By James R. Holmes

December 25, 2014

"Weapons free, Santa!!!

One suspects the jolly old elf's helpers have spent recent years fortifying the North Pole. Emplacing booby-traps around the perimeter. Aiming anti-ship and anti-air missiles toward every point of the compass. Refining anti-access doctrine and tactics. After all, governments from Moscow to Copenhagen now claim title to Santa's frosty fastness. Even the Grinch of Asia, which takes a proprietary view of its own marginal seas and skies, has made occasional noises about declaring Saint Nick's ocean terra nullius-territory available to all comers. What belongs to the Grinch belongs to the Grinch, that Christmastime malefactor whose heart is two sizes too small. What belongs to someone else is negotiable.

Ho, ho, ho. Them's fightin' words.

In any event, a non-elflike personage-Admiral David Titley, one-time grand wizard of U.S. Navy oceanography-is holding forth on Arctic strategy over at The National Interest. The bumper sticker for Titley's essay might read like this: apathy and neglect toward the polar ocean typify American strategy. As a result, the United States trails behind would-be competitors in such areas as building icebreakers, constructing support infrastructure to help police the U.S.-claimed swathe of Arctic waters, and beefing up the U.S. Coast Guard. Washington can use its upcoming chairmanship of the multinational Arctic Council to help set the agenda among nations that front on or take an interest in polar waters. The rest is a matter of devoting policy energy to the problem and finding resources to back up policy."

Read more:

http://thediplomat.com/2014/12/securing-santa-forging-a-us-arctic-strategy/ 

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