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Since its first offensive in Ukraine in 2014, Russia has also been massing troops and war material on Canada’s Arctic border, where it has reactivated its Cold War military bases.
“People don’t realize how close we are geographically to Russia. By air, we are nearby,” underlines Conservative MP Pierre Paul-Hus, for whom the Russian threat to our Arctic border is very real.
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However, the defenses of Canada in the North “are pitiful”, deplores the ex-soldier. Robert Huebert, a professor at the University of Calgary, an expert in Arctic security and sovereignty, agrees.
Although the scenario of a Russian attack in the North seems unlikely to him at present, he underlines that Vladimir Putin is unpredictable and that the Russians dominate the Arctic militarily and strategically.
In recent years, the Russians have invested heavily there and now surround half of the Arctic Circle with 18 military bases. Their last major military exercise in the region took place in January. Thirty warships, 20 aircraft and 1,200 soldiers took part.
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“We need to make sure we can see and react to anything the Russians might do in the Arctic. We have to get serious about this right now,” says Huebert.
Achieving this requires investing in modernizing the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), he says, as many of its facilities are obsolete, particularly the North Warning system which relies on radars. .
This system can detect missiles, fighter jets and bombers, but it is so old that it has difficulty detecting new military technologies, explains Paul-Hus.
“Canada will continue to work with its U.S. partners to ensure that NORAD is modernized to meet current and future challenges to Arctic protection and sovereignty,” Defense Minister Anita Anand said. , yesterday.
She said Canada had committed an initial investment of $252.2 million. But this sum was used to “pay an Inuit company to take care of the maintenance”, criticizes Mr. Paul-Hus.
Mr. Huebert adds that Canada also does not have fighter planes that can match those of the Russians or the Chinese to retaliate in the event of an incursion. Ottawa is thus dependent on Washington, which is stationing around a hundred F-35s in the Arctic.
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When Russia attacked Ukraine in 2014 to annex Crimea, Prime Minister Stephen Harper signaled that Canada must be ready to respond to any incursions from Moscow.
“In Europe, we see the imperial ambitions of Vladimir Putin, who seems determined that there will be no peace for Russia’s neighbors,” he said on the sidelines of a military exercise off the coast. Baffin Island. And since Russia is also a neighbor of Canada, we should not be blind here either. »
This discourse is more relevant than ever, believes Mr. Huebert, especially since the border between Russia and Canada in the Arctic is shifting. Russia claims 70% of the Arctic seabed, encroaching on territories also claimed by Canada.
“There is a huge degree of overlap (between our territorial claims)”, underlines the researcher.
The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is a binational organization of the United States and Canada.
Its mission is to provide surveillance and control of North America’s aerospace space. It is responsible for the warning mission in the event of an aerospace attack and also monitors the maritime regions of the two countries.
This partnership was born in 1958 from the strong tensions experienced with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The advent of nuclear weapons and long-range bombers created a risk of attack, hence the need for common protection.
Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, is the first line of defense in the Arctic.
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Reference-www.tvanouvelles.ca