ARCTIC: Military Technology in the Cold & more – 4th Feb 2025

Góðan daginn from BA! This is the Rorshok Arctic Update from the 4th of February twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what’s going down North of the Arctic Circle!

Political tensions are on the rise in the Arctic, and Denmark is preparing to defend its territory. On Monday the 27th of January, the Danish government announced a series of new defense spending measures worth over $2 billion US dollars. Among the measures are a fleet of new ice-capable ships, long-range drones and improved satellite capabilities, all intended to secure Denmark’s borders in the Faroe Islands and Greenland. The announcement stated this spending boost is only the first to come, suggesting that the Arctic is about to see a significant increase in military investment.

Denmark’s increased defense spending comes on the heels of the US President, Donald Trump, recently declaring he wishes to take control of Greenland. This week the residents of Denmark and Greenland have had the chance to state their opinions on the issue.

On Tuesday the 28th of January, the Greenlandic news agency Sermitsiaq published an opinion poll on the topic, with eighty-five percent answering they do not want Greenland to join the US. On Friday the 31st, The Guardian announced the results of a Danish poll, where almost eighty percent of people said they opposed Greenland joining the US. In both the Greenlandic and Danish polls, about half of respondents said they now consider the US to be a threat to their safety.

With the eyes of the world on Greenland, and the country only two months away from new elections, the Greenlandic government is trying to secure its elections from foreign interference. On Monday the 3rd of February, the government of Greenland put forward an emergency parliamentary proposal to ban foreign and anonymous donations to its political parties. The recent US election saw massive foreign donations put toward Trump’s campaign, and Greenland wants to ensure its upcoming election remains fair and free from foreign influence.

Donald Trump’s Arctic ambitions extend beyond Greenland though. On Tuesday the 28th of January, Trump made a surprise announcement saying that he plans to order forty new icebreaker vessels for the US Coast Guard, which currently only operates two heavy icebreakers. There have been no official plans announced to suggest how this order might come about, with the US last completing a heavy icebreaker in nineteen seventy-six.

This announcement has caught the attention of Finland, the world’s largest icebreaker producer. Posting on messaging platform Twitter on Tuesday, Elina Valtonen, the Finnish Foreign Minister, said she had spoken with Marco Rubio, the US’s new Secretary of State, regarding how the two countries might cooperate on the construction of new icebreakers.

The effect of Donald Trump on the Arctic is reaching Canada too. On Saturday the 1st of February, Trump announced a series of economic tariffs against Canada, implementing a twenty-five percent tariff on almost all Canadian goods being exported to the US. On Sunday the 2nd, the premiers of Canada’s Arctic territories released a joint statement calling the tariffs an insult and promising to respond with their own economic measures. On Sunday, the Yukon and North Western Territory governments both announced they would immediately minimize purchases of any US goods, including the complete halt to alcohol imports from the US.

Do you want to know more about this story? Check out the Rorshok Multilateral Update with the link in the show notes!

The increasing geopolitical tensions in the Arctic are causing many countries to look north and consider whether current military technology is suitable for use in the cold. According to a Reuters report from Thursday the 30th of January, Russia has been preparing for conflict in the north by building a fleet of Arctic drones since twenty fourteen. But NATO has fallen far behind in developing such technology. Reuters contacted Arctic NATO militaries to ask how they are addressing this shortfall, but only Finland was able to confirm they have been building cold weather drones.

Canada, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and the US all said they plan to fill the need for Arctic drones soon, but currently they do not have any drones able to defend the Arctic.

Military spending is increasing across the Arctic circle, but is it coming at the cost of nature? On Monday the 27th of January, the Norwegian Association for Nature Conservation raised alarms over the deforestation of Pasvikdalen, Norway’s largest primeval forest, for military use. Located in Finnmark, in northern Norway, between Finland and Russia, the forest hosts 25,000 species and 300-year-old trees, with only sixty square kilometers, about 15,000 acres, designated a protected area. The conservation group demanded this be doubled to 120 square kilometers, 30,000 acres, to safeguard biodiversity.

According to national broadcaster NRK, landowner Finnmarkseiendommen offered nearly fifty square kilometers (or 12,000 acres) of protection, but the conservationists argue this falls short of what’s needed to ensure the forest’s survival amid rising military activity in the Arctic.

Norway is having a busy week. On Thursday the 30th of January, the country’s government collapsed after the Center Party exited the ruling coalition with the Labor Party over disputes concerning the adoption of three EU energy directives. This departure leaves Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre from the Labor Party governing alone, becoming the first Norwegian government to rule alone in twenty-five years.

The Center Party, led by Trygve Slagsvold Vedum, the Finance Minister, opposed the EU's fourth clean energy package, which aims to boost renewable energy and improve energy efficiency. Vedum emphasized the need to prioritize stable and lower electricity prices in Norway and to resist ceding further authority to the EU.

Speaking of collapses, in Canada on Thursday the 30th of January, Inuit news agency The Inuvik Drum closed after almost sixty years of reporting. This isn’t a unique event, with First Nations newspaper Indian Time closing earlier this month after forty years of operation. Both newspapers cited the decreasing value of advertising revenues as their main reason for closure. After decades of reporting on Indigenous stories, many native communities in Canada now face a vacuum of news about the issues they face.

One industry hoping to recover from collapse is Alaska’s crab fisheries. On Wednesday the 29th of January, Alaska Public Media reported that the first commercial snow crab catches have landed in Alaska in three years. In late twenty twenty-two, 10 billion snow crabs, over ninety percent of the population, suddenly died in a devastating marine heat wave. Although the twenty twenty-five catch limit is less than ten percent the size of the twenty twenty-one allowance, snow crabs have managed to recover a little to allow a small amount of fishing this year, in a huge relief for Alaska’s struggling fishermen.

Moving over to Iceland where the new year looks to be repeating some of the worst moments of the last. The main story of Iceland’s twenty twenty-four was the repeated volcanic eruptions in southern Iceland causing repeated evacuations and infrastructure damage. But with the Sundhnúkar volcano’s last eruption almost happening three months ago, there were hopes the activity was ending.

However, on Friday the 31st of January the Icelandic Met Office reported that Sundhnúkar may see a new eruption soon. Magma has been accumulating within the volcano and it has now reached the level at which all recent eruptions took place. In November, the last time this magma amount was reached, an eruption followed after just three days, suggesting the residents of nearby Grindavik should be ready for yet another sudden evacuation.

Finally, some new research into polar bears could end up saving the Arctic. In research published by the University of Bergen on Thursday the 30th of January, scientists investigated why polar bear fur never freezes. They found that polar bear fur is naturally coated in oils which are better than any man-made ice repellents that aim to prevent ice buildup. So no matter how cold or wet it gets, polar bears won’t freeze.

Human-made ice repellents contain environmentally toxic forever chemicals called PFAS, which have been seriously harming Arctic animals. The researchers say engineers could use the ingredients found in polar bear fur to create safer products that work as a perfect ice repellent, all while keeping the Arctic healthy.

To learn more about how polar bear fur is uniquely adapted to life in the cold, take a look at the link in the show notes.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

We hope you're enjoying the Rorshok Arctic update as much as we enjoy making it. Got thoughts, questions, or ideas? Send us an email at info@rorshok.com, and don’t forget to subscribe on your go-to podcast platform!

Adjo