The debate over the Arctic is more heated than ever as US President Donald Trump continues to push for Greenland to become part of the US. But while President Trump’s demands for the United States to hand over territory belonging to one of its closest and most trusted allies has confounded the world, the race for the Arctic has been going on for decades.
And for a long time, Russia continued to win.
There is no doubt that Moscow has had a dominant presence in the Arctic region.
It controls about half of the landmass north of the Arctic Circle and half of its maritime exclusive economic zone. Two-thirds of the inhabitants of the Arctic region live in Russia.
And while the Arctic accounts for only a small portion of the global economy (about 0.4%, according to the Arctic Council, which represents Arctic countries), Russia controls two-thirds of the region’s GDP.
Russia has been expanding its military footprint in the Arctic for decades, investing in new and existing facilities in the region.
The broader Arctic region is home to 66 military sites and hundreds more defense facilities and outposts, according to the Simons Foundation, a Canadian non-profit that monitors Arctic security and nuclear disarmament.
According to publicly available data and research by the Simmons Foundation, there are 30 such sites in Russia, 36 in NATO countries with Arctic regions, 15 in Norway (including one base in the UK), eight in the United States, nine in Canada, three in Greenland, and one in Iceland.
And while not all bases are created equal (experts say Russia cannot currently match NATO’s military power), the size of Russia’s military presence and the pace at which the Kremlin has expanded it in recent years is a major concern.
The Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a UK-based defense think tank, said Russia has invested significant money and effort in recent years into modernizing its nuclear submarine fleet, which forms the backbone of its military power in the Arctic. As Russia continues its war in Ukraine, it has also improved its radar, drone, and missile capabilities.
Painting wasn’t always so dangerous. For years after the end of the Cold War, the Arctic was one of the areas where Russia and the West could actually do business together.
The Arctic Council, established in 1996, sought to bring Russia closer to the seven other Arctic countries and enable closer cooperation on issues such as biodiversity, climate and protection of the rights of indigenous peoples.
At one point, there were attempts to cooperate on security issues, and Russia attended two high-level meetings of the Arctic Defense Ministers’ Forum before being expelled for its illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Since then, most forms of cooperation have been suspended, and relations between the West and Russia reached a post-Cold War low after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The joining of Finland and Sweden to NATO in 2023 and 2024 effectively split the Arctic region into two roughly equal parts, one controlled by Russia and the other by NATO.
President Trump has repeatedly said the United States “needs” Greenland for national security reasons, pointing to Russia and China’s ambitions in the Arctic. He argued that Denmark, which has sovereignty over the world’s largest island, is not strong enough to protect it from the threats posed by both countries.
Although China is not an Arctic country, it has made no secret of its interest in the region. The country declared itself a “near-Arctic nation” in 2018 and outlined a “Polar Silk Road” initiative for Arctic shipping.
In 2024, China and Russia began joint patrols in the Arctic as part of broader cooperation between the two countries.
But safety is not the only reason for the growing interest in the Arctic. The region is changing faster than the rest of the world as the climate crisis deepens, with temperatures warming about four times faster than the global average.
Sea ice is rapidly shrinking. But while scientists warn that this could have an incredibly negative impact on the natural world and the livelihoods of the people who depend on it, many argue that melting sea ice could create huge economic opportunities in mining and shipping.
Two shipping routes that were nearly unviable just 20 years ago are now open thanks to dramatic ice melt, but researchers and environmental watchdogs warn that sending ships into this pristine, remote and dangerous environment is a recipe for ecological and human disaster.
The Northern Sea Route, which runs along the coast of northern Russia, and the Northwest Passage, which hugs the northern coast of North America, have both been virtually ice-free during peak summer since the late 2000s.
The Northern Sea Route reduces sailing time between Asia and Europe to about two weeks, about half the time compared to the traditional Suez Canal route.
Parts of this route were used by Russia during the Soviet era to reach and supply remote areas, but the challenges it posed meant it was largely ignored as an option for international shipping.
Things changed in the early 2010s when this passage became more accessible. Since then, the number of trips through this passage has increased from a few to about 100 each year.
Russia has been ramping up its use of the route since 2022, using it to ship oil and gas to China after sanctions cut off trade with previous European customers.
Similarly, the viability of the Northwest Passage has increased, increasing from 2-3 flights per year in the early 2000s to 41 flights by 2023.
A third, central route directly across the North Pole by boat may be possible in the future, but the level of ice melt that would be required would have the alarming consequences of accelerating global warming, increasing extreme weather events, and destroying the region’s precious ecosystems.
As for mining, melting ice could expose previously unexploitable land. Greenland in particular has the potential to become a hotspot for coal, copper, gold, rare earth elements and zinc, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland.
But researchers say extracting Greenland’s minerals would be extremely difficult and expensive because many of the country’s mineral deposits are located in remote areas above the Arctic Circle, with polar ice sheets miles thick and in darkness for much of the year.
The idea that these resources could be easily extracted for U.S. profit is “completely absurd,” Malte Humpert, founder and senior researcher at the Arctic Institute, told CNN.
President Trump has recently focused on Greenland’s security aspects, with former national security adviser Mike Walz telling Fox News in 2024 that the administration’s focus on Greenland was on “critical minerals” and “natural resources.”
