BODØ, Norway — Half a mile inside a mountain in the north of Norway, the U.K. is preparing for war.

The country’s military planners have travelled to Bodø, nestled between the sea and snow-capped peaks of the Arctic Circle, to rehearse what it would look like if Russia decided to unleash hostile activity on its doorstep. 

The exercise is set a year after an imagined ceasefire in Ukraine. It asks leaders of Nordic and Baltic countries to calculate what they would do as they begin to track pro-Russia civil unrest inside a bordering country.

Defense ministers and generals in attendance are supplied with newspaper reports about the incidents, patchy intelligence updates and social media posts and asked to decide the best course of action.

The task is not purely hypothetical. An unexplained attack on a Baltic undersea cable last year, Russian drones and airplanes violating NATO airspace and an increase in Russian ships threatening British waters have called attention to the vulnerability of the so-called “high north.”

In the wake of Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea, Britain put itself forward to lead a group of like-minded European countries in preparing for threats on their northern flank, founding the 10-nation Joint Expeditionary Force.

The question now is whether this alliance can live up to its potential as the Russian threat morphs — and the U.S. continues to turn away from European security under Donald Trump.

A changing landscape

While the high north has long been an area of Russian strength, Moscow’s methods are diversifying in a way that demands answers from its neighbors.

At the same time, melting Article ice is opening previously-impassable seas and triggering a new contest for access and minerals in the region — pulling in both China and the U.S. 

British Defence Secretary John Healey, who took part in this week’s war-gaming exercise, spoke to POLITICO on the plane from Norway to France, where he held talks with the French defense minister.

“These are the countries where Russian aggression is their everyday experience. They live next door to the presence of the Russian military,” Healey said. “We’re the nations that can best assess the risks, best respond to the threats, and best get NATO connected to take this more seriously.”

Part of the idea behind JEF is that it can act swiftly while the NATO machine, which requires the agreement of 32 member states to act, takes much longer to whir into action.

Northern allies also believe it is the right vehicle for adapting to rapidly developing weaponry and disruptive tactics which do not meet the threshold of traditional warfare, sometimes known as “gray zone” attacks.

Speaking from the cosy surrounds of the Wood Hotel, which sits on a winding road above Bodø, Maj. Gen. Gjert Lage Dyndal of the Norwegian army was philosophical about the danger to his country. Russian aggression in the Arctic is nothing new, he said, and has more to do with the long-running nuclear standoff between the U.S. and Russia than Norway itself.

Nonetheless, he acknowledged the importance of a coordinated response, particularly for dealing with hybrid warfare — “something that has been developing all over Europe over the last couple of years” — as he pointed to the 2022 sabotage of Nord Stream natural gas pipelines linking Russia and Germany, heightened drone activity and the disruption of shipping routes.

Under-powered?

In theory, then, the U.K. has helped forge an ideal alliance for protecting the high north as its boundaries are increasingly tested.

Yet there is a suspicion among some observers that it is not operating at full strength at precisely the time it is needed most.

Founded under the previous Conservative government, JEF was a particular source of pride for former PM Rishi Sunak — who made a point of meeting its leaders in Latvia after a gap of eight years — and then-Defence Secretary Ben Wallace.

Grant Shapps, another Tory former defense secretary, is keen to talk up JEF as “Britain leading from the front, working with our closest allies to make Europe and the North Atlantic safer,” but he stressed: “We can’t afford to lose momentum.”

The current Labour government has devoted enormous effort to shoring up its own record on defense. It’s focused to a large extent on offering solidarity and resources to Ukraine, including through the new U.K.-French-led outfit, dubbed the “coalition of the willing.”

But Anthony Heron, deputy editor-in-chief of the Arctic Institute think tank, said: “Maritime and air assets dedicated to the high north are limited, and the Arctic’s growing strategic significance demands hard but clear choices about resource allocations.”

Ed Arnold, senior research fellow for European security at the Royal United Services Institute, was more damning. He said that while JEF is “naturally placed to step up” it “has never really managed to articulate its purpose” and “needs to get its mojo back.” 

He’s calling for a long-term strategy for the force which would give it the resources and the attention currently devoted to the Coalition of the Willing, which sprung up amid European nerves about Trump’s commitment to Ukraine.

One Labour MP with a security background, granted anonymity to speak candidly like others quoted in this piece, said a key question mark remains over JEF’s authority to act. While it is “capable” of deploying “I don’t think it’s empowered to do so at present, not adequately,” they added.

“This is crucial because both the COW [Coalition of the Willing] and JEF will be the front lines against Russia,” they warned.

Defense officials gathered in Bodø agreed privately that the group will only grow in importance as the U.S. shifts its security priorities elsewhere, even if couched in the positive language of Europe “stepping up.”

Breaking through

One ingredient for powering up allies’ presence in the high north is investment in more icebreaking capability: specialist ships which can plow through the polar sea.

Russia is estimated to have 50 icebreakers — at least 13 of which can operate in the Arctic and seven of which are nuclear — while China has five that are suitable for the Arctic.

NATO members Sweden and Finland have their own versions of these vessels — as do the U.S. and Canada, but Norway’s Dyndal said more are needed.

“Russia is living in the Arctic,” he warned. “We see China stepping up and learning through more research and activity in the Arctic than we do. We need to step up on the European side, on the American side, to actually learn to live in the ice-covered polar sea.” 

The U.K. has no imminent plans to acquire an icebreaker, but British officials stress that the country’s brings its own naval and aviation expertise to the table.

One senior military figure said there was a risk Britain would miss out if it doesn’t persuade allies to buy other U.K.-produced cold-weather equipment as defense budgets boom.

Addressing Britain’s wider commitment to the region, Healey was defiant. “The level of recognition and readiness to follow the U.K. by defense ministers [in Bodø] was really strong.”

“You can judge us by the response to Russian threats,” he said, before remarking that plans for further military tabletop exercises are under way.

Europe is trying to get serious about its own security — but it’s still a long way from figuring out how to win the game.