Arnold on Thompson-Jones, 'America in the Arctic: Foreign Policy and Competition in the Melting North' [Review]
H-Diplo: New posted contentArnold on Thompson-Jones, 'America in the Arctic: Foreign Policy and Competition in the Melting North' [Review]
H-Net Reviews
Thompson-Jones, Mary A.. America in the Arctic: Foreign Policy and Competition in the Melting North. : Columbia University Press, 2025. 344 pp. $35.00 (cloth), ISBN 9780231198400.
Reviewed by David Arnold (National War College)
Published on H-Diplo (July, 2025)
Commissioned by Seth Offenbach (Bronx Community College, The City University of New York)
Printable Version: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=61883
For the first time since the Cold War, the Arctic region has become hot again. The Barack Obama presidential administration published its Arctic strategy in 2013, the first Donald Trump presidential administration built on it with military service strategies for the region, and the Joseph Biden presidential administration published a national strategy and a defense strategy for the region. Mary A. Thompson-Jones’s book, America in the Arctic, provides a useful history of US actions in the region to inform those who might only have begun paying attention to recent regional developments. Thompson-Jones gives us a very readable primer on the Arctic, focused on the history of the United States in the region. It is well-organized and a good place to start for those interested in recent Arctic history. Thompson-Jones is a professor of national security strategy at US Naval War College and a former senior diplomat in the US Foreign Service. She is also the author of a previous book, To the Secretary: Leaked Embassy Cables and America’s Foreign Policy Disconnect (2016).
The research question for this book is “What does change in the Arctic mean for the United States?” (p. xviii). An outline in the introduction proceeds from the assumption that the United States has an “Arctic destiny” (p. xix). Other assumptions embedded in the book are that the climate is changing and influencing the Arctic and that the eight Arctic nations in the book are the most militarized in the world. The author’s regional comparisons highlight cultural, political, and economic differences between the nations at the strategic level.
Chapter 1 provides a historical overview of the history of the Arctic region, emphasizing the many perceptions of the Arctic that have little to do with reality. This chapter focuses on the North Pole, the land, the ocean, the ice, and climate change.
In the second chapter, about Alaska, the author examines the history of the state through two lenses: aviation and distance. A culture of aviation in Alaska, along with the land, the sea, and the military have all had an impact on the state. But even today, most Americans do not see the United States as an Arctic nation, which complicates American foreign policy and Alaska’s relationship with Washington, DC.
Chapter 3 examines Canada’s Arctic interests, using the up-and-down US-Canadian relationship as a lens. The Arctic, the author asserts, is essential to Canadian identity but the Canadian military has atrophied, affecting its ability to secure its interests in the region. Thompson-Jones examines three factors which explain Canadian sensitivities about the Arctic: Canada’s prolonged route to nationhood; the challenges of asserting control over its Arctic, including and especially the Northwest Passage; and the reality of neighboring the United States.
The next chapter, on original NATO member Iceland, points out that although the “Arctic Coastal State” has no military, it nevertheless has a strategic location (p. 80). The American-Icelandic history dealing with cod fishing and Keflavik Air Base is particularly interesting. For various political, cultural, and economic reasons, the locals really did not want US forces in Iceland but they were angry when the US military moved to a non-permanent, rotational approach (p. 101). Nevertheless, the Russian invasion of Ukraine drove the Icelandic government closer to NATO.
The chapter on Greenland, Denmark, and the United States covers the latest idea of the United States buying Greenland, which the United States tried to do even before the current presidential administration suggested it. This chapter might have shown the strong Danish-American relationship with at least a brief mention of the contributions Denmark made in Operations Desert Storm and Enduring Freedom, which were outsized compared to its peers in NATO. That said, chapter 5 is a good synthesis of a lot of previous work, including the 1968 B-52 crash, the Henrik Hansen papers, Camp Century, and Project Iceworm, all of which strained the Danish-American relationship in one way or another during the Cold War.
Norway’s location is more important than its relatively small population because its 1,100 miles of shoreline have greater significance than its population of five million. As in other chapters, chapter 6 has a lot of history of the US relationship with Norway, selectively focused through the lens of the Arctic. For example, the US role in the 1920 Spitzbergen Treaty shows the US’s longtime interests in Arctic policies. But the author points out, the US-Norway relationship has been uneven.
Having a chapter combining Finland and Sweden seems at first glance inconsistent with the approach in the rest of the book but, as the author points out, the Russian invasion of Ukraine was the straw that broke the camel’s back for these two nations. Both countries had been NATO partners for decades but Russia’s actions pushed them into NATO as full members, in part because they were both seeking the guarantees of NATO’s Article 5. Covered in this chapter are Finland’s war against the Soviet Union and Sweden’s development of a nuclear weapon. Today, the author points out, both nations are reliable NATO allies, describing Finland as a “heavyweight ally” and Sweden as jumping in with both feet (p. 180). The Swedish Sámi Indigenous people make an appearance here, but the Indigenous peoples of the Arctic appear in the book only in passing.
A chapter on Russia finishes out the country-by-country tour of the Arctic, with the author asserting that the country’s decline is having a particular impact on the Arctic. There is a lot of discussion about what is happening in Siberia by describing the “dying” cities of Murmansk, Vorkuta, and others (p. 208). This chapter does not, however, say much about the US-Soviet/Russian history in the Arctic. Instead, it asserts that the roots of Russian decline are found in the inability of the Russian government to deal with falling demographics, the Ukraine war, and climate change, all of which affect Russia. This chapter could have used at least a mention of the American army’s operations during the Russian Civil War in the 1920s or American incursions into Soviet airspace during the Cold War. Yet by showing how Russia is again militarizing the Arctic with lots of new construction, the author reinforces that the Arctic is an American security dilemma but that the United States is better positioned than Russia because Russia does not have the same number of friends in the Arctic that the United States does.
Finally, the last chapter concludes that the United States is returning to the Arctic because, in the wake of the Ukraine war, many Arctic nations are afraid the Russians are not done. However, the United States is slow about making changes to Arctic policies and is more likely to be focused on security than economic, climate, or Indigenous peoples’ issues, none of which neatly align with national borders. Unfortunately, the Arctic is seen as a mission no American military service really wants, even the US Coast Guard. Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan (R) is quoted as saying of Department of Defense’s 2019 Arctic Strategy, “It was a thirteen-page document, seven [pages] of which I believe were pictures. Russia was mentioned once in a footnote.... This was not a serious strategy” (p. 241). Therefore, it seems that state governments in the American system are more likely than the national government to take the lead on Arctic issues, an approach seldom discussed in policy work on the Arctic. The author would prefer, however, that the United States use “domain awareness, diplomacy, local collaboration, and science” to improve its Arctic presence and develop new national approaches to Arctic issues (p. 257).
Ultimately the author concludes that the United States has national interests in the region. Generally, though, the United States sees the Arctic as a security problem, despite the loads of good, friendly partners in the region. If the Arctic is a security problem, the author asserts, the United States is woefully unprepared for conflict there because of a lack of deepwater ports, ice breakers, and air power. It is, however, refreshing to see mention of the United States’ northernmost military installation, Pituffik (formerly Thule) Space Base, a critical NATO installation that is usually omitted from Arctic security discussions in print.
It is not surprising, then, that the author sees the key to future US security as lying in diplomacy. Centered on the Arctic Council, diplomacy could be used, the author asserts, to deemphasize threats and emphasize opportunities, especially economic ones, for industry and small entrepreneurs.
David Christopher Arnold, National Defense University, Washington, DC.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent the views of the US Government, the Department of Defense, or any of its components.
Citation: David Arnold. Review of Thompson-Jones, Mary A.. America in the Arctic: Foreign Policy and Competition in the Melting North. H-Diplo, H-Net Reviews. July, 2025.
URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=61883
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
