The New Arctic Geography and U.S. Strategy

Abstract

It is axiomatic that climate change is affecting the Arctic more than any other region. Arctic sea ice continues to decrease. The summer of 2010 had the third-smallest extent of polar ice on record, and the 2010 ice volume was the lowest on record. One study suggests that the water flowing from the North Atlantic into the Arctic Ocean is warmer today than at any time during the past 2,000 years. The polar ice sheet is melting. In August 2010, a giant mass of solid ice broke away from the Petermann Glacier in northwest Greenland – the largest calving from an ice shelf since 1962. Although the cause of the Petermann calving is uncertain, the Arctic Five (A5) – Russia, Canada, the United States, Norway, and Denmark (Greenland) – are bracing for continuous warming and corresponding geophysical changes in the Arctic. Circumpolar melting ice foreshadows the prospect of associated political-military change. Will a confluence of political rivalries and a changing climate upend the strategic environment just as melting ice transforms the ocean geography? This is not the first time that climate change has had the potential to cause dramatic political effects. The Little Ice Age that lasted from the sixteenth century to the nineteenth century was marked by a period of worldwide cooling. The seventeenth century, in particular, faced upheaval and adversity on a monumental scale. The planet cooled in the Little Ice Age following the medieval warm period, freezing Chesapeake Bay and chilling Alexandria, Egypt; rice crops in Japan and wheat in Portugal were killed by the cold. Climate change caused widespread famine, which descended into anarchy, triggering riots, warfare, and chaos throughout much of the world.