NATO on 11 February formally launched a new-codename operation, “Arctic Sentinel,” billed as a step to strengthen security across the Arctic and the broader High North. The move comes a month after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to annex Greenland, a dispute that jolted transatlantic relations and pushed European capitals to demonstrate responsiveness to Washington.
Allied officials describe Arctic Sentinel as an effort to fold existing national and multilateral activity into a single operational framework, bringing the 32 members’ disparate Arctic and High North deployments under a coordinated posture. European outlets report the plan was hashed out during a meeting between Trump and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte at last month’s Davos forum, and that the announcement ends a phase in which military planners had been preparing while political leaders remained cautious.
The operation’s announcement was met almost immediately with scepticism. U.S. and European commentators have questioned whether Arctic Sentinel is genuinely new or simply a cosmetic rebranding of longstanding missions intended to soothe an unpredictable U.S. president. Several NATO officials and analysts say the recent spike in attention to the Arctic has been driven more by political pressure than by an urgent change in the military balance; one NATO official described the threat environment as largely hypothetical, and said the move carried “symbolic and publicity” elements.
Why the Arctic matters goes beyond headline-grabbing diplomacy. Melting ice continues to open shipping lanes and access to hydrocarbon and mineral resources, while Russia has rebuilt and modernised forces and infrastructure north of the Arctic Circle. Greenland sits at a strategic chokepoint in the North Atlantic, hosting facilities such as Thule Air Base that are central to transatlantic early-warning and space-based systems, and it has — along with growing Chinese polar activity — drawn fresh geopolitical attention.
The immediate diplomatic logic of Arctic Sentinel is clear: reassure Washington and keep the alliance united. But the arrangement carries risks. If Allied commitment is driven by short-term political calculations rather than assessed strategic need, NATO may overpromise capabilities, divert resources from other priorities or weaken its credibility when a declared posture does not match on-the-ground capabilities. It may also harden perceptions in Moscow and Beijing that the alliance is extending its remit northwards, prompting reciprocal posture changes.
What follows will determine whether Arctic Sentinel becomes a durable architecture or a public-relations fix. Observers will watch for concrete force deployments, budgetary commitments, exercises that test interoperability, and whether NATO produces the command, logistics and persistent surveillance assets needed to sustain an effective High North posture. Absent such follow-through, the operation risks being remembered as an emblematic response to a transatlantic spat rather than a substantive strategy.