Feuer Frei!
06-08-11, 09:05 PM
It wasn’t long ago that the press was running wild with hyperbolic claims (http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2011/01/10/US-slow-to-protect-arctic-interests/UPI-16871294680118/) of the U.S. losing out in an impending Arctic conflict (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/09/AR2011010904358.html). After all, global warming is freeing up access to large deposits of oil, gas and minerals right in the backyard of the Russians. But the press forgot to tell other polar nations to freak out.
Indeed, at a forum convened on Wednesday by the Center for Strategic and International Security, ambassadors from four polar nations, including some traditionally menaced by Russia, were sanguine about the future of polar exploration.
“We actually think we handled these areas for decades during the Cold War rather well,” said Wegger Strommen, Norway’s man in Washington.
The U.S Geological Survey assesses that the North Pole holds about 13 percent of the world’s untapped oil supplies. Companies and nations are champing at the bit to expand exploration (http://www.arcticstardiamond.com/s/NickelExploration.asp?ReportID=338730&_Title=Nickel-Exploration) as the ice caps melt. The Russians have an advantage: a fleet of six nuclear powered icebreakers on its northern shore. By contrast, the U.S. Coast Guard has just one, the cutter Healy. (http://www.uscg.mil/pacarea/cgcHealy/)
But no one’s sweating it. Should there actually be an arctic sea conflict, the U.S. submarine fleet is second to none.
And a massive Arctic oil rush is “years off,” Strommen added, since the “climate is harsh, the conditions are difficult and it’s incredibly expensive.” Beyond that, the Russians are warm in the Arctic. Russia finalized a maritime border with Norway on Tuesday that took 30 years to negotiate. Strommen’s colleagues from Greenland, Canada and Sweden gave high marks to a meeting last month of the Arctic Council (http://russia-media.ru/generalnews/morenews.php?iditem=2531), the diplomatic contact group of arctic nations, in which Russia signed onto an accord for search and rescue missions in the cold waters. Think of it as a diplomatic thaw.
SOURCE (http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/06/war-for-the-arctic-never-mind/)
Indeed, at a forum convened on Wednesday by the Center for Strategic and International Security, ambassadors from four polar nations, including some traditionally menaced by Russia, were sanguine about the future of polar exploration.
“We actually think we handled these areas for decades during the Cold War rather well,” said Wegger Strommen, Norway’s man in Washington.
The U.S Geological Survey assesses that the North Pole holds about 13 percent of the world’s untapped oil supplies. Companies and nations are champing at the bit to expand exploration (http://www.arcticstardiamond.com/s/NickelExploration.asp?ReportID=338730&_Title=Nickel-Exploration) as the ice caps melt. The Russians have an advantage: a fleet of six nuclear powered icebreakers on its northern shore. By contrast, the U.S. Coast Guard has just one, the cutter Healy. (http://www.uscg.mil/pacarea/cgcHealy/)
But no one’s sweating it. Should there actually be an arctic sea conflict, the U.S. submarine fleet is second to none.
And a massive Arctic oil rush is “years off,” Strommen added, since the “climate is harsh, the conditions are difficult and it’s incredibly expensive.” Beyond that, the Russians are warm in the Arctic. Russia finalized a maritime border with Norway on Tuesday that took 30 years to negotiate. Strommen’s colleagues from Greenland, Canada and Sweden gave high marks to a meeting last month of the Arctic Council (http://russia-media.ru/generalnews/morenews.php?iditem=2531), the diplomatic contact group of arctic nations, in which Russia signed onto an accord for search and rescue missions in the cold waters. Think of it as a diplomatic thaw.
SOURCE (http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/06/war-for-the-arctic-never-mind/)