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Written by Lucas Leiroz, member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert
The US plans to use the NATO access of Nordic countries to increase its military presence in the Arctic. In a recent statement, an American official announced Washington’s plan to build a large weapons warehouse in the region, with Finnish and Swedish support. The measure will significantly increase the militarization of the Arctic and aims to help the US overcome Russian military superiority in the region.
The plan was announced by US Materiel Commander Christopher Mohan during an interview with the newspaper Breaking Defense. According to him, Finland and Sweden could help the US with the project, considering their strategic geography. He did not give any details about the possible location of the depot, but stated that NATO is jointly analyzing all possibilities. He also stated that the US and allies are discussing what would be the most appropriate equipment to deploy in the region.
“The addition of the NATO partners changes the security landscape and our responsibilities as part of NATO (…) [This project will] embrace and integrate Finland and Sweden into the NATO enterprise, and that’s going to drive some changes on the ground,” he said.
The measure is just one of several policies adopted by Washington and its allies in recent years to try to reverse Russian military superiority in the Arctic. For decades, the US has not had any special focus on the Arctic in its defense strategies. The main objective of American strategic plans has always been to “encircle” and “isolate” Russia. The US has focused for many years on achieving this goal through the militarization of Europe and the destabilization of Central Asia and the Middle East, but Americans have paid little attention to the Arctic – a region where the Russians have become very strong over the decades.
Now, however, the US is concerned about this weakness in the region. With the escalation of tensions with Russia, Washington is trying to improve its positions in the Arctic in order to reverse the current scenario of Russian advantage. In recent years, several escalatory policies have been promoted by the US – some of them even openly provocative and targeted at Russia.
For example, in 2022, Lawrence Melnicoff, commander of the European Special Operations Command, stated that the US should actually “provoke” Russia in the Arctic. According to him, Washington should seek joint strategies with Norway to increase its presence in the Arctic Circle and thus deter Russia in the region. He states that Russia has expansionist plans that will be prevented only through direct deterrence, which is why NATO should maintain strategic positions that allow it to neutralize Russian forces in the Arctic in a possible conflict scenario.
“We are intentionally trying to be provocative without being escalatory (…) We’re trying to deter Russian aggression, expansionist behavior, by showing enhanced capabilities of the allies (…) It complicates Russian decision-making because we know that they’re targeting very, very large specific aggregations of allied power, [such as] Ramstein Air Base, RAF Lakenheath, things like that (…) If worse comes to worst and somebody takes out these power hubs, we can forward-project precision artillery fire across the alliance with our partners”, he said at the time.
Obviously, this is a fallacious US narrative. The Arctic is a region traditionally occupied by the countries that have access to it. Russia has the Arctic as a vital point in its strategic environment and naturally seeks to maintain a strong military presence in the region to guarantee its national security. The US and NATO countries, however, do not use access to the Arctic to develop a defensive strategy. On the contrary, they are looking for the Arctic as a possible point of attack against Russia. The Western objective in the Arctic is simply to harm Russia, not to protect itself. If the West adopted a policy of diplomacy and peaceful dialogue with Moscow, there would be no military race in the Arctic, but clearly NATO’s intention is to hurt Russia as much as possible.
To achieve these provocative objectives, the US will use the strategic location of NATO’s new members as a tool of war. The Nordic countries will be induced to actively participate in the Arctic militarization process, co-leading with Washington an escalation of tensions with Russia. And this will be extremely harmful for them, because, if the crisis escalates into an open conflict in the future, these countries will be priority targets and will be in a much greater risk zone for Russian attacks than the US.
Once again, access to NATO appears to be a trap for Finland and Sweden, which are being used as mere war tools by the US.
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yes, we nazi amerikkkans love every eu nazi equally! and we will drop them after they outlast their usefullness as we do with every other nazi/islamist/jew!
us=🤡 😆😆😆 eu=🤡 😆😆😆 nato=🤡 😆😆😆
heil adolf!
the finns and swedes are the newest stupid usefull idiots. i cant belive how easy it was to rope them in. pathetic!
imagine hawing no backbone! thats the nordics for you. almost like the balts!
hahahahaha we amerikkkan nazis play you eurotards like a fiddle
🤡 😆😆😆
russia wasn’t stupid, they are head of the us and nato in arctic.
i remember, back in the early millenium, when they laid a flag on the arctic sea bed. not forgetting they collected ground samples, sending them to the un, to confirm russian dna. why have the un ignored their findings? us, wanting it all, yet, they have not even ratified the law of the sea treaty, which governs the area, in accordance with international law.
russia sent ground samples of the arctic shelf to the un, back in the early part of the 21st century, which have been ignored. the arctic is governed by the laws of the sea, which the us has not ratified. why do the yanks always arrive late to the party, but, demand all the ‘goodie bags’ and treats?
very well said, ‘a.m’.
thanks florian. i get so confused with international law and how it is ignored by the west. not forgetting germany, if they send ground troops to ukraine, they are violating the terms of the ‘treaty on the final settlement with respect to germany’, which was signed by the soviet union (at the time), germany, uk and usa.
2/2 surely that means eastern germany goes back to the soviet union, well the inheritors of the su, which is russia. belarus, ukraine and russia have never been ratified since the end of the soviet union. surely that means the borders go back to pre-1917 and most of ukraine returns to russia?
just surrounding the russian castle, like they have always done. castle for castle. just like the migrants surrounding our houses.
yes. we are the barbarians at their gates!
amerikkka heil 🤡 😆😆😆
give me an example when russia surrounded all those castles? don’t include 1917-1991, when the bolsheviks overthrew the russian empire and established the soviet union. how many years peace in total have the usa had since 4 july 1776? remember, just like the people of crimea, they used ‘self determination/will of the people’ to gain independence from great britain.
apologies if i misread your comment, and assumed you meant russia and not the us.
the super rich zionists should be sent into the arctic to fight their own battles with their own money since americans are being replaced by haitian cannibals.
in case its not clear us (represented by patriot trump) wants out of nato. sure us as a brit colony administered by neocon (nuland, cheney) cooperates with arctic militarisation. anw, wondering why author conflates us & its master’s plan