China, Russia Deepen Arctic Cooperation In Challenge To US

RFE
01 Nov 2026, 13:57 GMT+10

The recent meeting of the Chinese and Russian heads of government held in St. Petersburg was notable for its focus on cooperation in the Arctic, where Beijing and Moscow are increasingly challenging the United States and its allies.

China and Russia released a joint communique after the regular meeting, held on October 21, that emphasized their intention to boost freight traffic along Arctic shipping routes, jointly build polar vessels, and "assist enterprises from both countries engaged in Arctic cooperation."

While the statement's tone was anodyne, it ultimately signals a deepening alignment of the United States's two most prominent rivals in a strategically vital part of the world that spans 14.5 million square kilometers. Because of Alaska, the United States is considered an Arctic nation, of which there are only eight in total -- including Russia but not China. Arctic countries have territories within the region and serve as its stewards.

With its hegemonic ambitions, Beijing hasn't been content to play a supporting role in the Arctic. In 2014, Chinese leader Xi Jinping declared that China sought to become a "polar great power" by 2030.

Since then, China has rapidly built up its Arctic presence. It has invested heavily in the region, mostly in Russian natural resources projects. TheHouse Foreign Affairs Committeeestimated in 2022 that China had invested $90 billion in the Arctic since 2003. Following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Moscow and Beijing began conducting joint military exercises in the Arctic. Beijing has further ramped up its state-sponsored Arctic research expeditions, reaching 16 major missions.

National Security Concerns

The Arctic is critical to US national security for several reasons. On the one hand, Alaska anchors homeland missile defense. It hosts the critical infrastructure designed to intercept long-range ballistic missile threats before they can reach the continental United States. The state further acts as a strategic hub to project airpower across both the Arctic and the Indo-Pacific regions.

Secondly, Greenland, an autonomous Arctic territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, serves as a forward platform for missile warning and space surveillance for the US and NATO. The massive island also has vast deposits of critical minerals that are essential inputs for military systems.

Given the Arctic's national security importance for the US, China's military exercises in the region with Russia are worrying. In July 2024, the two countries' strategic bombers conducted a combined patrol over the Bering Sea, entering airspace near Alaska for the first time. US and Canadian fighter jets intercepted the aircraft.

"Make no mistake, this is an escalation -- the first time Russia and China have sent a joint bomber task-force into the Alaska ADIZ,"US Senator Dan Sullivanfrom Alaska said in a statement following the exercise. He referred to the state's air defense identification zone, a designated area of airspace or land or water where a country requires the identification, location, and tracking of civil aircraft for national-security reasons.

China's Scientific Research

In the large-scale Ocean 2024 exercise, China and Russia undertook their first joint naval patrols in the Arctic Ocean.

"These activities are not necessarily driven by a Chinese ambition to establish military presence in the Arctic, but to consolidate its close ties with Russia," Jo Inge Bekkevold, senior China fellow at the Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies, told RFE/RL. He adds that Beijing "has an interest in keeping a close watch on US military activities in Alaska, which has a very prominent position as a strategic flank in the US-China rivalry in the Western Pacific. The latter is of course a concern to the United States."

Playing The Long Game

Despite the Chinese leadership's lofty Arctic ambitions, Beijing faces structural constraints in the region that constrain its ability to operate there.

Crucially, China's lack of membership in the Arctic Council -- the main intergovernmental forum that addresses Arctic issues -- prevents it from advancing its vision for the region. None of the eight Arctic nations agree with Beijing's idea to redefine the region as a global common. China has had observer status in the council since 2013, but that offers no voting or decision-making rights.

Of the eight Arctic Council members, only Russia has close ties with China. The US is Beijing's chief rival. The other six members are close American allies: Canada, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland.

For that reason, "Russia continues to act as a gatekeeper to China's ability to operate in the Arctic," says Wishnick of the CNA Corporation.

While Beijing and Moscow have overlapping interests in the Arctic, tensions exist beneath the surface of their cooperation in the region. "China and Russia of course have different agendas in the Arctic," Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Stimson Center in Washington, said in an interview.

"Russia is an Arctic state, and China aspires to be an Arctic state. That is a natural conflict. Before the first Ukraine war, Russia had opposed China's presence in the Arctic. Geopolitics changed things, but not the fundamentals," Sun said.

China's attempts to gain a foothold in Greenland are among its least successful Arctic endeavors. Between 2016 and 2018, Chinese firms tried to acquire three airports and an abandoned naval station in Greenland. Under heavy US pressure, Denmark blocked the sales to Chinese buyers. Danish interests ended up controlling the strategic infrastructure. Further, US officials successfully lobbied the developers of Greenland's Tanbreez rare earth deposit to block a potential sale to Chinese buyers. New York-based Critical Metals Corp eventually bought Tanbreez, completing the acquisition in April 2026.