Shipping Companies Are Studying Russia's Northern Coast as the Shortest Link Between Seaports of East Asia and Europe, Bypassing Southern Oceans and the Suez Canal

"DUTCH HARBOR, Alaska -- On patrol in the Bering Sea last fall, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Kimball spotted seven Chinese and Russian vessels steaming through the frigid waters near Alaska's Aleutian Islands.

The Kimball's crew identified the main Chinese ship as the Nanchang, one of a new class of cruiser-destroyers that can launch more than 100 guided missiles. The Russian and Chinese ships, which were on a joint exercise, sailed north and east into U.S. waters, sending an unmistakable message about the region's strategic value to Moscow and Beijing, according to U.S. military officials and national security experts.

Russian warships and Chinese research vessels aren't uncommon in a region that includes the Aleutians, a strategic chain of volcanic islands that divides the Pacific Ocean from the Bering Sea and Arctic Ocean. They were the location of bitter fighting during World War II. One small island city, Unalaska, which brings in more fish than any other U.S. port, hosts the Coast Guard base at Dutch Harbor.

"But to see these combatants form up in a surface action group together and steam together, that's what's rare," said Rear Adm. Nathan Moore, who was Coast Guard commander for the Alaska region until earlier this month, when he became deputy commander for the Atlantic.

The Coast Guard called in a C-130 Hercules aircraft from another of its bases, on Alaska's Kodiak Island, and officers aboard the Kimball radioed the Russian and Chinese ships to warn them they had entered U.S.-regulated waters. The Russian and Chinese ships broke formation and departed.

Once a lonely and largely impassable maritime expanse where countries worked together to extract natural resources, the Arctic is increasingly contested territory. As sea ice melts and traffic increases on the southern edges of the Arctic Ocean, governments are maneuvering in ways that mirror great-power rivalries in lower latitudes.

In recent months, Russian bombers have increased their patrols over the Arctic and probed further south. Norway's intelligence service said that with Russia's conventional forces weakened by the conflict in Ukraine, its strategic weapons are taking on greater importance, among them the nuclear-armed submarines of Russia's Northern Fleet. More Russian-flagged commercial and government vessels are active in Arctic waters.

While U.S. military officials and analysts don't expect Beijing to deploy broad military forces in the Arctic, they said China is sharing satellite and electronic intelligence from the region with Moscow.

In response, the U.S. is beefing up its presence in the Arctic by adding to its polar icebreakers -- the ships vital to a consistent presence in the icy seas. The U.S. has just one icebreaker in the region for only part of the year, compared with three dozen owned by Russia.

It's also tracking movements of Russia and China via satellites, drones and unmanned seacraft, analysts and military officers said.

After the U.S. and other Asia-Pacific nations watched Beijing build military installations in the South China Sea, the Pentagon doesn't want to get caught off guard again, this time near the shores of America, Canada and other NATO allies in Northern Europe. Last fall's Russian-Chinese exercise triggered "Operation Frontier Sentinel," Adm. Moore's plan to respond to foreign military vessels' unexpected approaches to the U.S. in the region.

"We're telling the world, 'We're up here patrolling this area,'" said the Coast Guard's Kenneth Boda, who was captain of the Healy, the U.S. icebreaker used in the Arctic, until June. "There are certain things we don't want you doing up here."

Russia's defense ministry said the exercises, which began in the Sea of Japan, were designed to improve interoperability of the fleets and to defend eastern sea lanes and economic activity.

"China will not and has no intention of using Arctic issues to promote its geopolitical interests," said Chinese embassy spokesman in Washington, Liu Pengyu.

The Biden administration released a new Arctic strategy in October that identified national security as the main pillar for U.S. interests in the region, ahead of the environment, economic development and international cooperation.

The Russian-Chinese partnership heightens the challenges faced by America's military as it enters a new era of great-power competition. For decades, the U.S. has been focused on fighting insurgencies in the Middle East and Afghanistan, and has lately been working to reorient its forces to face a different type of potential conflict.

"Both Putin and Xi have made clear that the High North is key to their strategic interests, and it is imperative that the United States and our allies keep them from dominating this region," said Sen. Roger Wicker (R., Miss.), the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping.

Russian-flagged commercial and government vessels active in Arctic waters rose to a monthly average of 709 last year, up 22% since 2018, according to satellite-tracking data compiled by AAC SpaceQuest for The Wall Street Journal. Among the vessels: the 50 Let Pobedy, a 524-foot nuclear icebreaker named for the anniversary of Russia's World War II victory.

China, for its part, is "looking for reasons to have a military presence in the Arctic," explained Vice Adm. Peter Gautier, the U.S. Coast Guard's head of operations.

The American public became aware of China's intelligence-gathering activities near the Arctic earlier this year after a Chinese balloon was first detected near Alaska's uninhabited St. Matthew Island in the Bering Sea. The balloon floated across the U.S. and Canada before it was shot down off the coast of South Carolina.

China's foreign ministry denied the balloon was for surveillance and criticized the U.S. for shooting it down.

Last year, Canadian officials seized Chinese buoys believed to have been involved in surveillance of U.S. submarines, Canadian officials said this year. U.S. officials are also investigating visits by Chinese nationals in and around U.S. bases, including in Alaska.

"If we're not there and we allow them to test our waters, it starts to look more like the South China Sea," said Capt. Stephen Adler, who was then the commander of the Coast Guard Cutter Stratton, on a stop in Dutch Harbor last fall.

The Russia-China security partnership is in part driven by commerce on the energy-rich trade route.

Warmer temperatures are opening new shipping lanes between Asia and Europe and may eventually introduce brand-new shipping routes near the North Pole. As early as the 2030s, the Arctic may be practically ice-free in September, the month with the lowest amount of ice in the year, according to a study in Nature Communications.

Shipping companies are studying Russia's northern coast as the shortest link between seaports of East Asia and Europe, bypassing southern oceans and the Suez Canal. A cargo ship's trip from Japan to a port in the Netherlands could be cut by more than half, to less than 6,000 miles from more than 12,000 miles, by traveling through the Arctic Ocean.

The Northern Sea Route, which Russia asserts the right to regulate under an Arctic agreement, allows ships carrying liquefied natural gas to transport the cargo through the Bering Strait. The route runs along the maritime border between Russian and U.S. waters just west of Alaska.

More ice-crushing vessels in the area are ferrying Russian gas to the Chinese market. Last year, Russia and China used a trio of massive ice-breaking ships flying Hong Kong flags to carry Russian LNG to Chinese and other markets, according to the AAC SpaceQuest shipping data.

The U.S. rejects Russia's claim to regulate traffic through the Northern Sea Route and has considered contesting it in a so-called freedom of navigation exercise, according to a classified document taken and shared online by Airman First Class Jack Teixeira of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.

Such exercises, known as Fonops, involve sailing through waters to contest what the U.S. sees as excessive claims of another nation, including China's claims in the South China Sea and other areas.

While Russia's vast territory dominates the Arctic coastline, with well-developed ports, airfields and vessels under its control, NATO assets in Canada, Scandinavia and elsewhere would come into play in any potential conflict.

The U.S. itself has combat capabilities in the Arctic ranging from air bases in Alaska with more than 100 advanced F-35 and F-22 jets, to nuclear-powered submarines roaming the seas that can punch up through the ice, to missile-tracking radar in Greenland.

A new Pentagon planner for the region monitors stepped-up exercises in cold conditions, often with allies in the region. In a February exercise, U.S. Army soldiers from the "Arctic Angels" airborne division flew over the North Pole from Alaska to Finland, where they practiced maneuvers with Norwegian troops.

The frigid deployments are inspiring efforts to deploy unmanned vessels and to innovate for northern fighting forces. Materials scientists are working with the military to improve tools used in icy conditions, for example to prevent frozen spray from accumulating on ships and weapons, a problem previously addressed by a serviceman with a baseball bat.

The biggest gap between Western nations and the Russia-China partnership is in "domain awareness," or the knowledge of what adversaries are doing in and around a region with few people and little infrastructure.

Military officers say fixing that involves adding more satellites to provide better communication on the ground, unmanned aircraft and seagoing vessels, and long-range radar. Ports such as Dutch Harbor also need improvements.

A greater U.S. presence in the region is hobbled by a lack of ships hardened to withstand ice. In comparison, Moscow has invested continuously in ice-hardened ships that can steam through water dotted with "growlers" -- small frozen chunks.

Not since the Cold War have Arctic tensions between the U.S. and Russia been so high.

Both sides invested heavily in Arctic facilities, ranging from radar to ice-capable submarines. In the twilight of the Cold War, Soviet and American nuclear submarines collided twice in Arctic waters north of the main Soviet submarine base on Fennoscandia, near the border with Norway, causing damage to the submarines and headaches for diplomats but avoiding a military conflict.

In 1987, two years before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev signaled a willingness to dial back tensions. He warned in a speech in the Arctic city of Murmansk, Russia, that the "militarization of this part of the world is assuming threatening dimensions."

Three decades later, the return of Crimea and the events in broader Ukraine have rekindled old tensions, and the U.S. led Western nations to impose a raft of sanctions on Russia's economy. Western oil and gas giants halted their investment and technology cooperation with Russian firms, especially in technically challenging areas such as the Arctic.

On a visit to Nordic countries in June, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the reopening of a Cold War-era diplomatic outpost north of the Arctic Circle in Tromsoe, Norway." [1]

Northern passage is indeed short, so it could save us a lot of air contamination with carbon. Too bad that the technically challenging Arctic, still dangerous to human life in case of an accident, is removed from cooperation between the West and the East. Thanks to the global South the West's adventure in Ukraine is a complete failure. The adventure created many difficulties though, including no cooperation in Northern passage. It is time to collect the pieces, and fix the damage done.

1.  Melting Arctic --- Rivals have edge in icebreakers, ports. Mauldin, William; Cullison, Alan.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 31 July 2023: A.1.