Military Review English Edition November-December 2014 | Page 63

ARCTIC STRATEGY Members of the Arctic Response Company Group face intense cold and prepare for a possible displacement 3 March 2014 during Exercise Guerrier Nordique in Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada. (Photo by Cpl. Valérie Villeneuve, 35th Canadian Brigade Group) relationship that undermines our military’s ability to make substantial headway in developing a joint Arctic warfare capability. Conclusion As Chad Briggs observed, “changing environmental conditions … create new security risks where none existed before.”28 He goes on to say that military threats likewise shift, demand a new strategic focus, and, in some extreme cases, require an entirely new tactical approach to maneuver warfare. The Arctic region requires just such a shift in strategic focus. The time may well be coming when countries collide over their interests in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. Although we hope for peaceful expansion of business interests and governance into the Arctic, we must also prudently prepare to defend national interests at the top of the world against those who would oppose us or seek to exert control over the region. At present, we are not prepared for such a contingency. In the face of such a clear and plausible danger, strategic-level leaders and planners should be aware that despite having articulated a formal Arctic strategy for DOD, current capabilities at the joint tactical and operational levels do not include adequately trained and equipped ground combat units who could perform successful Arctic operations. Furthermore, while a small contingent of leaders and instructors in various U.S. military units maintain a certain depth of knowledge in Arctic operations and the associated skills, the Army and joint community lack the critical institutional knowledge and the trained and experienced personnel necessary to quickly create and employ enough units capable of accomplishing the kinds of major operations that may be needed in the Arctic region. As the Arctic becomes indisputably more important and other nations with Arctic borders move toward increased operational capability in the region, every year of delay puts the U.S. military at further risk of being unprepared to defend its own interests or those of its NATO allies in the region. As Arctic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson wrote in his treatise The Northward Course of Empire, “There is no northern boundary beyond which productive enterprise cannot go until North meets North on opposite shores of the Arctic Ocean.”29 Capt. Nathan Fry, U.S. Army National Guard, is the intelligence officer for 3rd Battalion, 172nd Infantry Regiment (Mountain), of the Vermont National Guard’s 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team (Mountain). He holds a B.A. in Russian from Dickinson College and is currently completing his M.S. in environmental and natural resources at the University of Vermont’s Rubenstein School. Fry is also pursuing certification as an alpine, rock, and ski guide from the International Federation of Mountain Guides Association. He led the U.S. Guerrier Nordique 2014 team on Baffin Island. MILITARY REVIEW  November-December 2014 61