The US and Canadian Air Forces have begun joint air defense exercises in the Arctic.

This was announced by the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) on its Twitter page.

Minnesota National Guard Air Force 148th Fighter Wing personnel are officially assigned to the Amalgam Dart maneuver.

Air defense exercises in the Arctic under the leadership of NORAD will start today and will continue until March 26, ”the statement reads.

#AirPower on the move!

Members of the @ 148FW, Minnesota National Guard, are officially on their way to #AmalgamDart.

The #NORAD arctic air defense exercise starts today and goes until March 26th.

# WeHaveTheWatchpic.twitter.com / W4QbIOV61D

- North American Aerospace Defense Command (@NORADCommand) March 20, 2021

As previously reported by the command, the purpose of the maneuvers is to increase combat readiness and demonstrate "the ability to defend the northern approaches to the territory" of the United States and Canada.

The official website of NORAD specifies that various models of military aviation of the Canadian and US Air Forces will be involved in the exercises to perform tasks "in the northern regions."

"The training flights will be performed at high altitude over the sparsely populated Arctic territories, where they are unlikely to be noticed by local residents," the message says.

It is noteworthy that shortly before the start of training, NORAD and the United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) published a joint strategy.

The document especially emphasizes the concern of the command of both countries with the intensification of the activities of the Russian Federation in the Arctic region.

"The deployment by Russia of advanced long-range cruise missiles, capable, after being launched from its territory, to overcome the northern approaches and try to hit targets in the United States and Canada, has become the main military threat in the Arctic," the document says.

In addition to Russia, NORAD and USNORTHCOM are also concerned about the activities of the PRC in the Arctic.

As noted in the strategy, "in the context of the current intensification of rivalry, China does not intend to be content with the role of a simple observer."

"He (China. -

RT

) proclaimed itself a" near-Arctic state "and took measures to make its naval and commercial presence in the region the norm and expand its access to lucrative resources and sea routes of communication," the document says.

  • The headquarters of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and the United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM).

  • © NORAD

Arctic direction

Earlier, on March 16, at a hearing in the US Senate Armed Services Committee, American General Glen Van Hirk supported the idea of ​​creating a naval base in Nome (a city in the US state of Alaska -

RT

).

The need for such a measure in the upper house of Congress was motivated by the growing naval presence of Russia in the region and the military-technical lag of the United States.

Recall that on February 23, following a virtual meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, US President Joe Biden told reporters that Washington and Ottawa had agreed to modernize NORAD, as well as to launch an expanded dialogue on the Arctic.

These negotiations, Biden said, will cover issues related to continental security, economic and social development, and governance.

It should be noted that this is not the first time the United States and Canada have conducted exercises in the Arctic.

In February and March 2020, the American-Canadian Arctic Edge-2020 maneuvers were held in this region. About 1,000 servicemen of all types of US forces, as well as members of the Joint Operations Command of Canada, were involved in the training.

The purpose of the exercise was to determine "the ability of the armed forces to conduct tactical operations in extremely cold weather conditions."

In addition, on March 2, 2020, a large-scale NATO exercise Cold Response started in northern Norway, in which about 1,000 troops from ten countries, including the United States, took part.

The maneuvers were supposed to last more than two weeks, but were completed ahead of schedule due to the spread of COVID-19. 

As specified, Cold Response were aimed "at practicing high-intensity combat operations in harsh winter conditions."

The main purpose of the maneuvers was to develop the ability of NATO states to conduct joint multilateral training.

“Another important aspect of the exercise is to practice actions to use the significant potential of amphibious forces and assets.

This includes the practical development of interaction between the forces operating on the coast and the forces providing support from the coastal areas, ”- noted in a statement on the website of the Norwegian Armed Forces.

The largest exercises in the Arctic - Trident Juncture - were held by NATO countries in October 2018.

Then the polar provinces of Norway served as the main springboard for conventional military operations.

The maneuvers were attended by about 50 thousand military (of which about 20 thousand American) from 31 states, including the United States and Canada, 10 thousand combat vehicles, more than a hundred aircraft and dozens of ships.

  • Arctic Edge Exercises - 2020

  • © NORAD / Air Force Staff Sgt.

    Diana Cossaboom

"Catch up and overtake"

As a military expert, senior researcher at the Higher School of Economics Vasily Kashin noted in an interview with RT, the Amalgam Dart exercise is one of the forms of combat training for the United States and Canada in the face of growing competition in the region.

“This is a kind of military preparations, taking into account the mutual distrust of Moscow and Washington.

During the Cold War, all this was given great importance; later, the American side did not concentrate so much on this topic.

And now the interest of the United States in the Arctic is growing again, ”the analyst said.

As military expert Alexei Leonkov recalled in a conversation with RT, the United States has already admitted that it lags behind Russia in the development of the Arctic.

“It turned out that they have an insufficient amount of naval equipment that can operate in the Arctic latitudes, including icebreakers.

Therefore, the United States decided to stake on what they have: on aviation and air and missile defense systems.

At the same time, cooperation with Ottawa in the Arctic is called key, since Canada has a network of radar stations that monitor airspace in northern latitudes.

At the same time, the capabilities of the Canadian Air Force and Air Defense Force are largely limited, ”the analyst said.

It is important for the US to use the Canadian military "as an information component," Leonkov added.

“The United States lacks data on the air situation in the region, especially given the fact that Russia has hypersonic systems.

Therefore, now the US and Canada are conducting Amalgam Dart exercises in order to understand how effective what they have and how it can be applied in the implementation of specific combat training tasks, ”the expert said.

At the same time, based on the results of these maneuvers, "conclusions are likely to be made disappointing," Leonkov stressed.

  • NORAD troops in the Arctic

  • © NORAD / 1st Lt.

    Austen Bouska

“The Americans will again say that the United States is rapidly losing its position in the Arctic, and therefore, in order to catch up and overtake, it is necessary to invest more money in military needs,” the analyst believes.

At the same time, experts agree that, when speaking of "the deployment of advanced long-range cruise missiles by Russia," the United States is referring to the weapons with which the ships of the Russian Navy and Russian aviation are equipped.

"The United States is trying to prepare to counter the far-fetched" Russian threat "in the Arctic, despite the fact that the Russian Federation is only defending its borders," Kashin said.

In addition, as the expert noted, the American side believes that due to the reduction in the ice area in the Arctic, the naval activities of the Russian Federation and the PRC are intensifying.

"In these conditions, according to the United States, the sea carriers of the missiles of these two countries may become more active," Kashin said.

According to him, such accusations against Russia and China look strange, given that the United States itself "intends to begin at least the deployment of intermediate and shorter-range missiles in the Asia-Pacific region."

At the same time, Leonkov predicts that the United States will only intensify the militarization of the Arctic region.

He stressed that while the United States is only planning to increase its presence in the Arctic region, Russia has already prepared weapons and infrastructure capable of protecting its Arctic borders.

“There are new anti-aircraft and aviation systems, anti-ship coastal defense systems.

The ship composition of the Pacific Fleet is being updated.

The modern armament of Russia, designed to ensure the security of the region, exceeds the capabilities of the United States and Canada in this area, ”the analyst concluded.