Arctic Containment DA Top Level

Arctic Containment DA

Top Level

Note

1NC

Limited US presence enables Arctic cooperation and solves tensions – Russian aggression is simply rhetoric and won’t escalate

“I think the Arctic is, today at least, one of the last places for cooperation with Russia following the Ukrainian crisis,” Marlene Laruelle said.

“US-Russia [Arctic] cooperation will probably be less directed to cooperation on security issues because of the Ukrainian crisis,” she specified, “but there are several other elements that are still open for discussion.”

Since 2011 the US has increased its stake in Arctic security and development and currently holds the chairmanship for the Arctic Council. The US is planning to invest $1.5 billion focusing on the Arctic, according to former State Department official Heather Conley.

“The securitization trend we see in the Arctic from the Russian side is mostly not an issue of military aggressiveness, but it is a business issue,” Laruelle said.

Concerning Russia’s delimitation of its continental shelf and control over the North Sea Pass, Laruelle said “Russia is playing by the rules.” The demarcation of national and international waterways is contested within the Arctic Council, but the first voyage of a Chinese merchant ship, Hong Xing, through the North Sea Pass last year set a precedent when the ship adhered to all Russian requirements for passage.

There are hopes that increased trade will take place through Arctic routes. The route is expected to see between ten and twelve commercial trips this year.

Laruelle’s remarks were part of a panel discussion at the Wilson Center on the interests of the Arctic nations, and the increasing participation in the region by non-Arctic players, particularly China, Japan, Korea, and Singapore.

The aff’s containment strategy provokes Russia into brinksmanship and wrecks relations – causes miscalculation and escalating aggression

As the situation in Ukraine continues to worsen, Canada is under increasing pressure to include the Arctic as part of NATO’s strategy to counteract Russian aggression. In the following, we content that it should continue to resist this pressure—even in the wake of events in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.

The efforts to increase NATO’s common interests in the Arctic began as far back as 2010 with Norway broaching the subject at a NATO Summit. At that time, Canada requested that the Arctic be removed from the Summit’s agenda as Canada felt that NATO had no place in Arctic affairs.

Recent events in Ukraine have evoked concern among NATO allies about Russia’s potential interest in expanding its borders. In a recent meeting of the Russian Security Council, Russian President Putin highlighted the “special” place of the Arctic in Russia’s sphere of influence. Referring directly to Russia’s future Arctic strategy, Putin noted: “We need to take additional measures so as not to fall behind our partners, to maintain Russian influence in the region and, maybe in some areas, to be ahead of our partners.” Russia is in the process of continuing its militarization of the Arctic and this week’s comments regarding Russia’s future Arctic interests is cause for concern.

Having mishandled the crisis in Ukraine for so long, NATO’s response can now be defined as “neo-containment” in which NATO bolsters its military presence in Poland and the Baltic states in an effort to dissuade Putin from going any further with his quest for what he has called “New Russia.” However, it would be incredibly unwise for NATO to include the Arctic as a component of the neo-containment strategy moving forward.

The idea of extending NATO to the Arctic theatre is not a new one. Canadian officials raised the possibility of such an extended mandate in the 1950s when Soviet bombers posed a threat to North America through Arctic airspace. Canada’s concerns at the time, however, were shaped as much by the relationship with its southern neighbour as they were with the Soviet threat. Indeed, Ottawa was hoping to deflect living under an exclusively bilateral (NORAD) umbrella by including our European allies in the plan. The Americans and NATO’s European members took little interest in the Canadian request and the matter was dropped.

The situation today is completely different. Russian interests in the Arctic are not primarily about a global competition for power through territorial expansion (despite the indirect implications of power accumulation); it is about pressing territorial and resource claims to their most extreme limits. At the same time, every other Arctic state is pressing similar claims. While military power is not insignificant in asserting and defending such claims, it has not been the exclusive, nor even primary, means employed thus far. Diplomatic and institutional measures are still a viable option for resolving these territorial disputes. A NATO presence in the Arctic would severely undermine these non-military measures and would likely provoke Russia into a game of brinkmanship.

To date, Arctic relations have been entirely diplomatic, with no genuine hint of armed conflict on the immediate horizon. It is true that Arctic states have invested significant domestic resources into Arctic scientific exploration, resource extraction technology and military assets but thus far relations in the Arctic Region have been cooperative. For the first time since the crisis in Ukraine began, though, the Arctic became a component of a broader strategic discussion when Canada withdrew from the meeting of the Arctic Council’s task force on black carbon and methane held in Moscow. Even so, it is likely that Canada’s withdrawal from the proceedings had more to do with the fact that the meeting was being held in Moscow and not a sincere effort on Canada’s part to goad Russia on policy issues concerning the Arctic.

The disputes at play in the Arctic are also fundamentally different from those being played out in Ukraine. Any attempt to link them would be counterproductive on many fronts. Much has been made in the weeks since the implosion in Ukraine on the effects that NATO expansion has had on Russian foreign policy. Regardless of how one interprets the effects of NATO’s expansion to the borders of Russia, extending the alliance into the Arctic would only confirm the perception in Moscow that the alliance’s primary objective has been to encircle Russia and deny what it views as legitimate security interests on its borders. If Russians weren’t paranoid about being trapped before, such a move by NATO would surely reinforce such a view.

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1NC Link – Icebreakers

The aff is perceived as a military demonstration of force. This spills over to broader deterrence and containment apparatuses in the Arctic – causes war.

2NC Overview

The turn outweighs the aff’s internal link – status quo deterrence and cooperation mean Russia will not initiate conflict in the Arctic, but strategic importance of resources means the mere perception of American encroachment provides the external trigger for war.

Bailes 13 – Alyson Bailes, Visiting Professor, University of Iceland, member of the Advisory Council of Independent Diplomat, visiting professor to the College of Europe teaching a course in New Security Challenges and Security Governance, former English Diplomat who has served as Deputy Head of Mission and Consul General at the British Embassy in Oslo, Head of the Security Policy Department at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Vice President for the European Security Programme at the Institute for EastWest Studies, and Political Director of the Western European Union, holds a Bachelor of Arts degree (First Class Honors) in Modern History and a Master of Arts from Somerville College, Oxford University, 2013 (“Arctic: new conflict theatre between Russia and the West, or model of peace?” European Leadership Network, December 16^th, http://www.europeanleadershipnetwork.org/arctic-new-conflict-theatre-between-russia-and-the-west-or-model-of-peace_1099.html | ADM)

To be sure, some commentators on the Arctic have other worries than just a disorderly 'race for oil'. They note signs of increased military spending on assets designed for the polar seas, together with support facilities; and they warn that an 'incident' could escalate into an international clash. What of these complications?

First, all Arctic states except Russia are cutting military expenditure generally and their Arctic plans are modest, involving mainly higher-tech replacements for old assets and a small growth in numbers. Russia's plans in the Arctic are not more grandiose than elsewhere and actual construction has made a slow start. New bases like Denmark's in East Greenland, and Russia's being built in the New Siberian Islands (far to the East), are designed mainly to get closer to the High Northern seas for purposes of patrolling and policing, climate monitoring, and response to accidents. A study in 2012 by the respected pro-peace institute SIPRI concluded: "Conventional military forces specially adapted to the harsh Arctic environment are projected to remain small scale, especially given the size of the Arctic region, and will remain in some cases considerably below cold war levels."[i]

One must also remember that Russia and the West remain in a state of uneasy strategic balance overall, despite all the progress made since the Cold War. Russia's northern coast is now its only real major 'break-out' area, and its forces there are also supposed to offset US and Western power in general. But recalling this also highlights something many analysts miss. The nuclear and naval stand-off between the USA and the Soviet Union or Russia has always taken place over the North Pole. Albeit by a deadly and costly logic, it has kept the peace since the 1950s. Why should either side think they could use military force against the other, in this very area, without the terrible dangers of escalation? Can one really imagine Russia fighting any of the other countries around the Arctic, all full NATO members, without fear of NATO retaliation? So long as Moscow's own Arctic assets are secure and the key sea route firmly under its grip, why would it take that risk here more than anywhere else?

Arguably, in fact, the Arctic interaction of Russia and the West is less tense, less subject to out-of-control incidents, than anywhere else their strategic peripheries touch. Since Cold-War times both sides have cooperated on Arctic exploration and environmental management. Since 1996 the Arctic Council has formalized and extended this cooperation, inter alia reaching two legally binding agreements (among the five Nordics, Russia, USA and Canada) on cooperation in Search and Rescue, and major oil-spill response, respectively. Under these agreements all sides have pledged to use their naval and air assets and other security expertise to help each other when something goes wrong. Add the way that Russia has opened up for Western investment in its own Arctic resource exploitation, and there seems rather less to worry about here than in the Caucasus or even the Eastern Baltic.

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