"Mother Russia” was vitally concerned about her northern neighbors even before there was a Soviet Union. In September 1916, the Imperial Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in a note that all land—undiscovered as well as discovered—between the Russian Arctic Coast and the North Pole would be regarded as Russian territory, unless Russia at an earlier time had acknowledged the sovereignty of another power over the territory in question.
A brief examination of the Wrangel Island affair a few years later demonstrates that the October 1917 Revolution changed many things—but not the Russian preoccupation with the Arctic.
In 1921, Canada had tried to colonize Wrangel Island in the East Siberian Sea, with Canadian Eskimos, but they had died of starvation on the 2,000-square-mile island. In 1923, new attempts to colonize were made by the Canadians. Canada claimed sovereignty over the island in 1924. The Soviet Union responded quickly by (1) informing Canada that the Czar’s 1916 decree remained very much in force, and (2) dispatching an icebreaker from Vladivostok to Wrangel to evacuate the Canadian Eskimos and hoist the Soviet flag on the island. So ended the Wrangel dispute.
On 15 April 1926, Moscow issued another decree—delineating the so-called “sector principle”—which claimed for the Soviet Union those “already discovered islands and land and also islands and land that may be discovered in the future.” Like the 1916 manifesto, the new decree excluded land previously acknowledged as the territory of a foreign state, and set boundaries for their sector: “ . . . which in the Arctic is located between the Northern Coast of the Soviet Union and the North Pole, i.e., between the meridians 32°04'36" East (the Western part of Fiskerhalvøya (Fisherman’s Peninsula) and 168°49'36" West (northernmost island group in the Bering Straits).”
The Svalbard group (including Kvitøya) directly north of Norway had been recognized as Norwegian territory by the Soviet Union in 1924, in conjunction with diplomatic relations being resumed between Norway and the Soviet Union.
But Franz Josef’s Land, farther to the east, was a different story. At the time of the signing of the peace treaty between the entente cordiale and Austria in 1919, Franz Josef’s Land was generally conceded to be Austrian territory. In 1921, however, the Soviet Union established a radio station on this island group and, somewhat later, a polar research station. Since no protests were lodged, the Soviet Union came to view Franz Josef’s Land as Soviet territory on the strength of the sector decree of 15 April 1926.
When Norway now found her time-honored and, on a rising scale, very considerable sealing, whaling, and fishing interests in Franz Josef’s Land menaced, the Norwegian government in 1928 lodged a protest. The Soviet Union took no notice of this protest, however, and the summer of that year dispatched an expedition to the island group. Another and bigger expedition was sent out in 1929, with Professor Otto Schmidt as its leader, on board the auxiliary icebreaker Sedov for activities in the islands. The expedition hoisted the Soviet colors and set up geophysical laboratories and radio stations in addition to those already established on the spot. Up to 1929, the Soviet Union tolerated the presence of Norwegian sealers and whalers, but when the Sedov returned once more in 1930, it was in the capacity of inspection vessel, and all the Norwegian sealing and whaling vessels were told to clear out. In this manner, Franz Josef’s Land was unilaterally absorbed by the Soviet Union which, has since vastly expanded its interests in the islands. As early as in 1934, an airfield was built on Rudolf Island, the northernmost island in the archipelago. Today this island is the northernmost cornerstone of the Soviet Union’s Arctic warning link and air defense front.
Up to 1930, discovery of new land and economic interests were almost exclusively the background of the various nations’ thrusts into the Arctic regions. From this point on, however, and owing to the evolution in Arctic aviation, defense and foreign policy interests started to make themselves felt, and today they constitute the predominant factor in Arctic matters.
Soviet sovereignty claims consistent with its “sector” principle in the Arctic are not approved by other nations, but the sector principle has been maintained and asserted by Soviet armed forces from the time it was decreed to the present. Moreover, the Soviet Union has grown bolder. As early as the end of the 1920s, Soviet experts in international law attempted to expand the term “land and islands” in the decree of 1926 to embrace also “continually frozen-up regions of the Arctic Ocean.” In September 1952, the Soviet Union issued a new decree, to all intents and purposes consistent with the sector principle—that is, that the Kara Sea, the West Siberian Sea, the Laptev Sea, the East Siberian Sea, and the Okhotsk Sea were all to be considered as national Soviet territory. Simultaneously with the issue of this decree, the Soviet armed forces received orders to seize every foreign ship found in these seas, and conduct them to the nearest port. Furthermore, every foreign aircraft appearing within these regions was to be requested to undertake landing and, in the event of failure to comply with the request immediately, to be forced to comply by means of armed force. The American press reacted strongly to this decree, calling it contrary to international law; but it is still in force. There is no background or basis in international law for this decree of 1952. It can only be asserted as the right of the strongest, in the face of international law.
In fairness, it must be pointed out that, if some of these lands were cheaply gained, they have been held at a heavy cost. The Soviet pioneers’ efforts in the Arctic regions are marked by courage, proficiency, and indescribable suffering. The pioneers knew full well that if they were not successful on their expeditions, there would be no return trip. Leadership in the Communist regime, as well as under the Czars, has been incredibly severe, throwing Arctic expeditioners into the slough of disfavor if they were not able to bring home positive and vital results. Tricky weather and ice conditions have never been accepted as reasonable alibis for failure.
The Soviet Union’s Northern Territories became even more important to them in World War II. When the Germans rolled eastward into the European part of the Soviet Union, whole factories were dismantled and moved to areas east of the Urals where industrial activities and war production were resumed. Approximately 50 per cent of the U. S. lend-lease assistance to the Soviet Union was carried to points along the northern sea lanes, from Vladivostok to ports on the Yenisei River. The Northern Sea Route and the Murmansk convoy route, so-called, running north of Norway, were practically on a par as to the bulk of imported cargo carried by sea.
Since World War II, the Soviet Union’s northern territories have been continually developed and exploited. Here, the Soviet Union has practically inexhaustible resources of lumber, with more than one-fourth of the world’s forest growth available for its pulp and paper industry. The northern territories also abound in coal, iron, and a number of minerals. They represent a very valuable addition to the Soviet Union’s economic potential, a potential that will grow in step with the progress in developments.
Similarly, its Northern Sea Route becomes increasingly valuable each year to the Soviet Union. One long leg of the Northern Sea Route—from Murmansk it follows the northern coasts of the Soviet Union and Siberia and up to Providentia (Emma Harbor) near the southern border of the Bering Straits—is a distance of about 3,400 nautical miles. From the same departure point to the same destination, via the Suez Canal, the distance is 15,730 nautical miles. If the Northern Sea Route is followed all the way from Murmansk to Vladivostok, the distance is 6,140 nautical miles. Via the Suez Canal, the distance is more than twice as long. The sea route generally hugs the coast but ice conditions may change this and force the shipping further out into the Polar Ocean.
During favorable “ice summers,” this sea route is navigable from the middle of August until the beginning of November. During more difficult ice conditions, the sailing period may be considerably shorter.
A necessary prerequisite to using these northern sea lanes, then, is a comprehensive icebreaker service. In the Arctic Ocean, the Soviet Union has approximately 17 icebreakers and is reported to have two more under construction. The Soviet icebreaker fleet falls into two categories: icebreakers and auxiliary icebreakers. In addition, the Soviet Union has a number of cargo ships with reinforced, icebreaker bows and strong engines. These vessels are assumed to be able to force their way through comparatively light ice conditions and consequently, to be independent of icebreaker assistance in the better part of the season.
Finally, the Soviet Union has transport vessels whose hulls and engines are sufficiently strong for the ships to follow in the wake of the icebreakers using their own engines. The icebreaker service comprises a number of disciplines, such as weather forecast service, ice observation service (aircraft, vessel and permanent stations), and a glaciological research service that evaluates all available data in order to be able to predict the ice situation on shorter and longer terms. Table I, above, lists Russian icebreakers in the Arctic Ocean.
Table I
Icebreaker | Displacement | Type of engines |
Lenin (1959) | 16,000 | Atomic |
Construction Numbers X and Y (under construction) | ? | Atomic |
Moskva, Leningrad, Kiev (1959) | 15,300 | Diesel electric |
Kapitan Beloussov, Kapitan Vornin (1954) | 5,300 | Diesel electric |
Kapitan Melekov Sibir, Admiral Lasarev, Admiral Makarov, and A. Mikoyan (1937) | 11,000 | Steam |
Krasin (1917) | 9,300 | Steam |
Vladimir Ilich (1917) | 6,300 | Steam |
Malygin (1917) | 2,000 | Steam |
Sadko (1913) | 2,000 | Steam |
Rusanov and Sedov (1909) | 3,200 | Steam |
Fedor Litke (1909) | 3,400 | Steam |
A new atomic icebreaker with a displacement of 25,000 tons is stated to be under construction according to Janes' Fighting Ships 1965-1966. In all likelihood this will become the world’s biggest icebreaker. She is expected to make a speed of 25 knots and have room for ten helicopters.
The Soviet Union’s merchant marine has constantly expanded in recent years, and in 1965 had a capacity of approximately 7,456,000 gross tons and approximately 1,510 units. This indicates that the Soviet Union has a large fleet of small craft, especially well suited for traffic on the rivers and in shallow coastal waters of North Siberia. The Soviet Union today ranks seventh on the world tonnage scale, behind Great Britain, the United States, Liberia, Norway—15,670,000 gross tons, and 1,635 units—Japan, and Greece. However, the Soviets are expanding their merchant fleet rapidly with approximately one million gross tons annually, and this, in the course of a ten-year period, should thrust them into the forefront of the world’s merchant fleet. As an example of their progress, at the beginning of the 1955-1965 decade, their merchant navy consisted of 604 units totaling only about two million gross tons.
The expansion of the Soviet Union’s fishing fleet also commands attention. In earlier times, Soviet fishing vessels concentrated their activities in the Barents Sea. Now, they are to be found all along the Norwegian coastline: from the Varangerfjord to the Skagerrak, in the Norwegian Sea, off Iceland, Greenland, and Newfoundland. It is an incontrovertible fact that the Soviet Union today is undertaking fishery activities in all the seven seas. In 1964, it was in fourth place in the amount of tons of fish caught that year.
Peru | 9.1 million |
Japan | 6.3 million |
China | 5.8 million |
U.S.S.R. | 4.5 million |
U.S.A. | 2.6 million |
Norway | 1.6 million |
The fishing fleet, as is the case with the merchant fleet, shows remarkable progress since 1955. The expansion in the tonnage of merchant and fishing craft represents a direct stepping up of the economic potential, at the same time it constitutes a reserve for the naval forces, in regard to materiel as well as personnel. In peacetime, ubiquitous Soviet trawlers have attracted attention because of their particular propensity for conducting fishing activities along the busiest merchant routes, and in regions where NATO naval forces are conducting their exercises.
Thus, the Soviet Union is displaying a pattern of conduct marked by assertion of power and by taking international law into its own hands. Within the Arctic sector over which the Soviet Union claims to have sovereignty, a permanent state of emergency exists in the face of foreign power. The necessary land, sea, and air forces, along with icebreakers and ice-going craft are in readiness to assert this sovereignty. Unannounced foreign aircraft are forced down or shot down, vessels are seized and citizens of other nations are arrested, notwithstanding their claims that in accordance with international law, the aircraft, ships or individuals are on international territory. To take precautionary measures in an attempt to have these conditions changed would lead indubitably to a state of tension of the gravest kind. If a closer evaluation is made of the Soviet Union’s efforts and thrusts in the Arctic regions, one is struck by the fact that much—not to say all— has been achieved short of waging open war. Soviet demonstrations of strength and force and consequent military intervention against all that the Soviet Union considers to be contraventions, have had to be put up with and accepted.
It is an open question, incidentally, whether this is not a characteristic feature in Soviet thrusts also in the fields of international and military politics at the present time. The direct frontal attack, with all available means at disposal, can hardly any longer be considered to be a navigable course through the roiled waters of international politics. Not even the Soviets, for whom the game is named, should be so foolish as to play Russian Roulette with someone else’s atomic firearms.
Infiltration, on the other hand, accompanied by repeated, convincing demonstrations of superior power, can be effective—but only as long as their opponent harbors no doubt that the Soviet Union will stop at nothing, not even the most extreme measures, should they be called for.
Yet, although we have talked mostly of the Soviets and the sea—of merchant and fishing fleets, of northern routes and ice-locked waters—we must always, as the Russian does, re-direct our thoughts to the land.
For the Soviet Union is a continental power. The land, the inland waterways, the coastal waters, and, of course, the air overhead are the highways over which the Soviet’s steamroller land forces will move if hostilities break out.
How big, how powerful, how mobile is this steamroller? The Red Army’s two million men are distributed among 140 divisions—50 tank divisions and 90 motorized infantry divisions. Tactical atomic weapons and chemical warfare weapons are part of the arsenal of the Soviet Army. The airborne force within the Red Army is about 60,000 men distributed in seven divisions. The transport capacity per lift over short or medium distances is approximately two divisions with full equipment.
In theater parlance, the Red Army is the star of the military show. But it has two important supporting performers, the Air Force and the Soviet Navy.
The Air Force is, in reality, four different air forces consisting of about 11,000 planes, 1,200 of which belong to the strategic air force. The rest of the air strength is divided among the three other air forces with 4,000 aircraft in the Tactical Air Force, 6,000 aircraft in the Fighter-and-AAA-Command and 800 aircraft in the Naval Air Force. In addition, the Soviet Union has an independent Military Transport Command.
The Fighter-and-AAA-Command have at their disposal ground-to-air rockets of various advanced types. Moreover, the Soviet Union also purports to possess an anti-ballistic missile rocket system and the capability thereby to be able to impose heavy losses on hostile air attacks with ballistic rockets. Even if the reports of such an ABM system do not have the ring of truth about them, no one can dispute that the Soviet Union has laid great stress on securing command in the air over their own and adjacent territories where hostile operations may be expected.
Because the Soviet Union is not dependent upon communications across, or control of, the vast oceans, her Navy is no replica of either the U. S. or the Royal Navy. And, obviously, it is no sign of weakness that the Soviet Union possesses no aircraft carriers.
The 500,000-man Soviet Navy is second only to the U. S. Navy in tonnage. Its primary weapon system is the submarine, and there are indications that atomic submarines, in concert with the Navy’s Air Force, play an ever-increasing part not only in the naval, but in the over-all, strategy of the Soviet Union.
The three most important base areas of the Soviet Navy are the Arctic and the Pacific Oceans, and the Baltic Sea (see Table II). Rotation of vessels between the Arctic Ocean and the Baltic Sea, via the White Sea Canal or around Scandinavia, is usual. To a smaller extent, the same is the case between the Arctic Ocean and the Pacific via the Northern Sea Route.
Half the atomic submarines are fitted out with nuclear rocket weapons. Approximately 20 of the conventional, ocean-going submarines are also equipped with such weapons. Thus, the Soviet Union has a total of 40 submarines carrying nuclear weapons. Each craft takes three such rockets. Submarines with nuclear weapons are based in the Arctic or in the Pacific. In the Murmansk region the Soviet Union has only a modest number of large-size landing craft. However, the capacity represented by the Soviet merchant navy with heavy-load winch equipment and by the fishing fleet, is sufficient successfully to carry out major amphibian operations within the area their naval and air forces are able to control. The merchantmen with heavy-load winch equipment will also be able to carry smaller landing craft for unloading of cargo on beaches or similar places.
In the course of World War II, the Soviet Union reaped much respect from the Germans for its well-performed landing operations in the Arctic Ocean and in the Black Sea. With their own Fleet Air Arm they have created a solid basis for effective co-operation between ships and aircraft. Moreover, of the Soviet fleet, it may be said that it has been developed with a specific view to solving naval tasks that are peculiar to warfare in coastal waters. For it is the European coastal waters, along with the land and air communications, that must be protected by the Navy. These form the connecting link between the various regions that the Soviet Union’s superior land forces will threaten, in the event of the outbreak of hostilities.
It is difficult to ascertain how much of the Soviet Union’s 15-billion-U. S.-dollar-equivalent annual military budget is allocated, respectively, to the strategic and the tactical forces. But the indications are that the strategic forces receive about twice as much. It has been estimated that about 62 per cent of last year’s total military budget went to the strategic forces—intercontinental and medium range ballistic missiles, strategic bombers and submarines, all carrying nuclear warheads. And this does not take into account the space research budget, for example, which includes experiments with sighting and hitting targets any place on earth from orbits in space—a problem, incidentally, which the Soviet Union claims to have solved.
The military planners of the Soviet Union, by apparently giving top priority to strategic forces, may have concluded that the old goal of the armed forces—defeating the enemy’s military forces on land, at sea, and in the air—is really gaining victory the hard way. For now the goal can be attained by simpler efforts—by paralyzing the enemy’s economic potential.
“Economic potential”—again and again we come back to the words. They are important words to the Soviet planners who know that their powerful army, supported by a formidable navy and air force, comprises a fearsome military potential. But they know, too, that even the strongest military arms must wither unless they can continue to draw renewed strength from a healthy economy.
Twice in this century, Russia has watched a German juggernaut grind to a halt, not for lack of skill or spirit, but for want of food and fuel. A blockade contributed mightily to the German defeat in World War I. As an example, cutting off its importing of all artificial fertilizers at an early stage of the war was a grievous blow to Germany. The fertility of the soil decreased and the amount of agricultural products that the Germans needed could not be produced, much less procured from overseas markets at that time.
Table II
| Arctic Fleet | Baltic Fleet | Pacific Fleet | Total U.S.S.R. |
Surface Vessels | ||||
Cruisers | 3 | 4 | 4 | 18 |
Destroyers | 20 | 25 | 28 | 140 |
Frigates | 15 | 10 | 25 | 50 |
Escort and Patrol vessels | 30 | 100 | 150 | 300 |
Motor Rocket, Torpedo and Gun boats | 100 | 150 | 130 | 600 |
Minesweepers | 60 | 150 | 50 | 350 |
Submarines | ||||
Oceangoing and coastal submarines | 150 | 70 | 120 | 360 |
Atomic-powered submarines | 28 | 0 | 12 | 40 |
Fleet Air Arm | ||||
Medium bombers | 150 | 150 | 100 | 400 |
Reconnaissance aircraft, Helicopters | 100 | 100 | 50 | 400 |
But the Allied blockade of World War II had next to no effect for the first two years of the war, since the Soviet Union was then a friendly neutral and much of the rest of the European continent either stood at Germany’s side or lay at her feet.
In the first half of World War II, then, Germany’s economic potential was intact and capable of meeting the requirements of both its civilian population and its Wehrmacht. An Allied naval blockade alone could not succeed, but, between the wars, the bomber that had barely made itself felt during World War I had developed into an extremely effective weapon against an enemy’s economic potential.
Increasingly more damaging air attacks were mounted against the raw material sources, key industrial centers, and the means of transport on land, the inland sea routes, and the coastal waters. The facilities that were to transport spare parts, fuel, and other supplies to the armed forces were harassed, halted, or so delayed that a high percentage of the planes, tanks, and military vehicles were not fit to operate. Gradually, military operations that required fuel had to be held to an absolute minimum and Germany collapsed under the strain of the Allies all-out war against not only its armed forces but also its national economy.
The Russian planner remembers.
In summary, then, it appears that the Soviet Union thus far has been successful in its efforts to expand the economic potential in the Arctic regions and at sea. Perhaps this success may stem from the fact that life in the Arctic regions, both at sea and on the land, offers little opportunity for personal development. The hazards, the mortal danger presented by the environment create an atmosphere of mutual dependence which is the crux of socialistic doctrine. Only time will tell whether the prosperity that is resulting from economic expansion will help or hinder even further expansion in the area.
Peaceful economic expansion—a nation in the throes of growth and progress—cannot be considered to be a threat against other nations, neighboring or not. Such expansion is a natural consequence of the competition between nations and social systems.
But, should expansion no longer be peaceful, the countries on the Soviet Union’s northern flank would face an entirely different set of military problems than would confront those countries in Central and Southern Europe.
The Red Army steamroller could not roll northward unless and until the Red Navy and Air Force did the necessary preliminary work. It is primarily the northern flank, then, and especially Norway, which would be exposed to assault by sea and air, as well as being the objective of landings and infiltration operations in the opening phases of an armed conflict. The entire Arctic Fleet (apart from strategic units), with necessary air support, amphibious and air-transported forces, could be committed here.
If, despite everything the Free World can do, war should break out, it is probable that Norway will be the primary objective of the Soviet Union’s conventional Arctic Fleet.
★
A graduate of the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy in 1930, Captain Araldsen escaped by fishing boat from German-occupied Norway in 1940 and established the Norwegian Naval Flying School in Vancouver, B.C., in 1941. He was Chief Staff Officer, Norwegian Flying Training Center, Toronto, from 1941 until 1943. He was Head, Planning and Administrative Division, Norwegian Ministry of Defense from 1945 until 1947, and Norwegian Naval and Air Attache, Washington, D. C. from 1947 until 1950. The naval member of the Joint Planning Staff of the Norwegian Defense Staff from 1951 until 1955, he has been Head of Norway’s Fishery Protection Service since 1961.