Norway Treats Arctic Security and Energy Infrastructure as One Defense Problem

Ine Søreide sees Norway as a northern hinge in European security: an Arctic ally, North Atlantic surveillance partner, energy supplier, maritime nation, and state responsible for exposed offshore and undersea infrastructure. Norway’s 2025 national security strategy describes the country’s situation as its most serious since the Second World War.

The immediate implication is not that Norway expects an imminent military intervention in the Arctic. Søreide’s point is that the operating environment has changed. The region now brings together Russian military activity, North Atlantic sea lanes, allied intelligence collection, civilian shipping, fisheries, offshore energy production, and a larger set of outside powers with interests in the Arctic.

Norway sits at the European edge of the Arctic Ocean, alongside Russia, Finland, Sweden, Greenland, Canada, and Alaska. Its northern geography is not peripheral to NATO’s area of responsibility. As Søreide puts it, the alliance’s area of responsibility extends to the North Pole.

Norway spent decades balancing deterrence and restraint in its northern neighborhood. It joined NATO after the Second World War while sharing an Arctic border with the Soviet Union, and it sought strong alliance ties without unnecessary escalation. After the 2011 Barents Sea delimitation agreement with Russia, Oslo often described the region as “High North, low tension.”

That formulation no longer fits, Søreide says. Russia remains the central military concern, but China has become more active in Arctic affairs, and India and other states are asserting interests as well. Before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Moscow kept China relatively constrained in the Arctic, treating the region as a primary Russian interest. Russia’s dependence on Beijing, in Søreide’s assessment, has weakened its ability to do that. China now has a larger foothold through increasingly visible political and economic interests, even if not necessarily through an overt military role.

Norway is expanding its own military presence in the north and concentrating a substantial share of its armed-forces investment there. It opened a new Combined Air Operations Center in Bodø in October of the prior year, near its operational headquarters. The center will be staffed by personnel from NATO countries and adds to alliance air-command capacity.

For Søreide, that is an alliance contribution as much as a Norwegian one. Norway’s collection and sharing of intelligence make it one of NATO’s “eyes and ears” in the north. The purpose is both national defense and better allied preparation for Arctic security.

Energy makes the same geography strategically consequential. Norway became a major European supplier through North Sea oil and gas. Its oil and gas fields stretch along the Norwegian continental shelf, while offshore installations make energy production inseparable from maritime and infrastructure security. After Russia’s full-scale invasion, Norway increased gas production by around 8 percent as Europe sought to reduce its reliance on Russian supplies.

Søreide treats those figures as security facts, not merely commercial ones. Shortly after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, she asked Norway’s Defense Ministry to assess the relationship between energy and security policy. The ministry readily saw the connection, she recalls; other parts of government were more reluctant to treat them as one problem.

The connection has only become more apparent. Europe’s dependence on energy routes, the vulnerability of offshore installations, and the ability of states to disrupt maritime chokepoints all turn energy supply into a strategic commitment. Norway’s capacity to keep oil and gas flowing supports European resilience, but the infrastructure that enables that role is itself an exposure.

Søreide applies the same logic to the conflict involving Iran. She argues that Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz has compounded global energy pressure, while Houthi activity in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait has added risk to shipping. In her account, militarily weaker states can still impose substantial costs by constraining trade and energy flows through narrow waterways.

Herbert McMaster disputes her suggestion that the danger was not sufficiently anticipated by Washington. He says U.S. planners expected Iran to attempt to close the strait and held annual exercises to reopen it. In his account, a ceasefire began as military operations were shifting toward forcing the strait open; ending the campaign before that objective was completed gave Iran room to recover.

They share the underlying premise: maritime infrastructure and trade routes can become instruments of coercion. Norway’s position as an energy supplier, shipping nation, Arctic state, and NATO ally makes those vulnerabilities difficult to separate.

NATO is stronger militarily than it was a decade ago, according to Ine Søreide, but that does not remove its central political vulnerability: uncertainty over whether allies will act together when coercion remains ambiguous.

When Søreide first joined the North Atlantic Council as Norway’s defense minister, NATO was not prepared for the security environment taking shape after 2014, she says. The following decade brought greater allied contributions, stronger readiness, and much deeper regional cooperation.

She sees regional formations as reinforcements to NATO rather than alternatives to it. Norway, Germany, and the Netherlands were pilot countries for the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force. The Joint Expeditionary Force and other geographically focused arrangements have helped because they give allies practical ways to coordinate and respond.

The military side of the alliance is working well in her assessment. Day-to-day collaboration is smooth, the United States continues to participate in exercises in Norway and elsewhere, and military personnel see the reciprocal benefit of allied cooperation.

McMaster’s concern is that material strength and operational competence are insufficient without political confidence. Finland and Sweden’s accession improves NATO’s northern position, and higher defense spending improves capacity. But public doubts about whether the United States would fulfill an Article 5 obligation can weaken the alliance even while its forces cooperate effectively.

McMaster points to U.S. criticism of NATO allies despite the alliance’s invocation of Article 5 after the September 11 attacks. He also cites Denmark’s contribution in Afghanistan, saying it suffered more casualties per capita than any other NATO member while later facing direct pressure over Greenland.

Søreide does not describe NATO as politically weak. Allied political commitment remains strong, perhaps stronger than before, she says. But she distinguishes a full-scale Article 5 contingency from the more likely danger: a gray-zone incident that approaches the collective-defense threshold without clearly crossing it.

Hybrid methods are cheap, repeatable, and comparatively low-risk, Søreide argues. They let an adversary test cohesion without triggering the straightforward response that a conventional attack would demand. The strategic gain may not be immediate physical damage. It may be forcing NATO members into a visible argument over whether a particular act qualifies as an alliance matter.

The gray-zone toolkit includes cyberattacks, sabotage, preparations for sabotage, and influence operations. Søreide identifies their political purpose as weakening support for NATO and Ukraine, fragmenting allied cohesion, and reducing democratic states’ willingness to sustain costly policies. NATO’s 2016 decision that cyberattacks could constitute an Article 5 situation was a watershed, she says, because cyber operations had become a routine instrument of Russian pressure.

McMaster cites undersea-cable cuts, cyber operations, warehouse attacks, alleged explosives on DHL aircraft, and drone incursions as evidence that such a campaign is already underway. He suggests that some of these actions could already warrant an Article 5 response. Søreide does not make that judgment. Her concern is that NATO must be able to recognize, attribute, and counter persistent coercion before ambiguity produces paralysis.

The relevant tools are distributed across institutions. NATO has a military role, but national governments and the European Union hold many of the authorities needed for maritime security, cyber defense, influence operations, law enforcement, economic policy, and infrastructure protection. A workable division of labor between NATO and the EU is therefore central to European security, she argues.

Norway’s management of Russian fishing vessels illustrates the problem. Russia’s Arctic military strategy, Søreide says, openly contemplates the use of civilian vessels, including fishing boats, for military purposes. Norway and Russia jointly manage a common cod stock in northern waters, and Russian fishing vessels can still enter three Norwegian harbors.

The arrangement has practical value, but it also carries intelligence and security risks. Norwegian authorities must be able to establish what kind of vessels are arriving, who is aboard, and whether crews are genuinely engaged in fishing rather than intelligence activity. Søreide has pressed the Norwegian government to make this a threshold decision: if the security risk exceeds the benefit of continued fisheries management, the arrangement should end.

For Ine Søreide, Russia’s war against Ukraine cannot be reduced to territorial expansion. Russia already has territory, she argues. Its deeper objective is political control: restoring spheres of influence, creating buffer states between Russia and NATO, and preventing democracy from taking root in a neighboring country.

A successful democratic Ukraine threatens Putin’s model because it could offer ordinary Russians an alternative political example, in Søreide’s reading. Regime survival is therefore a driver of continued aggression. That analysis, she says, helps explain why Russia has not made credible commitments to ceasefires or meaningful negotiations and why its aims cannot be understood simply as a dispute over borders.

Ukraine has gained momentum through military, financial, and economic support, Søreide says, but she sees a mixed outlook. European backing is uneven. Some countries regard the war as geographically remote, while others lack the financial means to contribute at the level northern and western European states now provide.

Norway has maintained unanimous political support for Ukraine and broad public backing, she says, while welcoming Ukrainian refugees. Yet she does not assume that solidarity will sustain itself automatically. The Middle East competes for political attention and military resources. When the United States shifts attention and capabilities there, Ukraine feels the consequences.

Søreide welcomes the improved tone between Volodymyr Zelensky and Donald Trump and calls the reported licensing of Patriot-interceptor production in Ukraine “absolutely vital.” Her emphasis is the continuing urgency of air defense. Russia continues to strike apartment buildings, civilian infrastructure, and energy facilities, she says, with no visible end to the brutality or a willingness to enter genuine negotiations.

Herbert McMaster frames the strategic danger in transatlantic terms. Putin may hope to secure U.S. acceptance of ceasefire terms that Ukrainians and Europeans reject, then use the disagreement to fracture NATO. McMaster challenges the portrayal of Russia as inherently strong and victory as inevitable; he sees an opportunity to increase pressure and show that the war cannot continue without unacceptable cost and risk.

Søreide agrees that the present moment requires sustained and increased support. She sees military momentum, but also what she describes as growing pressure inside Russia. Protests and actions by public figures have become more visible, she says. Economic strain, shortages, broader conscription, and changes in oil and energy conditions are reaching beyond distant regions.

She does not predict Putin’s collapse. A decisive domestic shift would probably arrive without advance warning, she says. But people in major cities and more privileged circles are encountering costs previously easier for elites to avoid: sons drafted into the war, deaths returning home, and strains on economic security. In Søreide’s assessment, those pressures could alter how oligarchs and other powerful groups judge Putin’s role as guarantor of their safety and influence.

She believes those pressures have weakened Putin and made him more desperate. In her reading, intensified attacks on civilians are not evidence of confidence. Nor does she think Putin’s larger aim—fundamentally changing Europe’s security architecture—is as attainable as it appeared six months earlier.

For Norway, Ukraine cannot be compartmentalized from the High North. A Russia that coerces Ukraine, splits NATO politically, and revises European security arrangements would alter the strategic environment around Norway’s border, offshore infrastructure, and North Atlantic approaches. Support for Ukraine is therefore part of deterring a wider revision of European security.

Ine Søreide argues that Russia’s war in Ukraine, China’s economic and political behavior, North Korea’s military role, Iran’s disruption of shipping, and Western industrial vulnerability are not separate problems. In her account, they form an interconnected strategic challenge.

North Korean troops would not be fighting alongside Russian forces in Ukraine without Chinese agreement, Søreide says. China’s relationships with Russia, Iran, and North Korea give it influence across theaters while strengthening its position toward the United States and Europe.

The connection is not only military. Søreide points to Chinese exports of industrial goods, including steel and aluminum, into European markets, which she says have prompted the European Union to impose protective measures. The issue, in her view, is not merely unfair competition. If European and American industrial capacity is hollowed out, democracies could become dependent on low-cost imports for ships, ammunition, hardware, and other goods required for defense production.

The Russia–China relationship is formally reciprocal but presently unequal, Søreide says. Russia depends on China for markets, political support, and components that may not be weapons themselves but are required for military-hardware production. Without Chinese support, she argues, Russia could not sustain the war in its current form.

The inverse is significant in her assessment. China could potentially pressure Russia to change course if it chose to do so, and she calls it the country most capable of exerting that pressure. It has not done so.

McMaster extends the analysis to Iran, arguing that China buys the overwhelming majority of Iranian oil and supplies hardware and components relevant to missile, drone, and air-defense capability. Søreide’s focus is less on that specific supply relationship than on the European consequences of a connected system of coercive leverage.

Norway has a direct stake in the conflict around Iran because it is, Søreide notes, the world’s fifth-largest shipping nation. Norwegian and Norwegian-flagged vessels operate globally, and many Norwegian vessels have been stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. A prolonged closure threatens not only energy markets but the wider movement of goods. Norway has an interest in freedom of navigation and an open strait.

That does not lead her to predict direct NATO participation in the war. She does not foresee NATO countries becoming directly involved, principally because allies were not consulted before the conflict began. The absence of consultation, she says, made it difficult to assemble a coalition afterward.

The war’s objective is also unclear to her. Is it directed at Iran’s nuclear program, other weapons systems, or its regional influence? Søreide makes no defense of the Iranian regime and points to its repression of its own people. But unclear ends make it much harder to rally allies around the means of a war.

She also says that Iran has acquired a better strategic position in at least some respects because it has fought back at a scale that, in her view, U.S. and Israeli leaders did not anticipate. Its attacks on U.S. allies are unsurprising, she says, because they are among the levers it retains. If the conflict continues, she believes, it could alter regional dynamics more deeply.

For Ine Søreide, Norway’s practical problem is not simply whether it spends more on defense. It is whether a state with a long northern frontier, offshore energy infrastructure, open ports, globally operating shipping, and a small population can connect military preparedness to civil resilience.

The answer begins with recognizing that conventional deterrence alone is insufficient. NATO supplies military deterrence, planning, exercises, and collective-defense mechanisms. But national governments and the European Union control many of the authorities relevant to cyber defense, industrial policy, maritime regulation, policing, economic security, and information resilience. The effectiveness of that division of labor determines whether gray-zone pressure can be answered across the full range of tools it uses.

Norway’s experience makes the stakes concrete. The country must protect offshore infrastructure that supports European energy resilience, monitor Arctic and North Atlantic activity, assess risks from ostensibly civilian maritime traffic, and maintain allied capacity in the north. These are not separate policy portfolios in Søreide’s account. They are parts of the same security problem.

Her final warning is against planning for a restoration of the prewar status quo.

Søreide’s prescription is not that Norway or NATO can eliminate every exposure. It is that allies must identify dependencies early, make better use of their combined resources, and sustain the political confidence that makes collective capabilities credible. Russia, in her assessment, will continue trying to alter Europe’s security architecture and prevent democratic development in its neighborhood. The faster allies accept that this environment is durable rather than temporary, the faster they can adjust their strategies to it.