The Russian Northern Fleet and the (Re)militarisation of the Arctic

• Author: Jonas Kjellén
• Position: Swedish Defence Research Agency, Sweden
• Pages: 34-52

© 2022 Jonas Kjellén. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons

CC-BY4.0 License. eISSN 2387-4562. https://arcticreview.no.

Citation: Jonas Kjellén. “The Russian Northern Fleet and the (Re)militarisation of the Arctic” Arctic Review on Law and

Politics, Vol. 13, 2022, pp. 34–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.23865/arctic.v13.3338

Arctic Review on Law and Politics

Vol. 13, 2022, pp. 34–52

34

Correspondence to: Jonas Kjellén, e-mail: jonas.kjellen@foi.se

Peer-reviewed article

The Russian Northern Fleet and

the (Re)militarisation of the Arctic

Jonas Kjellén

Swedish Defence Research Agency, Sweden

Abstract

Over the last decade, Russia has considerably ramped up its military presence in the Arctic. This is

something that attracted much attention from Western countries, especially against the backdrop

of deteriorated relations and general mistrust following the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Current

developments are to some extent familiar, as they echo the militarisation of the Arctic during the

Cold War and the attendant US-Soviet tensions. Although comparisons with the Soviet Union’s

Arctic military posture lie close at hand, we need to analyse Russia’s current military build-up

in the Arctic with fresh eyes. Two of the most indicative developments were studied. Firstly, the

formation of a single Arctic military command, with its implications for a reassessment of the

Arctic strategic direction; secondly, the physical expansion of its Arctic military footprint, which

includes both the construction of modern facilities and the increased activity of its armed forces

there. In both these developments, the Northern Fleet is taking on a leading role, but the overall

military posture relies on other military and civilian actors as well, and is closely related to security

concerns of the developing latitudinal axis of the Northern Sea Route, rather than the Cold War

longitudinal axis of a massive nuclear weapons exchange.

Keywords: Russia, armed forces, Northern Fleet, High North, Arctic, bastion, Northern

Sea Route, C2, joint strategic command, militarisation, climate change

Responsible Editor: Njord Wegge, Norwegian Defence University College, Norway

Received: June 2021; Accepted: December 2021; Published: March 2022

1 Introduction

Early on in the post-Cold War world, the Arctic swiftly transitioned from being a

region of high military tension to one mainly characterised by cooperation and sta-

bility. The end of the East-West ideological confrontation resulted in the fading of

the imminent transpolar nuclear threat. Propelled by Russia’s economic and political

The Russian Northern Fleet and the (Re)militar isation of the Arctic

35

turmoil in the 1990s, the Russian Armed Forces – spawned from the Soviet armed

forces – entered a state of decay that lasted decades. However, by 2021, Russia

had experienced two decades of generally high economic growth, largely driven by

exploiting the hydrocarbon riches of the Russian Arctic. This enabled a thorough

military modernisation, commenced in 2009–10, which has backed a more assertive

and confrontational foreign policy. This development has once again spilled over

into the Arctic region.

This article aims to study Russia’s renewed military interest in the Arctic, and

the overarching research question guiding this work is: how should Russia’s enhanced

military focus in the Arctic be interpreted? For this, two specic developments are stud-

ied: rstly, the establishing of a single Arctic command based on the Northern Fleet

headquarters; secondly, the expansion of Russia’s Arctic military footprint. There

are indeed other ways to approach this subject, such as the study of ofcial docu-

ments and statements on how Moscow perceives security in the Arctic, but the two

themes studied here are perhaps the most indicative. The present article relies on

publicly available sources, including academic articles, specialised literature, news-

paper reporting, and ofcial Russian government information such as press releases.

To further focus my research and my somewhat open-ended research question,

the concluding analysis explores the degree to which the current events are best

characterized as something new. ‘Remilitarisation’ is commonly used to describe

current developments, suggesting it is feasible to interpret today’s military build-up

against the backdrop of the Soviet Arctic military posture.1 Indeed, with Russo-

Western relations once again at a low, the notion of an emerging new Cold War in

the Arctic is not far-fetched. This does not necessarily imply that Cold War notions

are entirely t for elucidating current developments. On the one hand, there are sim-

ilarities: the Northern Fleet remains Russia’s main military force in the Arctic and

sustaining nuclear second-strike capacity is still its most central task. On the other

hand, the ideological bipolarity of the Cold War is gone, as is the conventional mil-

itary capacity to counterbalance the world’s sole remaining superpower, the USA,

or even less the combined forces of NATO.2 Accelerating effects of global climate

change are also reshaping the geopolitics of the Arctic. In 2012, due to the lowest

concentration of sea ice ever observed in the Arctic, the Northern Sea Route (NSR)

was already open for shipping in mid-July.3

2 Command and control for Arctic operations

The accomplishment of two ostensibly, separate measures has led to an increase

in the Northern Fleet’s status, and transformed it into Russia’s leading Arctic

military command body. First, in December 2014, a Joint Strategic Command

(JSC) was formed, on the basis of the Northern Fleet headquarters. This was the

fth JSC formed since 2010, when four JSCs were formed on the basis of MD

headquarters. Then, by presidential order on 1 January 2021, the Northern Fleet