While Trump attacks the United States

Bergen, Norway — In the frigid waters off the coast of Norway, America’s NATO allies scour the depths in search of clandestine Russian activity.

This stretch of ocean, seen as a gateway to the Arctic, is where the high north of Europe meets the high north of Russia, home to the Kremlin’s Northern Fleet.

Russian nuclear-armed submarines are regularly dispatched from the vast naval base on the frozen Kola Peninsula, slipping silently beneath the waves before heading into the North Atlantic.

News themezone joined the crew of a NATO warship participating in exercises aimed at detecting, tracking and, if necessary, eliminating these submarines before they pass through the narrow gap between Green EarthIceland and the United Kingdom, and then to the east coast of the United States.

If a war broke out between Russia and the United States and its NATO allies, the area would become a strategic bottleneck.

Commanders consider Operation Arctic Dolphin, an exercise involving ships, submarines and aircraft from Spain, Germany, France, the United Kingdom and many other nations, to be essential to maintaining cohesion in a military alliance that has lasted 75 years.

“Norway has the great advantage of being part of such a large alliance,” said Commodore Kyrre Haugen, commander of the Norwegian fleet that oversees Arctic Dolphin. “But every nation is taking advantage of being part of something that is bigger than themselves.”

The commander said Norway has operated in the Arctic since the Cold War, and the “special focus” on the region now highlights how crucial it is to the security of both Europe and the United States.

“Those missiles can attack Europe, they can attack the United States if they are deployed in the deep seas, all in the Atlantic,” he said, referring to Russia’s arsenal.

The NATO exercise is just one aspect of a race to secure a region that has become a “front line for strategic competition,” according to U.S. Air Force Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander in Europe.

Russia is already using the Arctic as a testing ground for its hypersonic missiles, designed to evade US air defenses.

But threats to regional stability have also emerged closer to home.

President Trump angered NATO partners by repeatedly insisting that the United States needed to seize Greenland and by threatening last month to impose tariffs on allies if they did not comply.

He stepped back that threat, announcing a still vaguely defined “definitive long-term agreement” with the United States’ NATO allies in Greenland, but also habitually attacks those alliesaccusing them of not spending enough on their own defense.

It is undeniable that the alliance is catching up in the Arctic and high north. Seven of the eight Arctic states are NATO allies. However, Russia, with more than half of the Arctic coast in its territory, has almost as many permanently staffed bases in the region as all NATO members combined.

On the bridge of the Spanish frigate ESPS Almirante Juan de Borbón, the commander defended Spain’s contribution to NATO on News themezone, which Trump recently accused of not being “loyal” to the alliance.

“I’m not going to delve into the political dynamics,” Rear Admiral Joaquín Ruiz Escagedo said, before gesturing to the young naval officers busy in front of maps and radar screens. “But I would say that Spain’s contribution can be seen here.”

Escagedo said the country has “many capabilities” and is committed to NATO’s principle of collective defense.

“We cannot be isolated. The power of NATO is unity,” he said. “That is the success of NATO for decades.”

That unit is about to be put to the test with a new mission.

NATO plans new Arctic Sentry mission to “improve surveillance” in the far north

A spokesperson for General Grynkewich, the US NATO commander in Europe, confirmed to News themezone that a mission is being planned in the Arctic region.

Arctic Sentry will be an “enhanced surveillance activity to further strengthen NATO’s posture in the Arctic and High North.”

The spokesperson told News themezone that planning for the new mission “has just begun, but details will be provided in due course.”

The possibility of an Arctic Sentry mission was first mentioned by Britain’s top diplomat last month, as an element of negotiations that resolved Trump’s standoff with Europe over the fate of Greenland.

Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said the UK had proposed working “through NATO on a new Arctic Sentinel, which is similar to what we already have through NATO: a Baltic Sentinel and an Eastern Sentinel”, referring to existing regional security partnerships between NATO allies.

“This will now be a focus of work across NATO, with different Arctic countries coming together and supported by other NATO countries on how to achieve that shared security,” he told News themezone partner BBC News on January 22.