exclusive Economic Zone in the Arctic region. Indeed, Denmark – like Russia – has laid claim to an extensive part of the Lomonosov ridge as its own, on the basis that the continental shelf off of Greenland extends from the top of Greenland to the North Pole. Denmark also assumed the chairmanship of the Arctic Council in April of 2009.  It plans to establish a joint-service Arctic Command, replete with an Arctic navy and with possibly air capabilities, out of its military base at Thule in Northern Greenland.  The Danes will experience conflicts with the residents of Greenland and the Faroe Islands, who will expect a sizable share of natural resource proceeds given the autonomy Greenland has recently exercised under home rule. Showing initiative and a grasp of the region’s importance that the United States and Canada have not, Denmark has committed millions to creating detailed topographic maps of its claims by the time they come due to UNCLOS in 2014.  They also have significant fishing interests in the region and recognize the need to effectively police mining and drilling operations in order to preserve native ecosystems.

The Norwegians are the fifth and final nation with a legitimate claim in the Arctic under UNCLOS. Norway's interests in the region are historical as well as physical. Indeed, Arctic explorer Roald Amundsen is one of the nation's few national heroes. In 2009, Norway became the first nation to have the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf approve its Arctic claims – extending its sovereignty by 235,000 square kilometers beyond the 200-mile EEZ.  Norway shares a 120-mile Arctic border with Russia and is understandably wary of provoking its larger neighbor.  The current regime has used Arctic tension to justify recent increases in military expenditures. Given that Norway's approved claim extends up to – but does not include – the North Pole, it is certain to face an increased burden as Arctic shipping increases at the same time that it benefits from new mineral and hydrocarbon discoveries. Currently, Norway seeks to promote cooperation rather than competition amongst the Arctic nations.

The remaining three nations with territory in the Arctic are Finland, Iceland and Sweden. None of the three stand to gain territory in the Arctic. Iceland has recently opened up its waters for oil drilling and in 2009 is more intent on recovering from the recent financial crisis than focusing on issues of Arctic sovereignty. In February of 2009, it was announced that Sweden and Finland would cooperate with Denmark and Norway in a Nordic security cooperative designed to protect their interests in the Arctic.  For Finland, Iceland and Sweden, the biggest challenges going forward will be to maintain the quality of life for their peoples, protect the local environment and ensure that they are not put at a disadvantage by a new rush for resources in the Arctic.

Aside from the eight nations, fishermen, native peoples, mining, oil and shipping companies, environmental groups and non-governmental organizations such as the World Wildlife Foundation have significant interests in the Arctic region. These diverse interests' unanimous support in the United States for ratification of UNCLOS is indicative of UNCLOS’ status as a preeminent and critical piece of legislation that will be of increasing importance in the coming decades as final territorial disputes amongst the five Arctic nations with legitimate potential geographic claims under UNCLOS are settled. In the long term, any Arctic Treaty will have to protect the environment while providing for deep-sea mining and drilling; allow for indigenous peoples' rights; better outline legal obligations to search and rescue and disaster operations in the region; and reconcile actors who, on their own, might act as free-riders and act in an unsustainable and harmful manner.