Donald Trump revisited his desire to “get” Greenland “one means or the other during a wide-ranging , 90-minute speech” to the US Congress on March 4. According to Trump,” for regional safety” his nation needed Greenland.
While he claimed that” we strongly support your right to decide your own future,” he continued, “if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America.”
In the first six months of his next term, Trump’s interests regarding Greenland and its enormous mineral wealth have strewn among other issues that have disorganized international politics in Europe.
The US leader is even discussing” cutting a offer” with Russian president Vladimir Putin as the White House presses Ukraine’s leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, to help the US to own the country’s material success.
That agreement would result in regional costs for Kyiv, as well as setting the stage for a potentially profound economic relationship between the White House and the Kremlin.
Trump and Putin’s current agenda is largely centered on the country’s mineral resources and its territory. However, conversations have even begun regarding possible locations for “deals,” including in the Arctic.
Given how significant both officials believe the Arctic should be in terms of the rich material resources they possess, a carve-up of it is a good idea for the two nations. Such a strategy would reveal Trump’s preference for interpersonal politics at the expense of international approaches, as in the case of Ukraine.
Any agreement in the Arctic would effectively put an end to the idea of” circumpolar cooperation.” Since the end of the cold war, this has upheld the regional supremacy of the eight Arctic states ( A8 ) that have cooperated to address common problems.
The A8 has been working on issues of environmental protection, green creation, human security, and technological collaboration since the Arctic Council was founded in 1996. In a time when Arctic snow is rapidly melting due to climate change, cooperation has been important.
Importantly, the Arctic Council was instrumental in the negotiation of a number of legally binding agreements. These include agreements on scientific cooperation ( 2017 ), marine oil pollution preparedness ( 2013 ), and search and rescue ( 2011 ). Additionally, it backed the Central Arctic Ocean fisheries agreement ( CAO ) that the Arctic Ocean states signed in 2018 with South Korea, China, Iceland, and the EU.
The Arctic Council and, more widely, latitudinal assistance, remained resilient to the political shocks caused by Russia’s 2014 and 2015 seizure of Crimea and sections of eastern Ukraine. However, faith was teetering on the edge as a result of Russia’s massive invasion of Ukraine.
Members of the Arctic Council and its clinical working groups, which were isolated in Moscow, had pressed pause on ordinary meetings a month earlier from Europe and North America.
Although some activities were gradually resumed in online formats at the working group level, Russia’s full withdrawal from Ukraine has remained a conditional one. In addition, the US and Europe imposed severe restrictions, including those aimed at Russian Arctic energy initiatives.
Russia’s comment was to strengthen its interactions with others. Russia and Russia are currently working together in the Arctic on commercial and scientific tasks. Nations like Brazil, India, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia are examples of this.
NATO allies expressed concern about a stronger and more difficult Russia-China existence across the Arctic following this tilt. However, the math has changed as a result of the following Trump presidency. A fresh Arctic attempt is now threatened by the risk of a reset of US-Russian relationships based on the predominance of the A8 rather than the A8.
Change of perspective
Trump’s filing of an executive attempt on February 4 to decide whether to remove support from international organizations might lead the White House to assume that the Arctic Council has no place in the world.
The Trump administration, which has already withdrawn from the Paris Agreement and is destroying local climate-related research programs, is anathema to its historic rely on climate change and economic security.
The White House, which favors the embracing of great power politics, is likely to reject the A8’s longstanding commitment to circumpolar cooperation or even a narrow A5 ( Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia, and the US) view of the Arctic Ocean coastal states ‘ supremacy. While many have argued that Russia cannot support the Arctic Council, losing US support and interest would undoubtedly be its death knell.
The possibility of Washington and Moscow dividing the Arctic and its resources seems more and more plausible in this” America first” environment.
The international agreements signed by the A8 and the CAO may also be in danger in this circumstance. If Trump gets his way over Greenland, Denmark may find itself completely cut off from Arctic affairs. In any case, all the Nordic Arctic states are likely to struggle to make their voices heard in the area.
If Trump brought US-Russia economic cooperation to extract the region’s wealth, what is the key question for European NATO and EU members to ask: Would they worry about Russian dominance in the European Arctic?
If doing so meant collaborating to unlock Svalbard’s mineral resources, let alone the wealth of the Arctic seabed, then might Trump even be supportive of Russian attempts to rewrite the 1920 Spitsbergen Treaty, which ultimately gave Norway control over the Arctic archipelago ( albeit with some limitations )?
What room, if any, would a deal allow for international scientific collaboration on pressing issues relating to climate and biodiversity?
If there has been anything to be learned from the recent tumult, it is that European nations, individually and collectively, struggle to exert strategic influence over contemporary geopolitical events. Europe might have to accept the end of the Arctic Council and circumpolar cooperation if Trump and Putin do start to talk about the Arctic.
The ability of indigenous people to choose their future would suffer as well as climate science, environmental protection, sustainable development, and other factors. Meanwhile, it will be up to the UK and Europe to decide what can be done to defend Arctic interests if anything.
Caroline Kennedy-Pipe is professor of war studies at Loughborough University, and Duncan Depledge is senior lecturer in geopolitics and security.
This article was republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.