Russia's Armed Forces and the Arctic: All Quiet on the Northern Front?

Abstract

In 2008, Russian leaders stated their intention to make the Arctic Russia's ‘primary resource base’. This, and the region's growing importance as an arena for marine transportation and resource extraction, has led observers to question the longterm stability of the northern part of the globe and predict a new military buildup on the Kola Peninsula. Based on a review of Russia's previous behaviour in the Arctic, recent strategies and doctrines, the pattern of civil-military relations, and trends in the development of Russia's military forces in the region, this article argues that the role of the region in contemporary Russian security policy and defence planning should not be exaggerated. This analysis concludes that the character of Russian Arctic policy will largely depend on relations with NATO and the policies adopted by other Arctic rim states. The region's growing economic significance, the existence of unresolved jurisdictional issues, and the ‘action-reaction’ dynamics in the military field may lead to a strengthening of the military dimension in Russia's Arctic policies, but this does not mean greater militarization of the region is inevitable or even likely. Tensions in the Barents Sea region and other parts of the Arctic are much lower today than in the days of the Cold War, and hard security concerns in the Arctic do not figure at the top of Russia's current security agenda. While Russia's Arctic policy in the past was governed by national security interests, it is now increasingly governed by national economic interests and the interests of companies closely associated with the Russian state.

Acknowledgements

This study has been financed by the Research Council of Norway under the ‘Geopolitics in the High North’ programme – a five-year (2008–2012) research programme conducted by the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies with partners and associates. Parts of the article are based on some of the author's previous publications, including a German piece entitled ‘Im Norden nichts Neues? Die Arktis in Russland's Sicherheitspolitik’, published in Osteuropa, Vol. 61, Nos. 2–3 (2011). The author would like to thank Tor Bukkvoll, Anders Kjølberg, Rolf-Inge Vogt Andresen, and CSP's anonymous reviewers for taking the time to read and comment on earlier drafts of the manuscript.

Notes

Michael L. Roi, ‘Russia: the Greatest Arctic Power?’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Vol. 23, No. 4 (December 2010), p. 551f.

Pavel Podvig, ‘Strategic Fleet’, posted 20 December 2010 at http://russianforces.org/navy/

See for instance Scott G. Borgerson, ‘Arctic Meltdown: The Economic and Security Implications of Global Warming’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 87, No. 2 (March/April 2008), pp. 63–77; Mark Galeotti, ‘Cold Calling: Competition Heats Up for Arctic Resources’, Jane's Intelligence Review, Vol. 20, No 10 (October 2008), pp. 9–15; David Fairhall, Cold Front: Conflict Ahead in Arctic Waters (London: I.B. Tauris, 2010).

Barry Scott Zellen, Arctic Doom, Arctic Boom: The Geopolitics of Climate Change in the Arctic (Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2009), p. 93.

See for instance Rob Huebert, ‘The Newly Emerging Arctic Security Environment’, Paper, Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute, 2010, available at http://www.cdfai.org/publicationsyear.htm, pp. 15–18; Ariel Cohen, Lajos F. Szaszdi and Jim Dolbow, ‘The New Cold War: Reviving the U.S. Presence in the Arctic’, Backgrounder, The Heritage Foundation, 30 October 2008, available at http://s3.amazonaws.com/thf_media/2008/pdf/bg2202.pdf, pp. 10–11; Adrian Blomfield, ‘Russia plans Arctic military build-up’, Daily Telegraph, 12 June 2008, p. 17.

Valery Melnikov, ‘Russia to Prioritize Modern Weaponry in New Arms Acquisition Program’, RIA Novosti, 11 March 2011, available at http://en.rian.ru/mlitary_news/20110311/162956743.html

David Nowak, ‘Russian military to purchase 600 planes, 100 ships’, Associated Press Archive, 25 February 2011, http://www.ap.org/

Rob Huebert, ‘The Newly Emerging Arctic Security Environment’ (note 5), p. 18.

Up to February 2011, Russia was only able to deliver one of the seven nuclear submarines planned for procurement in the 2007–2015 period, two of twelve of the planned corvettes and frigates, and 22 of the 116 planned warplanes. As with the previous State Arms Procurement Program (GPV-2015), there are many uncertainties when it comes to the financing and implementation of the current, and considerably more ambitious, programme (GPV-2020). For details, see Ivan Safronov, ‘Minoborony pereshlo ot slov k 19 trillionam’ [The Ministry of Defense went from Words to 19 Trillion], Kommersant Daily, 25 February 2011, p. 2.

Rob Huebert, ‘The Newly Emerging Arctic Security Environment’ (note 5), p. 18.

Atle Staalesen, ‘Medvedev: The Arctic is Best Without NATO’, BarentsObserver, 17 September 2010, available at http://www.barentsobserver.com/medvedev-the-arctic-is-best-without-nato.4820044-58932.html

Tønne Huitfeldt, Tomas Ries and Gunvald Øyna, Strategic Interests in the Arctic (Oslo: Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, 1992), p. 93.

Kristian Åtland, ‘The Introduction, Adoption and Implementation of Russia's Northern Strategic Bastion Concept, 1992-1999’, Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Vol. 20, No. 4 (October 2007), p. 510.

In the so-called ‘Sector decree’, issued in 1926, the Soviet Government claimed all lands and islands between the meridians 32° Eastern and 168° Western longitude. In Soviet times, the entire ‘sector’ was largely perceived as Soviet internal waters. Today, the applicability of the Sector decree to contemporary maritime law is highly contested. Nevertheless, the principle has a special place in Russian thinking with regard to the Arctic. See Leonid Timtchenko, ‘The Russian Arctic Sectoral Concept: Past and Present’, Arctic, Vol. 50, No. 1 (March 1997), pp. 29–35.

Rudolf A. Golosov, ‘Osvoenie Arktiki i podvodnyi flot Rossii’ [The Conquest of the Arctic and Russia's Submarine Fleet], Voyennaia Mysl', No. 3 (March 2006), pp. 49–50.

Aleksandr Kots, ‘Ryazan' podo l'dami Arktiki’ [Ryazan' under the Arctic Ice], Komsomol'skaya Pravda, 1 October 2008, p. 4.

Ilya Mogilevkin, Arktika: Interesy Rossii i mezhdunarodnye usloviya ikh realizatsii (The Arctic: Russia's interests and the international conditions of their realization) (Moscow: Nauka, 2002), p. 39.

USGS, ‘90 Billion Barrels of Oil and 1,670 Trillion Cubic Feet of Natural Gas Assessed in the Arctic’, press release, 23 July 2008, available at http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=1980&from=rss_home

See for instance Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov's 2005 address to the Russian Maritime Collegium, ‘O sozdanii kompleksnoi sistemy bezopasnosti neftegazovykh kompleksov na kontinental'noi shel'fe’(On the Establishment of a Complex Security System for Petroleum Installations on the Continental Shelf), Morskoi sbornik, No. 12 (December 2005), pp. 5–6.

Kristian Åtland, ‘Russia's Northern Fleet and the Oil Industry – Rivals or Partners? Petroleum, Security, and Civil-Military Relations in the Post-Cold War Arctic’, Armed Forces & Society, Vol. 35, No. 2 (January 2009), p. 378.

Vladimir Gundarov, ‘Pogruzivshis', nadeemsya vsplyt'’ [Having Taken a Dive, we Hope to Resurface], Rossiyskoe voennoye obozrenie, Nos. 3–4 (March/April 2005), p. 21.

Dmitriy Litovkin, ‘Nash flot snova zavoyevaet mir’ [Our Navy Again Conquers the World], Izvestiya, 9 June 2003, p. 4.

‘FSB opens Shtokman village’, BarentsObserver, 5 March 2009, available at http://www.barentsobserver.com/fsb-opens-shtokman-village.4563718-16178.html.

‘Treaty between the Kingdom of Norway and the Russian Federation concerning Maritime Delimitation and Cooperation in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean’, signed in Murmansk on 15 September 2009, available at http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/UD/Vedlegg/Folkerett/avtale_engelsk.pdf

Howard Amos, ‘Arctic Treaty with Norway Opens Fields’, Moscow Times, 7 July 2011, p. 1.

Donald N. Jensen, ‘How Russia is Ruled – 1998’, Report E102, Conflict Studies Research Centre, p. 24.

These documents replace, respectively, the 1997/2000 National Security Concept and the 2000 Military Doctrine. They are available (in Russian) on the website of the Russian Security Council, http://www.scrf.gov.ru/documents/sections/3/

This document was published in 2009, and is available at http://www.scrf.gov.ru/documents/98.html. It replaces a similar document from 2001: see http://www.arctictoday.ru/region/economics/469.html

‘Strategia natsional'noi bezopasnosti Rossiyskoi Federatsii do 2020 goda’ [National Security Strategy of the Russian Federation to 2020], 2009, available at http://www.scrf.gov.ru/documents/99.html. My translation (KÅ).

Russia's long-standing maritime delimitation dispute with Norway in the Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean was resolved on 15 September 2010, after more than 40 years of bilateral negotiations. The full text of the delimitation treaty is available at http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/UD/Vedlegg/Folkerett/avtale_engelsk.pdf

‘Strategia natsional'noi bezopasnosti’ (note 29).

For a detailed discussion, see Nikolai Sokov, ‘The New, 2010 Russian Military Doctrine: the Nuclear Angle’, posted 5 February 2010 at http://cns.miis.edu/stories/100205_russian_nuclear_doctrine.htm; Roger McDermott, ‘Russia's National Security Strategy’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, 19 May 2009, available at http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=35010

‘Osnovy gosudarstvennoy politiki Rossiyskoi Federatsii v Arktike na period do 2020 goda i dal'neishuyu perspektivu’ [Fundamentals of the Russian Federation State Policy in the Arctic for the Period up to 2020 and beyond], 18 September 2008, available at http://www.scrf.gov.ru/documents/98.html My translation (KÅ).

Ibid.

See for instance ‘Rossiyskaia Armia gotovitsya k bitve v Arktike’ [The Russian Army Prepares to Fight in the Arctic], Izvestiya, 24 June 2008, available at http://www.izvestia.ru/news/news179190

Trude Pettersen, ‘Lavrov: No Enhancement of Russian Military Presence in the North’, BarentsObserver, 30 April 2009, available at http://www.barentsobserver.com/index.php?id=4586694. Lavrov's opening remarks at the Arctic Council meeting in Tromsø on 29 April 2009 are available at the website of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, http://www.ln.mid.ru

Viktor Baranets, ‘Rossiya gotova vysadit' arkticheskiy desant dlya zaschity svoikh polyarnykh granits’ [Russia is Ready to Put Airborne Forces in the Arctic to Protect its Polar Borders], Komsomol'skaya Pravda, 28 March 2009, p. 1. My translation (KÅ)

See for instance Konstantin Rashepkin and Andrei Lunyov, ‘General-leytenant Vladimir Shamanov: Podgotovka i oblik Armii budet menyat'sya’ [Lieutenant General Vladimir Shamanov: The Training and Appearance of the Army will Change], Kraznaya zvezda, 24 June 2008, p. 1, cited the same day in ‘Russia prepares for future combat in the Arctic’, RIA Novosti, http://en.beta.rian.ru/russia/20080624/111915879.html

See for instance the statement made by Russia's Arctic Council representative, Ambassador Anton Vasilyev, prior to the Council's Ministerial in Troms, 28–29 April 2009, referenced in Denis Tel'manov, ‘Chasovye Arktiki stoyat’ [Safeguarding the Arctic], Gazeta, 21 April 2001, p. 7.

‘Putin Appoints “Nationalist” Rogozin as Russia's NATO Envoy’, RIA Novosti, 10 January 2008, available at http://en.rian.ru/russia/20080110/95978194.html

Dmitry Korobeinikov, ‘U.S. Could Deploy Missile Shield in Arctic – Russia's NATO Envoy’, RIA Novosti, 28 September 2010, available at http://en.rian.ru/russia/20090929/156282845.html; Mikhail Fomichev, ‘European Missile Defense System Either with Russia or against Russia – NATO Envoy’, RIA Novosti, 2 December 2010, available at http://en.rian.ru/russia/20101202/161595398.html

The Russian Navy is divided into four fleets (the Northern, Pacific, Baltic, and Black Sea Fleet) and one independent flotilla (the Caspian Flotilla). Two of the fleets are nuclear-armed (the Northern and the Pacific).

Taras Kuzio, ‘Russia Plans to Strengthen the Black Sea Fleet’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, 7 December 2010, available at http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=37255

Ilya Pitalev, ‘Russia's Pacific Fleet Ready to Receive Borey Class Submarines’, RIA Novosti, 19 October 2010, available at http://en.rian.ru/mlitary_news/20101019/161011788.html

Mikhail Tsypkin, ‘The Challenge of Understanding the Russian Navy’, in Stephen J. Blank and Richard Weitz (eds), The Russian Military Today and Tomorrow: Essays in Memory of Mary Fitzgerald (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, 2010), pp. 331–57.

‘Voyennaya Doktrina Rossiyskoi Federatsii’ [Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation], 2010, available at http://www.scrf.gov.ru/documents/sections/3/

Roger McDermott, ‘Makarov Announces “New Look” Operational-Strategic Commands’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, 15 June 2010, available at http://www.jamestown.org/programs/edm/

In discussions relating to the new command structure, it was suggested that all or parts of the Northern Fleet could be attributed to the new Northern/Central Command, possibly located in the North. This did not happen. The regional command headquarters for the central district are now (that is, since 1 December 2010) located in Yekaterinburg, some 1,300 kilometres south of the Arctic Ocean. Unlike the new Western, Southern, and Eastern Commands, the Yekaterinburg command controls no separate naval units.

Aleksei Elkin, ‘Podvodnye sily: novoye ob''edinenie – starye zadachy’ [The Submarine Forces: New Organization, Old Tasks], GTRK Murman, 11 February 2010, http://murman.rfn.ru/rnews.html?id=849491

Podvig, ‘Strategic Fleet’ (note 2).

International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance (London: Routledge, 1985), p. 26.

Ibid., p. 223.

Alexei Danichev, ‘Russia, France Open Exclusive Talks on Sale of Four Mistral Warships’, RIA Novosti, 1 March 2010, available at http://en.rian.ru/mlitary_news/20100301/158057156.html

Trude Pettersen, ‘Northern Fleet to get Helicopter Carrier First’, BarentsObserver, 26 May 2010, available at http://barentsobserver.com/northern-fleet-to-get-helicopter-carriers-first.4786923-116321.html

For further details, see Patrick Thomas Baker's recent Master's Degree thesis, A Study of the Russian Postgraduate School, 2011), pp. 61–72.

Stefan Büttner, ‘New Look for the Russian AF’, Combat Aircraft Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 6 (June 2010), pp. 26–33; Aleksandr Pinchuk, ‘Na aviabaze Besovets’ [At Besovets Air Base], Krasnaya zvezda, 24 March 2010, p. 12.

Mikhail Barabanov, ‘Kuda idet rossiyskiy flot?’ [Where Does the Russian Navy Go?], Kommersant Vlast', 25 February 2008, p. 73.

According to the Norwegian Joint Headquarters, the Russian strategic bomber fleet carried out ten patrol missions in the northwest (that is, west of 30 degrees east) in 2010, two less than in 2009 and 2008. Only one of the missions was carried out by a Tu-160 bomber. The remaining nine were carried out by older Tu-95 bombers. See Thomas Nilsen, ‘Less Russian Military Aircrafts in the Vicinity of Norwegian Airspace’, BarentsObserver, 7 January 2011, available at http://www.barentsobserver.com/security.58932.en.html