BARDUFOSS, Norway — Britain and Norway are publicly backing the idea of an “Arctic Sentry” NATO mission, a military co-operation that would aim to counter Russian threats while reassuring U.S. President Donald Trump of Europe’s commitment to the region.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said Thursday in an interview with POLITICO that she envisages the mission as covering “the whole of the high north,” including Greenland, Iceland, Finland and the increasingly busy shipping lanes around them. She did not rule out the prospect of military exercises by NATO troops in Greenland.

“We want to see the stronger NATO role, and for NATO to really double down on Arctic security and develop this Arctic Sentry approach,” Cooper said during the last stop of her multi-day tour across the Nordic region.

The move is the latest in a series of steps European leaders have taken to highlight their investment in securing the Arctic against not just Russian but Chinese threats. 

Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide, who visited the British Royal Marines’ Camp Viking Arctic training area in the far north of his country with Cooper on Thursday, also voiced support for the idea in a separate interview with POLITICO.

Their interventions came one day after U.S. Vice President JD Vance met Danish and Greenlandic representatives at the White House amid growing tensions over Trump’s repeatedly stated intention to take control of Greenland. Following the meeting, Denmark’s foreign minister said there was still a “fundamental disagreement” with the U.S.

The idea of an “Arctic Sentry” as a long-term commitment has gained traction in recent days. Cooper said the intention would be to “echo” NATO’s “Baltic Sentry,” which launched a year ago with frigates and maritime patrol aircraft to monitor critical infrastructure, and “Eastern Sentry,” which launched along the alliance’s eastern flank in September after a Russian drone incursion into Poland.

In such missions, “the stronger NATO coordination — bringing countries together around communications, operations, coordination — is a way of strengthening our response to the Russian threat but also strengthening deterrence,” Cooper said.

She added: “It’s something the U.K. has been working on with Norway for some time and we’re in the process of expanding that, but what we want to see is the broader framework as part of NATO. And the Arctic Sentry approach is really to echo what NATO has already successfully done with the Baltic Sentry and the Eastern Sentry.” 

Asked if it could include NATO exercises in Greenland, Cooper said the effort is about countering the forces that have drawn Trump’s attention in the first place. “This is about the whole of the high north. If you look at some of the key areas — for example, the Greenland-Iceland gap, the Iceland-U.K. gap, the shipping channels … are crucial for the transatlantic alliance, security and defense,” she said.

“So that’s why this is about the Arctic as a whole. That includes [Norway] … but it also includes Iceland, Greenland, it includes the work that Canada has been talking about [in] the high north. So it’s a broad approach to Arctic security.”

Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said Thursday that he welcomed the “Arctic Sentry” proposal and had discussed it with Cooper.

“Actually, it’s an old Norwegian idea — not exactly that name, but to have a co-operation on [the] Arctic in NATO,” Eide told POLITICO. That’s linked to what he termed the “A7” — the seven NATO countries with Arctic territory.

“We have always thought that it’s useful to have a stronger focus on the Arctic, and what we call the ‘A7’ has been cooperating more and more on this,” Eide added. “We’ve seen that countries that were less interested in the Arctic are now becoming more interested, which is a good thing. And NATO is there for military cooperation on whatever challenge we find.”

He cautioned, however, that Norway’s focus was still more on Russia’s live threat to the European high north than a future threat to Greenland. “According to our own and allied intelligence, there is not so much activity around Greenland as sometimes is being described,” he said. “There’s hardly any military activity from, for instance, Russia and China in Greenland. It’s much more over here and in our north, and we follow that very closely.”

Asked if he would like Arctic nations to take the lead on an Arctic Sentry proposal, Eide replied: “It’s logical that the Arctic countries have a leading role in the Arctic. But of course, we welcome, we warmly welcome that countries who are not themselves in the Arctic take an interest in this.”

Belgium publicly voiced support for a NATO operation in the high north on Sunday, while Germany is reported to be a key proponent of the “Arctic Sentry” proposal. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said Wednesday that he was working on next steps “with all Allies involved, particularly of course, the seven who are bordering on the Arctic.”

The U.K. announced Wednesday that it is also sending one military officer to Greenland as part of a multi-nation reconnaissance group. Separately, Sweden and Denmark on Wednesday announced a commitment to send troops to Greenland.