{"id":527674,"date":"2025-10-25T20:22:15","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T20:22:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/527674\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T20:22:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T20:22:15","slug":"russias-massive-nuclear-arsenal-in-arctic-pointed-at-us-norway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/527674\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia’s massive nuclear arsenal in Arctic ‘pointed’ at US: Norway"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russia is reinforcing its presence at a base in the Arctic Circle<\/a>, including nuclear weapons pointed towards the United States, according to Norwegian Defense Minister Tore Sandvik.<\/p>\n

Newsweek contacted the U.S. and Danish ministries of defense, along with the Russian foreign ministry, for comment via email on Saturday outside of regular office hours. <\/p>\n

Why It Matters<\/p>\n

Relations between Moscow and the West nosedived in February 2022 when Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his military to conduct a full invasion of Ukraine<\/a>, sparking the biggest war in Europe since World War II. <\/p>\n

This week saw President Trump announce he didn\u2019t want a \u201cwasted meeting\u201d<\/a> with Putin in Budapest after the Russian leader rejected American and European demands for an immediate ceasefire. Trump also introduced a new sanctions package targeting Russian oil giants Rosneft and Lukoil. <\/p>\n

What To Know<\/p>\n

Sandvik discussed Russia\u2019s military situation in an interview with British newspaper The Daily Telegraph that was published on Friday.<\/p>\n

Referring to a region of Russia inside the Arctic Circle, near Finland, Sandvik said: \u201cRussia is building up on the Kola Peninsula\u2026where one of the largest arsenals of nuclear warheads in the world is located. They [the nuclear weapons] are not only pointed towards Norway, but towards the UK and over the pole towards Canada and the US.\u201d<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cWe are the eyes and ears of NATO in this area, and we see that they\u2019re testing new weapons, for example hypersonic missiles, and they are testing nuclear-driven torpedoes and nuclear warheads.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russia bases nuclear weapons on the Kola Peninsula along with its Northern Fleet which was established in 1733.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Sandvik <\/a>argued that in the event of war with NATO Russia would likely target the Bear Gap, which separates the island of Svalbard from mainland Norway, along with the GIUK Gap between the UK, Iceland and Greenland.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cPutin needs to establish what is called the Bastion defence. He needs to control the Bear Gap to make sure that he can use his submarines and the Northern Fleet. And he wants to deny [NATO] allies access to the GIUK Gap.\u201d<\/p>\n

At least seven people were killed<\/a> on Wednesday by a mass drone attack across Ukraine which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said hit \u201cordinary cities\u201d along with energy infrastructure. <\/p>\n

What People Are Saying<\/p>\n

During the interview<\/strong> Sandvik commented:<\/strong> \u201cEven though Putin is losing heavily in Ukraine \u2013 he has lost one million soldiers \u2013 the Northern Fleet is intact. And they are developing it.”<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a new frigate and a new multi-role submarine, developed just in the last two years. The most threatening thing about Russia right now is its submarines. Even though Russia is not able to win in Ukraine, the threat of nuclear warheads and second strike capacity from up here [Kola Peninsula] makes them a superpower still,” Sandvik added. <\/p>\n

In a 2018 article Jamie Kwong, then a research assistant at the London based Royal United Services Institute, <\/strong>wrote<\/a>: \u201cAs early as the 1950s, US military planners worked with their Canadian counterparts to place radar systems in the far north to detect an incoming Soviet attack. The Soviet Union based its Northern Fleet in the Kola Peninsula for similar reasons, leading to regular nuclear submarine patrols beneath the Arctic\u2019s icy surface by the Soviets, Americans, and British alike.\u201d <\/p>\n

What Happens Next?<\/p>\n

Moscow shows little sign of winding down its war in Ukraine meaning tensions with the West are likely to remain high, particularly if Kyiv is given access to more advanced weapon systems such as Tomahawk missiles. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russia is reinforcing its presence at a base in the Arctic Circle, including nuclear weapons pointed towards the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":527675,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7655],"tags":[2821,1115,1767,332,657,17961,9041],"class_list":{"0":"post-527674","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-russia","8":"tag-nato","9":"tag-norway","10":"tag-nuclear","11":"tag-russia","12":"tag-ukraine","13":"tag-ukraine-conflict","14":"tag-ukraine-crisis"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115436673834925191","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=527674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/527675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}