NATO’s Naval Forces Are Demonstrating Their Arctic Commitment for Trump

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They are also responding with increased surveillance of the Arctic region. Even before Trump’s threats, NATO’s Arctic members — reinforced by the accession of Sweden and Finland — have been calling for the alliance to take the region more seriously. Britain and Norway agreed to jointly operate a fleet of warships to hunt Russian submarines, with the UK also planning to place military assets in the country to better prepare for future crises. Norway, Denmark and Sweden — all Arctic nations — are planning to expand their frigate fleets. 

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But Russia, too, has expanded its military presence.

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The Russian Navy commanded an estimated 64 vessels in 2024, 16 of which are strategic nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative. That compares in the same year with an estimated 71 US submarines, 14 of them ballistic missile boats. Russia operates one-third more military bases in the Arctic Circle than all NATO members put together, according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

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NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte has said the alliance needs to take more collective responsibility for the defense of the Arctic. NATO’s outgoing maritime chief Mike Utley told Bloomberg last year that though the alliance has superior capabilities to Russia they don’t currently have the military resilience for a protracted conflict.

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“I wouldn’t say we lost those capabilities but I will say that we have not exercised as we had to and we have to regain and rebuild those capabilities as soon as possible,” Rear Admiral Joaquín Ruiz Escagedo, Commander of the NATO maritime group taking part in the exercise, told Bloomberg. That’s because anti-submarine warfare wasn’t a priority for NATO allies over several decades, due to the focus on land forces in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, he said.

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Sweden’s former foreign minister, Tobias Billström, who negotiated the country’s entry to NATO, said he doesn’t believe the alliance has enough of a grasp on Russia’s submarine fleet operating in the Arctic and may need to develop more capacity in the region to detect and track them.

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NATO has launched an enhanced vigilance mission, “Arctic Sentry,” which will mirror how the alliance operates in Eastern Europe and the Baltic, though it mainly involves reorganizing and better coordinating the alliance’s existing assets.

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“It’s certainly an improvement and it shows willingness, which after all is what was being asked by Washington,” Billström said.

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During the Norwegian Sea exercise, once the submarines are detected, they and the naval fleet practice tactical maneuvers in a war-style scenario which mimics how they would attack each other with torpedoes, without actually firing them. 

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It’s like “playing hide and seek,” said Lieutenant Commander Marc Jereskes of the Dutch Navy.

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This is no game, though: if Russia launches a ballistic missile from one of its submarines in the Arctic, it is capable of hitting the US mainland. 

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With greater investment and advancing technology, Russia’s submarines are becoming more deadly and harder to track. Nuclear submarines, unlike the conventional ones used on Arctic Dolphin, are faster and don’t need to come to the surface as often. Last year, President Vladimir Putin unveiled Russia’s latest submarine, capable of carrying Poseidon torpedo drones, which he said had evaded interception in tests.

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Melting ice is meanwhile opening new shipping routes, which Russia’s shadow fleet is taking advantage of, helping to fuel its war against Ukraine. One hundred sanctioned ships sailed through the Northern Sea Route along Russia’s Arctic coast in 2025, 87 more than the previous year, according to the Bellona Environmental Foundation. Though the numbers are still small, container ships are also increasingly using the route, which can halve the 40-day Asia-to-Europe trip via southern Africa.