Authors

George Soroka¹;  ¹ Harvard University, United States

Discussion

Once thought of as a region insulated from wider geopolitical conflicts, the Arctic has, since 2013-2014, increasingly featured as a proxy battleground. This has become more obvious since 2022, when two key Arctic states--Finland and Sweden--applied for NATO membership as a direct resutl of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 

This paper examines the changing strategic dynamics of NATO's  eastern front in relation to how Russia's invasion of Ukraine has altered the strategic calculus of NATO's Arctic members. The analysis proceeds through process tracing, interviews, and careful content analysis of key policy documents. 

The question itself is a timely, one, as NATO has traditionally stayed out of the Arctic, though this may no longer be possible. As such, what is considered in this paper is just how the spillover from the Ukraine conflict has affected the strategic calculus of key Arctic players, particularly Sweden and Finland, and how the would be/new member states are poised to, in turn, reshaope NATO's policies in the region.