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Key Terms and Concepts. Learning Objectives. Upon completion of this module, you should be able to: 1. Define different concepts of security

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UNIVERSITY OF THE ARCTIC

Module 11 Security

Developed by Lassi Heininen, Arctic Centre, University of Lapland, Finland

Key Terms and Concepts

• security: hard, soft, and civil

• stability and peace, instability and tension

• the military and military technology, including the nuclear weapons system

• the categorization of nuclear involvement

• geopolitics, including the technology models of geopolitics and maritime strategy

• arms control, disarmament, and confidence-building measures

• risk and threat, nuclear accidents and environmental threats, and conflicts

• power and influence, war and violence

Learning Objectives

Upon completion of this module, you should be able to:

1. Define different concepts of security

2. Define power and influence, and risk and threat

3. Compare and contrast power and influence with risk and threat 4. List the military presence and activities (including, for example, the

C3I system and the categorization of nuclear involvement) in the Circumpolar North

5. List and describe the main arms control and confidence-building measures in the North

6. List different kinds of nuclear and other military accidents, in the context of the nuclear problem of the North

7. Describe the relationship between the military and the environment, and that between the military and northern Indigenous peoples and give some examples of conflicts between the military and the environment or northern peoples

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8. Describe and recognize the so-called forces of continuity and those of change, and name some of the main challenges for the future of security in the North

9. Recognize and describe some aspects of the three different concepts of security in your region

Module Readings

Read the Overview and Lecture for Module 11, then read the assigned readings from the Reading File given below.

Reading 31: Tony Samstag, “Security and Defence Issues Relating to the Arctic Region: A Norwegian Perspective”

Reading 32: Lassi Heininen, “The Military and the Environment: An Arctic Case”

Reading 33: Alexander A. “Sergounin, Russian Policy towards the BEAR:

from ‘Hard’ to ‘Soft’ Security”

Overview

The main aims of this module are to introduce different concepts of security and to give an overview the military presence, especially that of the nuclear weapons systems in the Circumpolar North in the beginning of the twenty- first century. First, the module defines security, discusses the different concepts of security, and describes the categorization of nuclear

involvement. Second, it describes and explains both the current state of the security and military-political situation of the Circumpolar North and the change that has taken place since the early 1990s. During the Cold War period, the Circumpolar North was primarily a security area and a military front, but is now emerging from this period of high tension and

confrontation toward a phase of international co-operation. Third, the module identifies and describes the so-called forces of continuity and those of change from the point of view of the different concepts of security.

Fourth, it describes the relations between the military and the environment in the North, and describes the nuclear problem in the Barents Sea region.

Finally, the module lists and describes of the main challenges of security in the North.

Lecture

Introduction

For nearly the whole of the twentieth century, from the end of the First World War until the end of the Cold War, the Arctic was in a process of

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militarization. The region transformed, first into a military flank, and then the military front of the Cold War. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the Cold War and the confrontation and tension between two major nuclear powers, the Soviet Union and the United States, ended. Although there is less tension and more stability in the Circumpolar North, security is still a relevant topic and important field of politics, and a particularly sensitive one from the point of view of the unified states. Security policy and the military are not on the agendas of many new forums of international co-operation, such as the Arctic Council and the Barents Euro-Arctic Council, and the real disarmament process has not dealt with the Arctic, at least not yet.

In assessing the current geopolitical and security-political situation in the Circumpolar North, there are several factors to consider. First, and most significant, is the collapse of both the socialistic bloc and the Soviet Union, particularly in the context of the success of Western integration resulting in NATO and the European Union (EU). Second, in the politics of the West, one of the main objectives is peace and security through co-operation and integration instead of confrontation. That ideal can perhaps be best achieved through the integration of the Russian Federation and the other New Independent States into the European economy, and not only the Central Eastern European countries. Third, because of the globalized world economy and globalization in general, the importance of the military and military power has decreased compared with economic and cultural affairs.

Economic competition has become more intense while, at the same time, global phenomena such as international terrorism have increased the need for cohesion among the industrial countries of the world.

Different Concepts of Security

This module deals with the importance of security, security policy, the state of international co-operation, and the relations between security and international co-operation. The future of security (meaning mostly

traditional security) can include three scenarios: divided, partly divided, and non-divided, depending how security is defined (narrowly or

comprehensively) (Nokkala 2002). When dealing with security, especially in the Arctic, it is necessary to ask: Whose security, and what kind of security? (Griffiths 1993; Heininen 1992, 55–56).

Therefore, this module defines security and discusses risk and conflict and three different concepts of security: traditional, environmental, and civil security. Security in this module means either traditional security and the security policy of the unified states, or environmental security (i.e., the environmental effects of the military). Civil security is also discussed from the point of view of both citizens (e.g., northern Indigenous peoples) and regions, but not phenomena such as citizens’ rights, family violence, or gender relations.

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Traditional, Environmental, and Civil Security

The unified-state system emphasizes security and national interests. Power, including the military, is a useful tool to guarantee national security.

Competition and even conflicts between states are natural in the anarchy of international order, but international co-operation is needed for special purposes, as was the case in the Second World War, for example. Another example is the establishment of NATO in 1949 to contain the expansion of socialism in Europe. Behind such international organizations are traditional state-centred hegemonic policies and national interests and influence according to the principle of “new realism” (Waltz 1990). International law provides the legal framework for relations between unified states, and between them and inter-governmental organization (IGOs). National borders are the outer edge of national sovereignty and the starting point for

international law.

Traditional geopolitics, as portrayed by Halford J. Mackinder, for example, and especially the “technology models” of geopolitics, may be used to define geographical regions such as the Arctic from the point of view of geography, technology, and military power (Heininen 1991). Geostrategy and geopolitics have relevant meanings even today. The so-called

technology models of geopolitics opened the Arctic to the nuclear-oriented maritime strategies of the United States and the Soviet Union. Nuclear arms, nuclear energy, and other technical innovations form the technical means by which humans relate to the physical environment (Till 1987, 25). That is, the new arms technology—for example nuclear energy, missile and radar technology—made it possible to use of the Arctic for military purposes. In international relations, the technology model of geopolitics is generally related to military power and is thus an instrument of hegemonic politics.

Traditional Security

The international system is still largely based on the unified-state system, and unified states emphasize national sovereignty, including national borders and interests. International co-operation is mostly a function of intergovernmental economic, political, and military unions. For example, the border between the EU and the Russian Federation is one of the best defined and most controlled in Europe, while the borders between individual EU countries are barely visible.

Hegemony and force, including military power, are the main means to establish and maintain sovereignty and national interests, and force has also been used to defend human rights against ethnic and other violence.

Traditional security falls under the category of “high” politics, that is, security policy and military policy. For example, the purpose of the common European policy on security and defence is to develop the EU’s military and non-military crisis-management capability, including troops.

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Traditional, weapon-orientated security is important to the growth or modernization of unified states, to fulfill the needs of the centres of nation- states, and to control national borders. This is also the case in the

Circumpolar North. Security and security policy in the North is still largely determined by state centres outside the region, such as Moscow,

Washington, and Brussels, and not by actors inside the regions. Northern residents are excluded from security policy planning because of the problematic and sensitive nature of security policy and because of the international nature of competition and disputes over the natural resources of the northern seas, such as the shelf of the Barents Sea.

The traditional concept of security is less conspicuous in the new geopolitics, which takes into consideration the “low” politics, such as environmental and social issues. This broader concept of security is present both in discourse and practice. The situation, however, is not always clear.

Although security policy is excluded from international organizations, such as the Arctic Council, the EU’s Northern Dimension, and the Barents Euro- Arctic Region (BEAR), these international frameworks are for security and stabilization (according to the concept of a security community by Karl Deutch), and the peace project is a new containment policy of the West.

How problematic this kind of “selected” agenda of co-operation will be to the current and future co-operation in the BEAR context is difficult to say. In any case, it is both interesting and challenging because international co- operation built in this superimposed way is vulnerable to changes within the international system. For example, a potential East-West or NATO-Russia conflict would have serious and overriding consequences for agreements reached by organizations such as the BEAR.

Environmental Security

Apart from military security, comprehensive security, or “everyday security” at an individual level deals with practical issues of health, social, and economic conditions (Nokkala 2002). Today, this extended concept of security is widely accepted and used, especially when issues of foreign policy and cross-border co-operation are being discussed. This is quite natural because security is an attractive concept that appeals to basic human instincts—everyone wants to be secure. Nuclear safety is an acute and challenging topic of the current discourse on security, especially when extended definitions of security are used, which would include the notion of environmental security. An extended definition of security is based on the idea that there are a vast number of threats to national security, besides traditional military threats, such as nuclear accidents, crime across national borders, and international terrorism (Buzan 1991).

Since the late 1980s, many citizens of the northern regions have been worried about their security and about the security of the North. In the early 1990s, the Nordic governments began to express concern about nuclear waste, mostly from Russia. In the 1970s, Canada, passed the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act (AWPPA). For the citizens of the Nordic countries,

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the environment is one of the main incentives to improve international collaboration. Perceived threats from nuclear activities, covering the whole spectrum from accidents on nuclear submarines to nuclear power plant emissions, are still real in the European North. For that reason, these countries consider themselves as stakeholders in the international nuclear negotiations process, although, in most cases, they are outside the formal negotiations.

For Russians the situation is more complex. For example, decreasing the risk of nuclear problems in the Kola Peninsula is in the interests of Murmansk in attracting foreign investment to the oil and gas industry of the Barents Sea.

Lectures on eco-catastrophes and nuclear accidents in Murmansk indicate a threat of nuclear accidents to the citizens, but without polls and

investigations it is difficult to know a general attitude among the people of the Murmansk Region. Do they take the nuclear problem as a threat, or a risk? (Heininen 1999)

In the area of international co-operation, as in the above-mentioned BEAR co-operation, the problem arises that security is, in practice, broader than the traditional concept of security. Therefore, some elements of “low” politics, for example, environmental protection to deal with contamination from military sources, may cross over to become a part of “high” politics. To include high politics in the existing organization is a complicated challenge.

From the point of view of the unified states, the BEAR is seen as a part of the European integration and co-operation policies led by the EU, and as a peace project by the Western democracies. This indicates that, in the BEAR, the fights between the unified states in the 1990s have changed into

economic competition and co-operation. The states have succeeded in decreasing international tensions and the possibility of war between states.

Security, including alternative security, stability, and sustainable development are the main aims of the BEAR and of the EU’s Northern Dimension. Thus, although security policy is officially excluded from these new international organizations, they do deal with certain aspects of traditional security. Topics such as nuclear safety and the clean up of decommissioned nuclear submarines will measure the real will of the member states of the BEAR for multilateral co-operation for environmental protection. It is either a good reason for real international co-operation, or a potential conflict of interests.

Civil Security

At present, there is no potential for international conflicts between the West and Russia that would justify the current military presence, and both security and political tension, and the military presence, have decreased since the end of the Cold War. The threats and security matters are now different, and include such issues as the gap in living standards between the Nordic countries and Russia, environmental problems, different political systems, and cultural differences. However, discussion on security in the region and on security from the point of view of citizens and their rights, has

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hardly started. Such terms as civil (or civic) security and civility have been launched to replace the old-style security thinking and to decrease the influence of outside forces on the North (e.g. Griffiths 1993; Heininen and Lassinantti 1999).

Some contributors to the security debate, however, argue that the concept of security carries such a heavy militaristic, nationalist, and ideological burden that it is even dangerous to label non-military issues as security issues (Deudney 1999). The main risk lies in applying the traditional means of providing security to new kind of threats. Conventional security institutions—armies and the police—are not very practical for securing people and states against new threats. To the contrary, armies are likely to produce these threats themselves, as was the case in the Kursk accident (Heininen and Häyrynen 2002).

Consequently, it could be argued that nuclear security, understood as a part of comprehensive security, is a particularly complicated question. Usually, nuclear issues have to do with both military and civil securities. In the whole Arctic region, especially in the Russian North, there can be no clear dividing line between military and civilian issues. Nuclear activities cover the whole spectrum from use in medicine to nuclear warheads and, especially the management of waste, involves so many stakeholders and so many partly conflicting interests that a simple labelling of topics and priorities would lead to an oversimplification of the issues. Therefore, it is necessary to understand all aspects of security as parts of the same agenda in

international negotiations. For example, the management of environmental risks cannot be separated from infrastructure development of economic conditions (Heininen and Segerståhl 2001).

The Cold War period brought the high-tech and sophisticated military presence of the super-powers to the Circumpolar North, and it also brought other unified states. Since that time, potential, and, in some cases actual, conflicts of interest have existed between military elements and the Arctic environment and between the military and northern peoples. The basic reason is in the concept of traditional security, which must be understood as a relevant part of the growth-orientated modernization process. Security achieved by the military is, first of all, for the interests of the centers of unified states, not the peripheries, to gain control over large peripheries, natural resources, and borders. Military presence and action in peacetime is one of the ways unified states use their power in sparsely populated regions.

Relations Between the Military and the Environment: Risk and Conflict

The effects of the military on the quality of the environment was not much known or discussed in the Cold War period, although it was relevant in the Circumpolar North. In the 1980s, environmental organizations and the Nordic Saami Council began to show concern and it made a statement on

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the nuclear problem. Not only was there public concern and civilian activities, but researchers took an interest in environmental risks and influences of the military (Greenpeace 1987; Heininen 1992; see also “A Relationship between the Military and the Environment,” below). At the beginning of the twenty-first century, however, the issue and the challenge is how to tackle the environmental problems caused by the military in the past, such as old nuclear submarines, former missile and radar bases, used nuclear reactor fuel, and other radioactive waste.

Figure 1: Arms Buildup in the Arctic Rim

Based on the above-mentioned relationship, we must deal with both a risk and a threat. Nuclear affairs, either nuclear power for civilian purposes or nuclear weapons, always include risks, risk for the environment and for people. The fundamental difference between nuclear environmental risks and other types of environmental risks is that, as a rule, non-nuclear risks are

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caused by activities within the industrial, agricultural, or urban systems, without any significant security dimensions.

We must also deal with conflicts. In international relations, when we speak about conflicts, we usually mean either international or regional conflicts, and even armed conflict or war; the most extreme form of conflict. These conflicts on different levels are either inter-state conflicts, where the actors are nations, internal conflicts (civil wars) or state-formation conflicts between armed and organized opposition or tribes.

Now the Cold War and the traditional East-West tension are officially over.

In the Arctic, we can find different kinds of competition and potential for conflict, or conflicts of interest. For our purposes, conflict refers to

“inconsistencies in the motions, sentiments, purposes, or claims of entities.”

Competition is usually distinguished from conflict, but it is also a type of opposition (Wright 1980). A conflict of interests in the North can take many form, such as a conflict of interest between the military and the northern ecosystem, or that of between military activities and the everyday life of northern Indigenous people (Osherenko and Young 1989; Heininen 1992).

From the World Wars to the Turn of the Twenty-first Century

The twentieth century meant the first real hot wars in the Circumpolar North. This was the case especially in the European North, where the road from the “Murmann legion” to the “Escorts to Murmansk” included Englishmen fighting in the First World War for White Russian generals in the Kola Peninsula, and one of the main fronts of the Second World War between Germany and the Soviet Union. Fighting in the Barents Sea and the North Calotte was particularly fierce due to the high strategic value of the European North; for example, Kirkenes and Murmansk were among the most heavily bombed towns of the Second World War.

In the Cold War period, covering the time since the end of the 1940s until the early 1990s, the Circumpolar North was divided into parts where NATO and the Warsaw Pact were rivals and enemies. Both military blocs had their own military, political, and economic integration, and therefore, there was competition between them.

The Arctic as a Military Theatre

The Arctic as a military theatre of the Cold War meant both the presence and activities of the military, especially the categorization of nuclear weapons (Heininen 1994). Indeed, in the Cold War period, the political actors with real power in the Circumpolar North were the United States and the Soviet Union with their navies. Other political actors with an influence

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were NATO (as an IGO) and Canada and Norway as NATO member states and real Arctic states.

Since the 1960s, the Arctic and northern seas have been relevant in the military strategies of the United States and the Soviet Union. The Arctic in general, and especially the northern waters, are regions whose military use is dictated by geostrategy and by technology. Military use proceeded and, in the 1980s, northern seas and the Arctic Ocean, ceased to be peripheries in security and military activities and became fronts: the Arctic became a military theatre (Miller, 1989; Heininen 1991, 29–58).

The Cold War and East-West tension brought the high-tech and sophisticated military presence of the two super-powers, and the other Arctic states, to the Circumpolar North. In the 1980s, both the Soviet Union and the United States produced more and more sophisticated arms systems, especially nuclear arms, and deployed them in northern waters where military presence and activities became intense. Especially the ice-free reaches of the Barents, Norwegian, and Greenlandic seas were heavily militarized in the 1980s. This was very well illustrated in Stanley Kubrick’s visionary, satirical movie Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb, from the 1960s.

The general development of technology after the Second World War was used very much for the arms race. Missile technology, new radar systems, nuclear arms and energy, and other modern technical innovations have made it possible to use weapons like nuclear submarines in icy waters, such as the Soviet Typhoon class, the American Los Angeles class, and Command, Control, Communication and Intelligence (C3I) systems.

Military presence and action in the Circumpolar North were diverse since the end of 1980s, as the inventory of nuclear arms facilities shows: there are naval bases, airfields and radar stations, modern nuclear-powered and - armed strategic submarines (SSBNs), nuclear attack submarines (SSNs), C3I systems, and areas for military tests and maneuvers as illustrated the following case studies.

Case 1: Naval Bases in the Kola Peninsula

The Kola Peninsula and the Barents Sea Rim have the greatest

concentrations of nuclear weapons, reactors, and facilities in the Russian Federation and the largest concentration of military and industrial activities and facilities in the Circumpolar North. According to an inventory, all elements of nuclear involvement, except provision of uranium, are present on the Kola Peninsula and in the nearby waters (Fry 1983; Heininen 1991).

The high number of nuclear reactors present on and along the Kola

Peninsula exceeds by far the concentration in any other region of the world:

there are 178 nuclear reactors in submarines in operation, and about 140

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decommissioned. There are also nuclear weapons test ranges and storage areas for nuclear waste. Nuclear waste has been dumped into the Barents and Kara Seas during the last three decades by the Northern Navy and by the Murmansk Shipping Company, which are based on the Kola Peninsula.

Case 2: DEW Line and US Bases in Keflavik and Thule

Partly based on its military presence in the Second World War, the United States established several air and other military bases and radar stations in the North. The Distant Early Warning (DEW) Line stretched from Alaska to Baffin Island and the North-American Air Defence (NORAD) system from Alaska into Greenland were built to detect Soviet bombers and missiles approaching from Eurasia over the North Pole.

Bases and airfields were also established outside North America in the North Atlantic: at Thule in Greenland, Keflavik in Iceland, and airfields and radar stations in northern Norway. During the Second World War, the United States established an air base in Keflavik because of the geostrategic position of Iceland in the middle of North Atlantic. Since then, and in spite of the independence of Iceland and the resistance of the Icelandic peace movement, is has served as an important air base for the United States and NATO.

The Thule US air base was founded in 1953 on Inuit land through an agreement of the governments of the United States and Denmark. Because of that, the Inuit were displaced from the area of about 3,000 km2 to another place in Greenland. The Thule base and a US military base in the Faeroes are the result of a secret military agreement between the Danish government and the United States (Brösted and Faegteborg, 1985). There was a serious nuclear accident in 1968 near the air base at Thule. An American B-52 bomber lost three of its four hydrogen bombs and the radioactive material burned and spread onto snow and ice and into the water (Shaun 1990).

Case 3: A Nuclear Submarine in the Arctic Ocean:

‘Something under a Surface’

A strategic or attack nuclear-powered and nuclear-weapon-equipped submarine in the sea is a heroic picture, but also an everyday routine of the Cold War in northern seas. One of the most relevant elements of the nuclear weapons system in the North are these submarines, which hide under the ice pack of the Arctic Ocean and have the capability of so-called revenge strikes.

These kinds of military activities and manoeuvres have resulted in nuclear accidents, including the sinking of submarines and collisions of submarines and surface vessels. Such an accident involved a Komsomolets (or Mike)

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class nuclear submarine with a twin nuclear reactor and two warheads on board in the Norwegian Sea in 1989. This accident is one of more than twenty such naval accidents involving either nuclear-armed and or nuclear- powered submarines or war ships in northern seas. Between 1945 and 1988 there have been 212 nuclear accidents in major navies (Arkin and Handler 1989).

In these circumstances, the relationship between the environment and the military is a concrete thing. The risk of a nuclear accident and radioactive contamination in the North Atlantic has been a real threat and cause for an anxiety to Icelanders and the Icelandic government since the middle of 1980s. The concern centres around possible environmental effects on the fishery, an industry of great importance to the economy of the country.

Strategic nuclear submarines, either from the US Navy or the Russian Navy, that were once the most important tool to maintain military power over the oceans, have become severe environmental risks, either in operation or in dock waiting to be decommissioned (Heininen 1996). This is very much the case in the Barents Sea region where the largest number of nuclear weapons, reactors, and facilities in the Russian Federation, and the whole Circumpolar North, are concentrated. In the near future, the possible continued thinning of the ice in the Arctic Ocean could mean more utilization of natural resources, such as fish, more traffic in the two passages of the Arctic Ocean, and increased military patrols. Further, this could mean conflicts in the context of national sovereignty, such as that of Canada’s sovereignty claim over the Arctic Archipelago.

Case 4: Maritime Strategies in the Norwegian Sea

A clearly visible outcome of the general tension between East and West in the North has been the offensive maritime strategy that the United States adopted in the first part of the 1980s in the Arctic and northern seas. The naval competition of the super-powers in the 1980s, before the collapse of the Soviet Union, was actually the final act of the Cold War. It took place mostly in the North Atlantic and other northern waters with equipment such as the Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS). At the end of 1980s, the Soviet Union, in accordance with its military doctrine of “sufficient defence,”

decreased naval incursions in seas far away from her own coast.

There is still a struggle in Russia between the forces of continuity—those who would maintain nuclear weapons and geostrategic elements like the naval and air bases in the Kola Peninsula, and the forces of change—those who welcome the end of the Cold War, arms control, and the new military doctrine of Russia (Miller 1992). The most relevant element of the forces of continuity are nuclear weapons, especially SSBNs.

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Case 5: Nuclear Tests in Novaya Zemlja

The Soviet Union did much of its nuclear testing on Novaja Zemlja.

Between 1957 and 1991 there have been a total of 132 nuclear tests, 77 to 86 of them in the atmosphere. In the middle of the1950s, the Soviet Army started to build two nuclear test areas on Novaja Zemlja, even though the Nenets people lived, fished, and hunted along the coasts of the Barents and Kara Seas, as well as on the islands. Since then, the Nenets have been prohibited from living or hunting in Novaja Zemlja.

We know that radioactivity from nuclear tests done in the atmosphere is forming even today and is the greatest source of radioactive contamination of the oceans. Radioactivity from these tests is found in the sediments of the ocean bottom. There is also some evidence of radioactive contamination from underground nuclear tests because of earthquakes. In 1992, the president of Russia, Boris Jeltsin, signed a decision to make the test area the official, and only, nuclear test site in the Russian Federation.

Case 6: Low Level Flights in Goose Bay

Military tests and manoeuvres in the northern regions increased

considerably in the 1980s, and the trend continued in the 1990s. The area around Nitassinan, in Labrador, Canada, is used as an area for low-level, military training flights, but also a land where Innu people used to live.

Yearly, four NATO countries did thousands of low-level flights there at a height of only 30 to 75 m, at near maximum speed. In 1991, there were 7,700 low-level flights. Harmful effects included noise, sonic booms, aircraft emissions, and microwaves, as well as the risk of accidents and crashes (Lloyd 1989).

All in all, the above-mentioned cases are examples of the militarization of the Circumpolar North in the Cod War period, and they also indicate competition and even conflicts of interest between both the military and the northern ecosystem on one hand, and the everyday life of the northern Indigenous peoples and other northerners on the other.

Arms Control and Confidence-building

Measures, and the End of the Cold War Period

In spite of the arms race, competition, and tension between the two superpowers in the Cold War, there were also arms-control process, arms control treaties, and confidence and security-building measures (CSBMs) between the United States and the Soviet Union. Among them are, for example, global treaties such as the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) 1 and 2, and the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) I in 1991, and START II in 1993, following the

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collapse of the Soviet Union in late 1991, and treaties for Europe, such as the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) in 1987 and the Treaty of Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE). It is possible to interpret that the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE currently the OSCE), these arms control agreements, and the development of gas pipelines from western Siberia into Central Europe, brought the common interests of Western bloc and the Eastern bloc of Europe into focus.

Also, slogans such as “The Baltic Sea—Sea of Peace” and proposals for security building and arms control in North Europe and northern seas, according to the principles of the OSCE, help to generate pan-European co- operation. Among the initiatives are President Urho Kekkonen’s (President of Finland from 1956 to 1982) proposal for a Nuclear-Free Norden, which created a big debate inside the Nordic states, and the Murmansk speech by President Gorbachev of Russia in October 1987, with six proposals on arms control and nuclear disarmament, as well as proposals for peaceful

international co-operation in the Arctic. The West did not, however, interpret the proposals in the right spirit and, instead of giving a positive response, suspected that the proposals for arms control were one-sided (Scrivener 1989).

The geopolitical situation of North Europe started to change as early as the 1980s and the Murmansk speech, as a part of glasnost and perestroika of the Soviet Union, was one indicator of the coming change and encouraged several proposals and activities for international co-operation in the Arctic, such as the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS). Finally, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Cold War was over, and a transition period started.

With the end of the Cold War came a euphoria of peace and friendship between the West and Russia, which the slogans “Common European Home” and “Nuclear Free World” and the Paris Statement of the OSCE indicated. Not only slogans but deeds, such as the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), signed in 1996, heralded the new era. The CTBT is usually considered (though also challenged) an important step toward the goal of a de-nuclearized world. It includes elements of arms control and a non- proliferation measure; an essential prerequisite for nuclear disarmament.

Although the Russian Duma has ratified the CTBT, the US Congress has not.

At end of the Cold War, the geopolitical situation of Europe started to change, first slowly and then dramatically. It was not only the end of hostilities, but lack of money for arms, that brought a decrease in the total number of submarines, warships, and nuclear weapons, affecting the whole Circumpolar North. Both the Russian Federation and the United States did some unilateral arms control and disarmament.

It was especially the European North that changed dramatically. What was once primarily a security area and a military theatre evolved into a new kind of region with new actors and interests (see Module 10: New External Political Structures). For example, North Norway lost its strategic

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importance and it is no longer a military front of NATO, and the Russian military in the Kola Peninsula is no longer considered to be as great a threat as it was in the Cold War period. However, the military importance of the North remains high for Norway and NATO (Nokkala 2002).

Forces of Continuity, and Those of Change

The Cold War period and the traditional East-West tension are officially over, armament has decreased, and arms control has turned towards real disarmament, at least concerning nuclear weapons. Global and European security is in transition. Many of the old structures, like the nuclear weapon system and the military arsenal, are still in use, however, and a part of the current military structure. The nuclear weapon system is still the backbone of the military of both the United States (about 7000 warheads) and Russia (about 6000).

The legacy of the Cold War period also exists partly in some external political organizations such as NATO, the EU, and the OSCE. Thus, in spite of the renaissance of regional co-operation and new external structures such as the Baltic Sea States (CBSS) and the Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC), these old structures are attractive enough to expand beyond the former Iron Curtain and dominate international politics, and even the discussion of international relations.

Security and security policy are still largely structured according to the concept of traditional security guaranteed by the military, which leads to the question: Have we changed the way we think about war? The Gulf War, the Bosnian air campaign, the Kosovo war, and especially the Afghanistan war of 2001–2002, supported the idea that “bombing works,” supported by advanced technical equipment, like global-positioning systems, laser guidance, smart bombs, and so on. But, although we are in a new era of international relations, how fundamental the changes really are is still in question. Does high-tech war represent a fundamental change, or is it merely a tactical shift in the conduct of conventional war. It is not yet clear how the nuclear weapons systems and the new military doctrines of both the Russian Federation and the United States will affect security.

In spite of the decrease in the amount of armaments, the Circumpolar North is still of great strategic importance. Naval forces are still strategically important and will likely be permanently present as part of strategic military-based security. The geostrategic position of the North Atlantic and the Barents Sea is important for the Russian Federation and the United States. For Russia, the naval bases in the Kola Peninsula are even more important in a relative sense than for the Soviet Union, and the US Navy continues patrolling close to Russian waters in the Barents Sea (Nokkala 2002).

Worldwide disarmament actually progressed more in the last years of the Cold War than in the post-Cold War period (Gorbachev 2001). There is

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little real evidence of disarmament in the Arctic and northern seas, even though the military presence has decreased. There are rumours (in American newspapers) that both the United States and Russia might restart

underground nuclear tests in order to test existing nuclear warheads, in spite of the CTBT. Global and European security arrangements and security structures are in transition, but steps toward the goal of disarmament have been modest, and even arms control measures made in the Cold War era have been made ineffective by the nuclear capability of India, Pakistan, and other middle powers. Also, the disarmament process between the United States and Russia has encountered obstacles on both sides, including NATO expansion and the US plan for a ballistic missile defence system (contrary to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty).

This apparent contradiction is due to competition, typical in transition periods, between the forces of continuity and the forces of change. The forces of continuity support arms technology, and particularly quality of technology over quantity of arms (one of the basic reasons why the military is present in the Arctic). The forces of change see new kinds of threats, like a lack of border security, armed conflict within the former Soviet Union or civil wars in the Russian Federation, and global and regional environmental degradation, including that caused by peacetime military activities.

Traditional Power I: NATO

Just after the Cold War, the West gave its moral and financial support to the Central Eastern European Countries and the newly independent states through initiatives, such as the Tacis Programme. (The Tacis Programme was launched by the EC in 1991 to provide grant-financed technical assistance to 13 countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia with the aim of enhancing the transition process in those countries.) The West also promised to enlarge its institutions, first the EU and NATO, to take new member states from Eastern Europe.

The West has had difficulties implementing its promises quickly, and several so-called waiting rooms of NATO, such as the North Atlantic Co- operation Council, the Partnership for Peace, and the Euro-Atlantic

Partnership Council have been established. There has been strong support in Eastern Europe for a rapid NATO enlargement, with an emphasis that it should be a political project rather than a slow, bureaucratic process. Behind this haste is a sense of a lack of security. The first new member states, Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland, were taken into NATO in 1999, and the enlargement processes of the EU and NATO are still in progress.

Russia has reacted to NATO expansion mostly due to the situation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. NATO enlargement into these states, and beyond the “red line” of the former Soviet Union, is seen as the only threat to Nordic-Russian relations. It does not to coincide with the security interests of Russia and could be taken as a provocation (Foreign Policy 2000). There are, among the Russians, the feeling that the West is hostile

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toward Russia and might try to harm or even attack it, so Russia has opposed the enlargement of NATO. Russia has not, however, protested against EU enlargement nor against EU plans to create its own security policy and military for crisis management. In response to Western encroachments into the former Soviet sphere, political alliances have been created, such as the strategic partnership between Russia and Ukraine, the Kiev-Moscow Pact, the Collective Security Council of the Commonwealth of Independent States, and a new, rapid-action military troop to fight against terrorism and extremists in Central Asia. Russia is also strengthening its military power in some areas: a ballistic Topol-M-missile “to respond to new geopolitical realities, both external and internal threats,” military manoeuvres, such as the testing of a new missile technology; and redeployment of tactical nuclear warheads.

All in all, the Baltic Sea region is no longer as strategically important to Russia because the real problems are elsewhere. The Baltic regional governments, with the exception of Russia, argue that NATO membership for Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania will increase stability generally in the Baltic Sea region and North Europe. Finland and Sweden are not members of NATO and it does not appear that they will apply for NATO membership in the near future. Finland is militarily non-aligned and Sweden is neutral, but the situation is under discussion and, therefore, in a transition.

NATO has adopted a new strategic concept, especially since the September 11th terrorist attacks. This includes the expansion of military actions outside the geographical areas of its member states, but with the permission of the UN, and involvement in regional and ethnic conflicts, massive arms buildups, proliferation of nuclear weapons, and terrorism. In this context NATO can be seen as an instrument of the Western peace policy, guaranteeing stability and security in Europe. It is argued that NATO has transformed from a military union into a political alliance, and is open to countries preferring peace and partnership.

It remains a question whether the institutional and structural changes, such as the NATO enlargement, should be proceeded by the principles of new realism; that is, through functional and regional co-operative frameworks, such as the Baltic Sea States and the Barents Euro-Arctic Council. How can the West maintain and increase stability, and create a strategic partnership and a spirit of new community if, at the same time, the United States continues the nuclear arms race with the National Missile Defence plan?

Finally, the most fundamental question is: could the Russian Federation join the Western organizations?

Traditional Power II : National Missile Defence

A part of the US nuclear weapons strategy, and an example of traditional military power based on nuclear weapons systems, is the US National Missile Defence program. President Bush, in 2001, began the development

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of a large missile defence system in co-operation with US allies, and, at the same time, announced a decrease in the number of its nuclear warheads.

Tests have been done since 1999 by the so-called killer vehicle above the Pacific Ocean to test the practicality of a missile-against-missile defence.

In rhetoric the main idea of the National Missile Defence program is to build a large national ballistic missile defence capability to protect the territory of the United States, and its forces abroad, from ballistic missile attacks from the so-called rogue countries, such as Iraq, and North Korea. The National Missile Defence program will use both satellites and radar stations to find and attack missiles and destroy them. Behind the National Missile Defence program is the Strategic Defence Initiative, initiated by President Reagan, with his idea to build a defence shield in space. Estimates of the total cost of the National Missile Defence program is about US$300 billion, with the costs of a single test at about US$100 million.

The National Missile Defence program has direct and strong connections with the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, signed between the USSR and the United States in 1972, and with negotiations between the United States and Russia since then. Russia opposes the National Missile Defence program because it would, in Russia’s view, effectively end the stability achieved by mutual nuclear deterrence. Russia believes the system would nullify the offensive and retaliatory capacity of other countries, allowing the United States to attack other countries with impunity. Russia has warned the United States that the National Missile Defence program will restart the nuclear arms race, and that it will “build new atomic weapons to counter what is sees as a major threat” (The Globe and Mail, October 19, 1999). Russia argues that the theory of nuclear deterrence still makes sense, and that second-strike capacity is the best strategy to stabilize the world. It sees the ABM Treaty as the core of the whole network of nuclear arms control, with the benefits of transparency and mutual confidence in the nuclear control system. The Bush government argues that the ABM Treaty is a “relic” and would become a “tombstone” to the United States, because it represents the past and is a hindrance to the National Missile Defence program system.

The United States backed out of the ABM Treaty unilaterally in December 2001. The National Missile Defence program is not only an issue between these two states, but also between the United States and China, and even between the United States and its European allies, who also believe that it would stimulate a new arms race.

The National Missile Defence program affects the Circumpolar North in that it would introduce a new re-militarization of the North and reactions by Russia. There is potential for new military tests by the United States and Russia in the northern peripheries and use of the US air and radar bases in the Circumpolar North. Russia conducted two missile tests in November 1999 in response to US plans for the National Missile Defence program, one in South Russia and another from the Barents Sea into Kamtcatha

(Kamchatka).

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The Thule Radar Base will be a part of the National Missile Defence program. The Greenland Home Rule Government, especially Prime Minister Motzfedlt, and public opinion in Greenland are “skeptical, bordering on hostile” to return to the atmosphere of the Cold War period (International Herald Tribune, Sept. 19, 2000; Schultz-Lorentsen 2001).

However, Denmark is a NATO country and has a bilateral agreement with the United States on Thule. The National Missile Defence program also concerns Alaska because President Bush has sanctioned a test area there.

There is also some indication that the new radar station for satellites outside Vardö, Norway, would be part of the missile defence plan. Russia has asked that the radar station be put to joint use.

In an case, many experts are skeptical of the National Missile Defence program. Some argue that a weapon system, by its nature, cannot be only defensive. Others attack the concept on technical grounds, claiming that it will only be effective against relatively small attacks, not a massive attack by a country such as Russia, because it is not “a shield to protect the whole nation,” or that it would not function well against less-developed missiles (i.e., the missile threats of the rogue countries), because of their erratic and unpredictable flight paths. Finally, if the National Missile Defence program is an answer: What is the question? Or, as American scientist James Pike put it, the National Missile Defence program is “a weapon, which does not work, and which has been targeted into a threat which does not exit”

(Zakaria 2001; Landau 2001). Indeed, would the National Missile Defence program protect against the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001?

A Relationship Between the Military and the Environment

Social scientist Johan Galtung emphasized, in the beginning of the 1980s, the keen relationship between the environment and the military. “It is an error to think that there is little or no relation between the degradation of the environment and security matters” (Galtung 1982; see also Westing 1988).

In general, and on a global scale, there are relevant links, relations, and contradictions between the military and the environment that can be seen in the routine activities of armies. They have many elements: armies use the air, water, and land—worldwide about 0.5 to one per cent of all the land;

they need natural resources, such as copper, nickel, and lead; armies use energy, especially oil; and armies are both “normal” (pollution caused by regular human activities) and “special” polluters (toxic and radioactive waste), but are “protected” polluters in that they generally operate outside environmental legislation.

The environmental effects and risks are similar all over the world, but the Arctic and the sub-Arctic lands and seas are particularly vulnerable. As mentioned earlier, military presence and routine action takes many forms in the region, including garrisons, bases and airfields, manoeuvres and patrols, different kinds of weapons and weapon systems, and nuclear and missile

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tests and low-level flights. Even in peacetime, the effects of military presence to the environment and indigenous peoples can be actual, like pollution, or potential, like risks of nuclear accidents. For more details about the relationship between the military and the environment see Heininen 1992 and 1994.

At the start of nuclear weapons testing on Novaya Zemlya in 1957, there was already a growing awareness about radioactive contamination of the environment among scientist and authorities dealing with radiation protection issues. The public reaction, however, never became particularly strong, and worries about possible contamination of food products or health effects never progressed to widespread public concern. The accident of the Mike-class nuclear submarine in April of 1989, is an example of the risk in the Cold War period to northern seas. According to several international studies, the radioactive release would, in theory, cause significant

disturbances to marine life. The revelation of substantial radioactive releases from nuclear facilities along the River Ob in Siberia increased concern about environmental pollution, particularly in the Kara and Barents Seas, and the Chernobyl incident brought nuclear contamination sharply into public focus.

There are arguments against environmental concern. Some argue that the environmental effects of the military is no longer a relevant issue because military activities in the Arctic and northern seas are decreasing, or that there is so much space and land in the North that military testing and training has little overall effect, and even that, in some cases, the ownership of some areas by armies has prevented environmental degradation. Some argue that it is difficult, or even impossible, to show any dramatic evidence of pollution that would affect the Arctic ecosystem, or that there are much bigger environmental challenges and problems like oil-drilling, long- distance air and sea pollution, traffic, and local industrial pollution that are more damaging than military activities.

The relations between the military and the northern indigenous peoples is also relevant. There are examples, such as Canada’s efforts to force Inuit people to move to the Arctic Archipelago to support Canadian sovereignty claims; pollution from the equipment of the DEW line near the residences of the Eskimo people in Alaska; and plans to build a radar station in the reindeer herding area on the top of Litmurinvaara in Inari, Finland.

In dealing with these relations, there are two arguments: first, that in the North there is space enough for both the traditional uses of northern Indigenous peoples and the needs of armies; second, that armies have brought development to northern Indigenous peoples, and other people who are living in the North, including employment, needed services, tax

revenues, and flight routes inside the northern peripheries. Some Indigenous groups support military defence by NATO, and believe that they should have at least some representation in national defence decision-making (Jull 1990).

Also, the majority of the Home Rule Government of Greenland is in favour of NATO because Greenland is seen “as part of the NATO alliance”

(Fægteborg 1989).

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All in all, the relation between the military and the northern indigenous peoples is complicated. At a time when most northern Indigenous peoples, like the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, have expressed their concern for the growing militarization of the Arctic, some Indigenous groups support military defence by NATO (Fægteborg 1989; Gaup 1990). People living in the Circumpolar North need development and a minimum standard of living. A northern population is also needed to prevent these areas from becoming desolate, which would have security policy implications.

The whole idea of armies as polluters is new, complicated, and very political. There is a lack of evaluation and knowledge about the effects because of a lack of monitoring and because of the inherent secrecy of armies. It should also be pointed out that we are discussing potential threats (or risks), for example, the effects of nuclear accidents are potential, so the consequences are not yet well known. In spite of arms control agreements and disarmament activities, the arms race is ongoing. Finally, the ability to clean up pollution and environmental catastrophes exists. For example, in the early 1990s, based on an environmental assessment, the DEW Line Clean Up Protocol was signed and carried out (Poland 2001).

Challenges of the Future on Security

The international system is still mostly based on the unified-state system, and the unified states are the main actors with an emphasis on national sovereignty, including national borders and international co-operation through intergovernmental economic, political, and military unions. As mentioned in the theory of new realism, security based on power is at the core, and guaranteed by the military. The security policy of the post-Cold War period emphasizes stability through co-operation instead of

confrontation, but includes a strong role for traditional security.

The Peace Project of the West: Russia as a Strategic Partner or an Enemy

For the West, especially for the European NATO states, the Euro-Atlantic ties are important for security. The Euro-Atlantic security community in the context of NATO is also seen as the main guarantor for the security of the EU. From the point of view of the EU, the main strategic directions are South and East: the South because of Africa and the Arab and Islamic World, and the East because of the Russian Federation. These are seen as unstable and as potential conflict areas—as potential enemies and parts of the “other.”

The main dilemma for the West since the end of the Cold War has been to develop policy and relations toward the former socialistic bloc countries, an old “good” enemy, in order to increase stability and security in the new international system. Which alternative should be taken: either build up

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confidence step by step toward a strategic partnership, or strengthen the military. In response, the West has developed the peace project of the West, which includes contributions and various programs.

The main concept behind the peace project derives from the fact that even post-wall Europe is divided into parts—the integrated western part, the central East European countries and Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania as EU candidate countries, and Turkey and the Russian Federation. To the West, Russia and the Islamic World represent otherness, where the “other” has been primarily the Russians, in the context of “we” and “they” (Tunander 1997). Indeed, the Russian Federation, both as it represents chaos, and because of the two Chechnyan wars, has been seen as a problem and the biggest challenge for the West. The West does not want to isolate Russia or let Russia isolate itself but, on the contrary, wants to help Russia to help itself as a part of Europe. On the other hand, the West does not want to accept Russia in the Western organizations or give a veto to Russia in the NATO enlargement process.

Western policy of the 1990s beyond the former Iron Curtain can be interpreted as a policy to increase stability and peace and to create interdependence via co-operation instead of confrontation. Its main objective is to expand and strengthen a Euro-Atlantic security community by integrating the three Baltic states and the central East European countries deeper into the European sphere and Western institutions. The aim of increased stability makes it a practical means for the enlargement of the EU and NATO. Another objective is to integrate Russia into international co- operation and the new security architecture of Europe, mostly designed by the West, in order to stabilize the situation by governing and controlling, but not necessarily to take Russia officially into the institutionalized co-

operation of the West.

The Western policy for stability and security includes aid and assistance, such as the EU programs, and functional co-operation in trade and

environmental protection. The European Union has created several means to increase stability and security, notably the Phare and Phare-CBC programs with the central East European countries, and special policies such as the Euro-Mediterranean partnership, or the Barcelona Process, aimed toward the Mediterranean. For the Russian Federation, there are several EU programs, such as the Partnership and Co-operation Agreement, the EU’s Common Strategy toward Russia, and the Tacis Program, which covers the newly independent states. Correspondingly, the United States has the Northern Europe Initiative (NEI) as its new element of US strategy for post-Cold War Europe (Shearer 1997; US Department of State 2000).

Thus, Russia and other newly independent states, as well North African countries, have been taken into functional co-operation and, according to the official rhetoric, are even considered to be potential partners, especially after the terrorist attacks of September 2001. Russia is of great importance to the EU, but progress has not always been obvious or according to plan.

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The peace project policy, as a part of the intergovernmental policy of the Western countries, represents an attitude by the political elite that Western democracy and the market economy are the only alternatives after the Cold War. This is largely due to the emergence of the cultural agenda of the West as a universal paradigm. The main goal of the policy is to increase influence for the EU and the United States, and to try to guarantee the welfare of the Western democracies against threats from, for example, the Islamic World and Russia. It can also be called a new containment policy of the post-Cold War period, with a new Marshall Plan by President Clinton.

The Nuclear Problem of the Barents Sea Region: Changes in Problem Definition

The nuclear problem of the Barents Sea region is one of nuclear safety, but it is also an example of changes in problem definition. Russia’s shift from hard to soft security, including economic, environmental, and other kind of security, has moved nuclear issues onto the international agenda (Sergounin 1999). This case study deals with different concepts of security. It is based on traditional security but includes aspects of environmental and even civil security. For more details about the nuclear problem of the Barents Sea regions, see Bergman, Baklanov, and Segerståhl 1996; Heininen 1999;

Heininen and Segerståhl 2001; Heininen and Häyrynen 2002.

The list of possible radioactive sources in and around the Barents Sea comprises a multitude of different entities, of which the following are known, or expected to be, of major concern (see Figure 2).

• The Northern Navy has 154 nuclear-powered submarines (under and out of operation) and two battle cruisers (a total of more than 300 nuclear reactors) and the nuclear weapons they carry

• The Kola Nuclear Power Plant with four old reactors

• Atomflot, which operates eight nuclear ice-breakers, one nuclear container ship, and five ships with radioactive waste

• More than ten storage areas for nuclear waste, some of which contain large amounts of spent nuclear fuel

• Nuclear weapons storage sites and bases for nuclear warheads

• Dumped radioactive waste, sunken nuclear reactors, submarines and ships

• Building and repair shipyards

• Two nuclear weapons test ranges on Novaya Zemlya with up to 132 tests since 1957

• Testing of submarine-launched ballistic missiles in the Barents Sea

• Underground nuclear explosions for civil purposes

• Transport of radioactive fuel, materials, and waste

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• Mining and processing of radioactive raw materials, such as lopartite near Lovozero, and companies processing such material.

The actual and potential risks associated with these sources of radioactive contamination in some cases affects mainly the conditions at local and regional levels, yet others appear to be far reaching and of considerable concern for the whole Arctic region or large parts of Europe. In fact, apart from the contributions from nuclear weapons testing, primarily the atmospheric explosions at Novaya Zemlya, the present environmental contamination in the Barents Sea region is mainly from sources outside this region, including discharges from the reprocessing plants of Sellafield and Dounreay (UK) and La Hague (France), and from Russian nuclear

installations in Siberia (Chelyabinsk, Tomsk, Krasnoyarsk), from the Chernobyl accident, and atmospheric nuclear explosions in other regions contributing to the global component of the radioactive fallout.

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Figure 2: Nuclear Problems of the Russian Territories of the Barents Region The Barents and Kara Seas largely exhibit very low concentrations of radioactive contamination, and Russian scientists say that the Barents Sea is one of the cleanest seas of the world. The main areas of the Kola Peninsula and the adjacent seas are very clean in comparison to some other parts of Europe. At certain sites on land and in the sea, however, significant contamination results from explosions, accidental emission, or problems at radioactive waste depositories. The situation is getting worse as the amount of nuclear waste is increasing while efforts to manage it are inadequate, and an uncertain and unsafe situation in the region is a threat both to the people and the environment. The principal radiological hazard for the region, as well as for more distant areas, is the potential future risk of radioactive pollution from accidents and mismanagement. This is mostly due to the following four risky hotpots of the region: (1) the Kola nuclear power plant, (2) storehouses of spent fuel, (3) the old storage vessels, and (4) the large number of decommissioned submarines and nuclear reactors (Bergman, Baklanov, and Segerståhl 1996).

The nuclear problem of the Barents Sea region has also been widely discussed in the context of the Kursk nuclear submarine accident of August 2000 in the Barents Sea. It was mainly military and state officials, in addition to some ecologists, who contributed to the discussion, the former first denying the risk of radioactive contamination and then, in connection with the debate on the raising of the Kursk’s wreck, emphasizing it. Quite a confusing feature of the discussion has been the exclusion of other problems military activity is causing in the Kola Peninsula. The Kursk case can be interpreted in the framework of the discourse of comprehensive (including environmental) security. An analysis based on a study of material collected from Russian newspapers addresses the question of the perceptions of security and the environmental threat posed by the nuclear reactors of the Kursk (see Häyrynen 2001). What kind of security concepts there were present in the Russian public discussion? How was the environmental threat perceived and by whom? Answers to these questions are further examined in the framework of the theoretical debate concerning the extension of the security concept and the notions of environmental and nuclear security.

Collective environmental and social security, including nuclear safety via international co-operation in the Barents Sea region, requires a political will and a long period of international negotiation. The issues are complex and sensitive, due to the general fact that nuclear issues form part of the hidden agendas of the nuclear weapon states, and that the Arctic still forms an important part of global military strategic thinking. One proof of that is the ongoing presence and activities of nuclear weapons in the Barents region, for example, the testing of SLBMs by the Russian Navy. A particular reason for the complexity of the issues in this remote and sparsely populated region is the burden of strategic military importance the region carried through the years of the Cold War. That is why security issues are part of every international agenda dealing with problems in this region, whether they be environmental, social, or economic on the surface. As a consequence of this,

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the region is always part of the considerations in negotiations aiming at a reduction of military tensions and threats.

The governments of Finland, Iceland, and Sweden have been active in international politics, demanding arms control, nuclear disarmament, and a nuclear free zone. In the 1980s environmental organizations like

Greenpeace, the scientific community, and some NGOs, like the North Calotte Peace Days, started to become interested in the nuclear problem.

The Nordic Saami Council expressed the concern of the Saami people and made a statement on risks and environmental and social influences of nuclear power and reactors in 1987, however, that was mostly due to the radioactive contamination from the Chernobyl accident in North Europe.

In the 1990s, there were many political actors and other groups with interests in the area. Among them were actors from outside the region, like the EU, and multinational companies with economic interests. There were also many international processes going on dealing with the nuclear problem of the Barents Sea region.

• The London Convention of 1972 is an international agreement on the dumping of waste at sea, and it came into force in 1976. In 1993 the convention was strengthened when the parties agreed to a permanent ban on the dumping of radioactive waste, as well as on the dumping and incineration at sea of industrial waste. For many years the Soviet Union ignored the London Convention and did extensive dumping of radioactive waste in several sea areas.

• The AMAP report of the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS), signed by the governments of the Arctic states in 1991, covered radioactive contamination and wastes in the Arctic. Since then, nuclear security has been an important part of the agenda of Arctic security issues. Several actors and stakeholders are looking for their roles and positions in the international “negotiations game.” The AEPS did not, however, separate the radioactive contamination from military sources from that of civil sources. A change in problem definition became visible, however, first by research projects and analyses that have been directed to environmental contamination in the Arctic from Russian nuclear sources, mostly concerning the Kola Peninsula, the Barents and Kara Seas, and northern rivers like the River Ob.

• Due to the fact that the AEPS became a part of the Arctic Council, the Action Plan of the Arctic Council calls for the elimination of pollution in the Arctic, including radioactive wastes. The agenda of the Council does not, however, cover security or military issues including nuclear wastes related to the military sources.

• The Arctic Military Environmental Co-operation (AMEC) agreement between the United States, Russia, and Norway was signed in 1996. A division of work between the Arctic Council and the AMEC makes it quite obvious that the decisions were interconnected and that the United States, and perhaps also Norway and Russia, wanted to

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