The glacier has moved: Russia has warned of further militarization of Greenland
Moscow is recording the militarization of Greenland, which is being conducted under the guise of allegations of an allegedly growing Russian military threat. This was stated to Izvestia by Russian Ambassador to Copenhagen Vladimir Barbin. According to him, the Arctic, which was a region of low tension and cooperation, is turning into a zone of confrontation through the efforts of NATO. In particular, Denmark intends to deploy F-35 fighter jets on the island. In addition, Arctic-class frigates and patrol ships, transport and patrol aircraft, and long-range UAVs will be purchased. How the Russian Federation can respond to new threats is described in the Izvestia article.
What types of weapons may appear in Greenland
The conflict over Greenland, which was provoked by the claims of American President Donald Trump to the island, has not ended. However, as Russian Ambassador Vladimir Barbin explained to Izvestia, negotiations between Denmark, Greenland and the United States on ensuring American interests on the island, which have been underway since January 2026 at the initiative of Copenhagen, have made it possible to remove contradictions from the public space. In Copenhagen, according to the diplomat, they proceed from the fact that the United States will not give up its claims to Greenland, even if the negotiations are successful, but then it will be more difficult for them to realize such intentions.
Despite the fact that there is no clear clarity on the Greenland issue yet, Moscow records the active militarization of the island, which creates new threats to Russian security. Russia, which has the longest and most strategically important Arctic coastline in the world, is forced to consider any unilateral actions by the United States and NATO around Greenland as a direct and blatant attempt to fundamentally revise the international legal status of the region.
"The militarization of the island and the Arctic as a whole is being conducted under the guise of allegations of an allegedly growing Russian military threat, although until recently Copenhagen denied the existence of Russian military activity in the Greenland region," Vladimir Barbin told Izvestia.
Moscow, as well as Beijing, have repeatedly denied all accusations of "creating threats."
According to the Russian diplomat, the United States explains its claims to Greenland's ownership by Denmark's allegedly insufficient attention to the island's defense. Copenhagen, for its part, seeks to present Greenland's defense as the responsibility of the entire NATO, including the United States. This allows both to disavow the American accusations against themselves and to demonstrate European countries' support for Denmark's territorial integrity, the Russian ambassador added.
At the same time, since January 2025, Copenhagen has allocated about $6.5 billion to strengthen its military potential in the Arctic latitudes. Denmark intends, in particular, to deploy F-35 fighter jets in Greenland. Arctic-class frigates and patrol ships, transport and patrol aircraft, long-range UAVs for monitoring the marine zone near the island, and anti-submarine warfare equipment will also be purchased, Barbin said.
In the next five years, the course towards the gradual militarization of the Arctic will continue, believes Alexander Sporshev, senior lecturer at the Department of European and International Law at the Law Faculty of the National University of National Research. Moreover, we are talking not so much about the massive deployment of troops as about the development of dual-use infrastructure: radar stations, surveillance systems and marine sensors, UAVs, airfields, patrol aircraft and naval groups.
The main driver of militarization will remain the strategic rivalry between Russia and NATO, as well as China's growing interest in the Arctic. Therefore, even with a change of administrations in Washington or governments in European countries, the general course is unlikely to change significantly, said Sporshev.
What could be Russia's response?
Until last year, the armed forces of non-Arctic NATO countries, primarily Great Britain, France and Germany, were present in Greenland and in the Arctic as a whole in a national capacity. But since the beginning of 2026, at the initiative of Denmark, such military activity has been institutionalized under the auspices of NATO, Vladimir Barbin noted.
"The NATO Arctic Sentry Operation has been launched, the purpose of which is to intimidate Russia and take control of shipping routes, including Russia's exit from the Arctic to the North Atlantic Ocean," the ambassador added. — The Arctic, which was a region of low tension and cooperation, is now turning into a zone of confrontation and confrontation through the efforts of NATO with the active participation of Denmark.
Greenland's location allows NATO forces to fully control the Faroese-Icelandic border, through which ships and submarines of the Russian Navy's Northern Fleet sail from the Arctic seas into the open Atlantic. Although Moscow has every right to use this boundary, since it consists of open seas and international straits.
Moreover, the deployment of aviation and fleet in Greenland allows NATO to project force on the western part of the Northern Sea Route, Russia's key national transport artery in the Arctic. The island is also becoming a NATO electronic and satellite intelligence center.
— One of the main risks is the formation of a closed ring of bases around Northern Russia. The expansion of US and NATO control over Greenland fits into the configuration of Russia's strategic environment in the Arctic and North Atlantic directions," Pavel Anisimov, Deputy director of the Institute of International Relations and Political Sciences at the Russian State University of Economics, explained to Izvestia.
In addition, the growing military activity of NATO in the Arctic increases the risk of provocations and incidents between Russian and NATO forces. Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry warned that "any attempts to ignore Russia's interests in the Arctic, especially in the field of security, will not go unanswered and will have far-reaching consequences."
Russia's response to the militarization of Greenland may include several levels. The first is diplomatic: harsh criticism of the militarization of the island and the Arctic in general in bilateral contacts, on the platforms of the UN Security Council, the Arctic Council and relevant forums. According to Anisimov, Moscow will also actively promote the thesis of the need to preserve the Arctic as a zone of peace and cooperation, with an emphasis on the inadmissibility of deploying offensive systems.
The second level is military-technical. In this case, we can talk about strengthening the Northern Fleet grouping, developing Arctic airfields, air defense and missile defense systems, strengthening patrols in the North Atlantic and the Arctic, as well as deploying additional reconnaissance, electronic warfare and control over waters where NATO forces are likely to be active, including the Barents and Norwegian Seas.
At the same time, the militarization of Greenland is changing the overall balance of power in the Arctic. According to Anisimov, the development of military infrastructure on the island strengthens the "center of gravity" of NATO in the region. This means shifting the regional balance away from cooperation and towards the structural dominance of NATO.
After Sweden and Finland joined NATO, the northern flank moved out of the secondary category and became one of the dominant areas in relations between Russia and NATO. The Arctic was immune from conflicts that occurred on other continents, and now it fits into the general confrontational logic and turns the northern latitudes into another front of confrontation, Anisimov concluded.
Nevertheless, the scenario of a direct armed conflict with the use of conventional forces in the Arctic is currently not considered realistic by states, says Roman Zhilin, a junior researcher at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Moreover, even in the current situation, interest in cooperation persists and is even gradually being articulated, both in the scientific field related to the study of climate change and the state of ecosystems, and in the economic sphere, including energy and transport and logistics projects.
"The probability of a large—scale armed conflict in the Arctic remains low, but the density of military activity will gradually increase,— Sporshev agrees.
What is the United States trying to achieve
At the same time, there remains a factor of political uncertainty, primarily related to the Trump administration. If Washington continues to rigidly promote the idea of expanding its presence in Greenland or increases pressure on Denmark and the island's authorities, this can accelerate the processes of militarization.
At the end of May this year, Jeff Landry, the Trump-appointed special envoy for Greenland-American relations, said that the United States wanted to see Greenland as an independent state. Washington sees opportunities for the transition of autonomy "from dependence to independence," he said.
Analysts regard this as an attempt to weaken the island's ties with Copenhagen for a subsequent rapprochement with the United States. After all, Donald Trump had previously said that Greenland was of "paramount importance to national and global security" and there was "no turning back" on this issue. The American leader drew attention to the fact that the island is critically important for the deployment of elements of a promising missile defense system, informally called the Golden Dome. Although Greenland's Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen has officially confirmed that the island is opting for an alliance with Denmark, the EU and NATO and categorically does not consider the scenario of joining the United States.
The head of the Danish Joint Arctic Command in Greenland, General Søren Andersen, recently stated that Greenland has a sufficient number of military bases to protect itself and support NATO operations. Such statements are generally well-founded. After all, the current 1951 Greenland Defense Treaty already gives the United States serious opportunities to create new military facilities on Greenland territory, Nikita Belukhin, a junior researcher at the Department of European Political Studies at the IMEMO RAS, noted in an interview with Izvestia.
At the moment, the United States has one Pituffik military space base in Greenland, but they want to additionally receive three or four more bases. According to Barbin, the Danes and Greenlanders don't mind. However, as follows from media leaks about the negotiations, the status of the US bases became a stumbling block. Americans do not want to be guests on the island, but hosts and extend US sovereignty to the territory of the bases. In response, they hear that Greenland will not compromise its sovereignty, even if it is a territory the size of a postage stamp.
— The situation is similar with regard to the US economic presence on the island, including expanding access of American companies to the development of its mineral resources. Greenland is interested in developing economic cooperation with the United States, but does not accept the requirement to grant Americans the right to veto investments in the island's economy from other countries," Barbin said.
The most likely scenario now seems to be the definition of "agreed areas" by analogy with the Nordic countries, military installations to which the US Armed Forces will have virtually unlimited access. A significant difference in the case of Greenland may be the long-term lease of these areas or their transfer to the sovereignty of the United States, similar to the British bases of Akrotiri and Dhekelia in Cyprus, Nikita Lipunov, a junior researcher at MGIMO.
The accelerated militarization of the Arctic is finally turning this region into a zone of critical confrontation between Russia and NATO, where the risk of accidental military incidents increases significantly. The deep crisis over Ukraine is blocking any format of strategic dialogue, so only after it is fully resolved and global relations stabilize will the parties be able to reach new long-term agreements on Arctic security. Otherwise, the rivalry in the Arctic will continue to develop by inertia, finally turning the region from a space of economic cooperation into a frontier of a new cold war.
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