NATO Opens Amphibious Warfare Hub in Arctic Amid Turf Wars With Russia

An amphibious warfare center has been set up in Norway in the latest move by a NATO member to beef up its operations on Russia’s Arctic doorstep.

The hub in Sørreisa in the north of the country provides amphibious training for U.S. British and Dutch personnel. Norway has no amphibious forces of its own, but some of its main army units and special forces are based in the region.

Since the start of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Norway has stepped up its investment in military facilities, spending almost 16 billion kroner ($1.44 billion) in bases in the Troms region alone.

Sørreisa is by the Reisa Fjord and has a population of about 3,500. The local airport is base for a Joint Air Operations Center (JAOC) and a Control and Reporting Centre (CRC), the statement added.

Norway’s defense minister Bjørn Arild Gram said during a visit to the site on Thursday, “we have to train together in order to protect Norway, the Nordic region and NATO in crisis and war,” according to a translation of a government press release.

Newsweek has contacted NATO for comment on the center which comes amid a spike in tensions in the region, linked to Moscow’s actions.

Earlier this month, Norway’s Coast Guard monitored the Russian spy ship Yantar which had been spotted for several days in international waters near the Nordic country.

Norwegian media had reported the vessel was seen near critical seabed infrastructure such as oil and gas pipelines and cables for internet and telecommunications, which countries have warned could be sabotage targets.

The Coast Guard told Newsweek on November 8 that the the fact the Russian vessel chose to sail with its AIS transponder showed that it was “a deliberate act to gain attention for its presence.”

The alliance’s eastern bloc has accused Russia of other so-called “hybrid” attacks, such as GPS jamming in the Baltic region affecting airlines as well as stoking a migration crisis on the border of Finland, which Moscow has denied.

The Kremlin has framed the war in Ukraine as a proxy battle with the West and in a climate of heightened regional tensions, two American missile-armed destroyers were sent by an aircraft carrier group to the Barents Sea off the northern coasts of Norway and Russia in October for maritime operations.

As Newsweek previously reported in August, the U.K. has sent four F-35B fighter aircraft from its 617 Squadron to the southwestern tip of Iceland for an air policing mission focusing on the Arctic.