The Cold War made the High North a proving ground for nuclear strategy. Even though the powers and weapons have changed, the same geography matters again. China now fields long-range conventional and nuclear missiles capable of reaching Alaska and the American West Coast, while Russia is reinforcing its sea-based nuclear deterrent throughout the Arctic. Washington should no longer treat the Arctic as a periphery to monitor for missile warnings. Instead, it must insulate the American homeland from threats that traverse both the Atlantic and the Pacific.  

Alaska sits at the center of this shift. It hosts the bulk of America’s homeland missile defense infrastructure and, according to Senator Dan Sullivan, is undergoing its largest military buildup since World War II amid rising Chinese and Russian activity along its coastline.  

China, Russia, and Strategic Cohesion  

The Pentagon’s 2025 China Military Power Report confirmed that China has fielded the DF-27, an intercontinental ballistic missile with an estimated range of 5,000 to 8,000 kilometers. Analysts writing in Maritime Executive noted that the missile makes China the first nation to field an operational, conventionally armed (non-nuclear) ICBM, one capable of striking Hawaii, Alaska, and much of the West Coast without crossing the nuclear threshold. The DF-27 supplements a broader high seas program that includes the JL-3 submarine-launched ballistic missile, carried aboard Jin-class submarines, and extends China’s deterrent well into the Pacific.  

China also pursues a dual-use strategy in Arctic waters. In July 2026, the Coast Guard tracked the research icebreakers Xue Long and Xue Long 2 as they transited the U.S. exclusive economic zone and the extended continental shelf in the Bering Sea, prompting the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Munro to shadow them under Operation Frontier Sentinel. The transit itself was lawful, but the vessels carry equipment capable of mapping the seabed and acoustic conditions, which can later be used for enhanced submarine navigation.  

Russia, meanwhile, is deepening its own bastion. The 2026 Annual Threat Assessment found that the Kola Peninsula now hosts roughly two-thirds of Moscow’s second-strike nuclear capability, including seven ballistic-missile submarines armed with Sineva and Liner missiles that can reach open waters in under a day, thereby evading the historical chokepoint at the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom gap. Russia has also commissioned its first armed icebreaker, the Ivan Papanin, which Maritime Executive reports can mount containerized launchers for up to eight potentially nuclear-armed Kalibr cruise missiles, concealable within ordinary shipping traffic along the Northern Sea Route. In short, the two oceans that once insulated the U.S. from a two-front conflict are becoming a liability as Russian and Chinese submarines evade conventional detection by operating at higher latitudes. 

This coordination extends to joint operations. In July 2024, Russian Tu-95 bombers and Chinese H-6 bombers flew their first joint patrol near the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone, where NORAD fighters intercepted them. Neither nation violated American or Canadian airspace, but such patrols, along with a joint Chinese and Russian coast guard patrols observed in the Bering Sea, signal a deepening willingness to operate near the American homeland. 

U.S. Response 

Washington has made investments to close these gaps. Boeing has completed twenty additional Ground-Based Interceptor silos at Fort Greely, bringing the total to sixty. Congress is integrating the site into the larger Golden Dome missile defense architecture, which the Congressional Budget Office estimates could cost roughly $1.2 trillion over twenty years. The Army Corps of Engineers has also awarded a $399 million contract for the first phase of the nation’s first Arctic deep-water port at Nome, intended to eventually deepen the harbor from eighteen to forty feet and host Coast Guard cutters and icebreakers. Icebreaker production is expanding through the trilateral ICE Pact among the United States, Canada, and Finland. The disparity remains stark,  the Coast Guard currently operates only two Arctic-capable icebreakers, compared to dozens fielded by Russia. NORAD has paired these investments with Arctic Edge 2026, a multinational exercise that tested cruise missile defense across Alaska and Greenland. Nonetheless, these measures remain reactive, and the United States still trails its rivals in the Arctic domain. 

Policy Implications 

The combined weight of Chinese missile innovation, a hardening Russian Arctic bastion, and growing coordination between the two nations means Alaska can no longer be treated as an unexposed flank. Interceptor silos at Fort Greely address only part of the problem, since the system was designed to counter a limited North Korean-style threat rather than the hypersonic and maneuverable warheads China now fields. Chinese icebreakers currently outpace the U.S. Coast Guard in undersea surveillance, while Russian submarines increasingly route around NATO’s traditional Arctic barrier. A sustained U.S. funding for the Nome port, additional icebreakers, and persistent maritime patrol aircraft would close the detection gap more effectively than interceptors alone, helping reduce the threat. 

Policymakers should treat the Arctic and North Pacific as a single, interconnected theater, as China and Russia already appear to be doing. For the first time in its history, the U.S. is watching the geographic assets of two oceans turn into a liability as its Arctic posture atrophies. 

Jack Lindstrom is the Founder and Publisher of Arctic Ledger, an independent research and publishing platform, and a Junior Researcher at the Mackinder Forum, where he studies Arctic governance, critical minerals, and great power competition. He has authored and co-authored papers on Arctic security, submarine warfare, and Sino-Russian polar cooperation for Arctic Ledger. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own. 

China’s Long-Range Missiles, Russia’s Arctic Bastion, and the Alaskan Gap was originally published on Global Security Review.

The Strait of Hormuz crisis and the continuing crisis in the Bab al-Mandab Strait have shown that narrow maritime passages can and will be used as political weapons in future conflicts. The state actors in Tehran and the non-state actors in Sanaa, however, may not be the only ones that may leverage these choke points in future. For example, Oman’s ports could present an essential part of any land route alternatives like the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) that avoid both the Gulf of Aden and the Strait of Hormuz. However, they have also faced drone attacks in the current war and will likely face political instabilities in future. An alternative that has come into greater focus is the North Sea Route (NSR) or the Arctic route. Surprisingly, recent reductions in Arctic ice levels have increased the feasibility of using the NSR, now potentially facilitating the movement of goods. 

Iran asserts its right to regulate shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. Under its 1993 law, innocent passage is subject to prior authorization based on Iran’s national security. The present crisis created by the Iran war has highlighted how the food security of many countries is connected to oil through fertilizer prices, which have witnessed a price surge. Before the war, around 30% of global fertilizers were exported by gulf countries through the Strait of Hormuz. Additionally, 20% of global liquified natural gas is used as the feedstock for making fertilizers and much traveled through the Suez Canal before the Houthis disrupted trade. While the rest of the world will face higher food prices, the Gulf countries, which import up to 85% of their food, are still affected. Asian countries like China, India, Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, and Singapore are highly dependent on oil imports from the Middle East and must now find alternatives. In the present crisis, increased imports from the U.S. have provided relief to these countries, but the Cape of Good Hope route, needed for this transport, is time-consuming and increases costs.  

The NSR is also not without its share of complex legal matters. Russia has established laws and codes for regulating passage through NSR. Russia classifies the NSR as its internal waters and does not recognize the international right of innocent passage through it. All ships need prior authorization while foreign warships must notify their intended passage 90 days in advance. Ships may be required to use the services of Russian icebreaker escorts and pilots. Russia justifies its claim under article 234 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Known as the “Arctic Exception,” it applies to all “Ice-covered areas.” It grants coastal states the right to enforce non-discriminatory laws in their Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) to prevent marine pollution in the ice-covered areas. The U.S. and other countries argue that UNCLOS protects innocent passage through territorial seas and hence the Russian law is contrary to the provisions of UNCLOS. 

Unlike the Middle East shipping passages, however, the NSR has been in conflict and has not had any kinetic combat or active armed conflict. The free navigation operations may operate here because the U.S. may be reluctant to indulge in hostilities against and may not be equipped to do so. Simultaneously, there may be U.S. interest in selling its oil to East, Southeast, and South Asia through this route. Russia may also find advantage in developing this route and is seeking partners to develop it. Several countries have already reached agreements with Russia to take advantage of the NSR. 

Russia is already using its Arctic coast seasonally to deliver LNG from its Yamal project to Europe and Asia. With increasing arctic warming and higher investment in icebreakers, this may change to round-the-year operations. The present bonhomie between Putin and Xi Jinping had already led to the October 2025 Harbin agreement to make NSR a strategic Arctic trade corridor. NSR suits China for another reason. It reduces heavy Chinese dependence on transit through the Malacca Strait, where India is developing an island base with potential to choke that passage. 

India is diplomatically very heavily invested in the Middle East and has been seeking a route to Europe through Iran and through IMEC. If India were to shift to oil and gas imports through NSR it could face strong pushback and heavy geopolitical pressure. The shift will come with another risk; the conflict zone in the Middle East will be swapped for the possible U.S.-Russian tensions in the narrow Bering Strait and make India dependent on a Sino-Russian architecture beyond its control. Even so, that scenario may still be a long way off. A positive aspect is India’s long-standing trade and military engagement with Russia that has proved its strength in crises. In December 2025, Russia and India signed an agreement formalizing Indian military access to Russia’s Arctic naval ports. Long-term contracts for oil and gas and equity participation in the Arctic infrastructure and shipping capacity may follow. 

For India and Southeast Asian countries, the year-round availability of the NSR will increase overall energy resilience by creating an alternative route that will dampen price surges during the frequent Middle East crises. It will make it more feasible for these countries to tap into multiple oil and gas sources including Russia and the U.S. and, in addition, provide a faster sea route to Europe. There is also the feasibility of synergy between the energy needs of India, the ship-building capacity of South Korea, and the NSR. While the Arctic route will not be a silver bullet for Asian countries to have risk-free access to oil and gas, the shift of focus from the tropics to the North Pole shall reduce the historic leverage by the Middle East and will help keep prices and access stable even during the recurring Middle East flare-ups. 

R.N. Prasher is a retired member from Indian Administrative Service (IAS). His primary expertise is in geopolitics where he has published in RealClear Defense, Asia Times, and The National Maritime Foundation. He has published the book “Geopolitics: Impact on Energy Transition and Energy Security” and has an upcoming publication “Revisiting the Chinese Screen” The views are the author’s own.

The North Sea Route as an Alternative to the Hormuz-Red Sea Conundrum was originally published on Global Security Review.