Stuck between the US and Russia, Canada must prove it can defend its Arctic territory

The Canadian Arctic is a huge, dangerous and largely inhospitable place, spanning nearly 4 million square kilometers of territory – but with a small population roughly equal to that of Blackburn, England or Syracuse, New York.

“You can take a map of continental Europe, put it over the Canadian Arctic, and there’s still room,” Pierre Leblanc, former commander of the Canadian Forces Northern Sector, told the BBC. “And this environment is extremely dangerous.”

To defend this immense landmass, there is an aging suite of early warning radars, eight staffed military bases and about 100 full-time Coast Guard members covering 162,000 km of coastline, or about 60 per cent of Canada’s total ocean coastline.

The Arctic region is the scene of intense geopolitical competition, bordered by Russia and the United States on either side of the North Pole – and increasingly attractive to China, which has declared itself a “near Arctic state” and has significantly expanded its fleet of warships and icebreakers.

In the middle is Canada, whose population represents only a small fraction of the Arctic’s biggest players.

Nearly four years after Arctic security grabbed headlines following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the defense of Canada’s Far North has once again been brought to the forefront of public consciousness by Donald Trump’s plans for Greenland, a self-governing part of the Kingdom of Denmark that the White House says is vital to protecting the United States from potential enemies abroad.

The Canadian Arctic has not gone unnoticed by the Trump administration, which is reportedly increasingly concerned about perceived vulnerabilities by U.S. adversaries, and which in April signed an executive order emphasizing “the United States’ commitment to ensuring both freedom of navigation and American dominance in Arctic waterways.”

The Canadian government, for its part, sought to reassure the United States and its NATO allies that it was doing its part to protect the region.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Canada was working to ensure “our shared goals of security and prosperity in the Arctic” through “unprecedented” investments in radar systems, submarines, aircraft and “boots on the ground” in the region.

Colonel Leblanc, who spent a total of nine years in the Canadian Arctic, said these investments marked a “major shift” in Arctic security, noting that Canada’s increased defense spending – from 2% to 5% of GDP by 2035 – meant “real action” in terms of additional radars and over-the-horizon aircraft dedicated to the Arctic.

Much of that attention, he added, has been driven by the Trump administration’s renewed focus on the Arctic and Greenland.

“[That] certainly helps the Canadian government move in the right direction,” added Leblanc.

Yet challenges persist, including limited port facilities and difficulties resupplying remote bases, sometimes thousands of miles apart, cold and empty.

While Canada and other U.S. allies in NATO have opposed the Trump administration’s attempt to “take control” of Greenland to protect the Arctic, several experts who spoke to the BBC agreed with the administration’s general assessment that the need for additional defenses in the region is urgent.

Troy Bouffard, director of the Center for Arctic Security and Resilience, based in Fairbanks, Alaska, said that while on-the-ground cooperation between the United States and Canada in the Arctic “remains the envy of the world,” much of the existing defense infrastructure was designed to combat Cold War-era threats, rather than existing ones.

He notably warned of the prospect of hypersonic missiles that would travel at least five times the speed of sound, making them much harder to detect and intercept than traditional ballistic missiles, which would follow predictable arcs over the North Pole.

Such a threat is no longer theoretical.

Russia has used hypersonic missiles in combat in Ukraine, including a strike in January that saw the first operational use of the nuclear-capable “Oreshnik” missile that carries multiple warheads at around 10 times the speed of sound.

“This technology has changed everything for us. We need to review the entire North American defense system and remake it,” he said. “What currently exists cannot defend against hypersonic cruise missiles at all. Like 0%.”

Traditional ground-based radar systems, he added, “are not going to work” against these emerging technologies. Space satellites also face coverage gaps in high latitudes, leading to renewed attention and investment in above-the-horizon radars.

Notably, over-the-horizon technology – along with space sensors – is a key part of the Trump administration’s planned Golden Dome missile defense system for North America.

For now, it’s unclear what role Canada will play in the Golden Dome, a project that Trump said in Davos Canada should “be grateful for.”

On Friday, Trump posted on Truth Social that Canada was opposed to the idea of ​​having the Golden Dome over Greenland “even though the Golden Dome would protect Canada.” Instead, they voted to do business with China, which will “eat” them within the first year!

The BBC has contacted Carney’s office for comment.

Those negotiations have been strained by the often antagonistic relationship between the United States and Canada, with Trump announcing in May that Canada could pay $61 billion to join the program or become the 51st U.S. state and join for free.

Trump’s remarks prompted Canada’s UN ambassador, Bob Rae, to liken it to a “protection racket.”

Despite the tensions, Michael Byers, an Arctic security expert at the University of British Columbia, said U.S. concerns about Arctic security and its threats of tariffs have helped prompt the Canadian government to refocus on the Arctic.

“Whether American concerns are justified or not, there is a feeling in Ottawa that we must satisfy [them]“No one takes the issue of the 51st state seriously, but what we take seriously are the economic pressures that the United States is capable of imposing.”

“The Canadian government is very aware of this possibility,” he added.

However, high-level tensions between Ottawa and Washington have yet to translate into on-the-ground tensions in the Arctic, with some expressing confidence that the United States and Canada are cooperating for the time being.

“It’s a matter for politicians,” Bouffard said. “It has complicated things, but practitioners will continue to work together until they are not allowed to. Everyone will have to rise above the rhetoric.”