US wants to tear off Chukotka from Russia with the help of Greenland and a tunnel under the Bering Strait

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

In pursuit of the USA's elusive positions in the Arctic, this "last resource storehouse" of the planet, a special role is assigned to the gradual annexation of Greenland, the largest island on Earth (2.17 million sq. Km). This is not only about the geopolitical potential of Greenland itself, located at the “western gate” of the Northern Sea Route (NSR), but also about the possibility of influencing Russian Chukotka through Greenland at its “eastern gate”.

In its policy of a breakaway still autonomous territory of Denmark from the metropolis, Washington relies on the local movement of the Inuit (Eskimos), which claims to "joint sovereignty" in the Arctic of all northern peoples of the Inuit group (Eskimos, Chukchi, Koryak). In total, in this sparsely populated area, there are about 200 thousand people living in Greenland, Alaska, Canada and Russian Chukotka. Although the ideological and political center of the Inuit movement is Alaska, which has special powers from the White House to work with Inuit, Greenland has moved closer to independence.

The population of the island is about 60 thousand people, the Inuit make up an absolute majority of 50 thousand. On June 21, 2009, the extended autonomy of Greenland was proclaimed. The local administration assumed responsibility for the police and judicial system of the island and control over all natural resources, including gold, diamonds, oil, gas. Denmark still retains control over the defense, foreign and monetary policy of Greenland.

Washington has repeatedly offered Copenhagen to buy out Greenland from him, the financing of which is not cheap for the Danish government. Trump last made such a proposal in August 2019, on the 10th anniversary of the proclamation of expanded autonomy. For reasons of prestige, the Danish government has so far rejected these proposals. And the US has taken a different path, demonstrating that it can get its way for free by supporting the demand for Greenland's independence. And further options are possible such as the status of Puerto Rico in association with the United States. Moreover, guided by "democratic principles", the Danish government stated that "if Greenland wants to secede, it can secede … Denmark will not keep it by force. If the Greenlanders want to be independent, please, they have the right to do so …”.

The US consulate in the main Greenlandic city of Nuuk, opened by Trump in mid-June this year, will undoubtedly help the Greenlandic Eskimos in this. In the same vein, the statement on the provision of US economic assistance to Greenland in the amount of $ 12 million should be perceived, which, taking into account the needs of the island, is not so little. Opposition member of the Danish parliament, Rasmus Yarlov, called it "absolutely unacceptable action." A leftist MP Karsten Honge accused the United States of trying to drive a wedge between Greenland and Denmark and called on the Danish prime minister to "draw a line on the ice."

The immediate goal of the Americans on the island may be to persuade the islanders to hold a referendum on independence, the results of which, with appropriate inflows from the United States, are predictable. Many politicians in Greenland support this idea, believing that Greenlanders are closer to North America in mind and geography than to Europe. The intensification of US policy towards Greenland is possibly related to the fact that the supporters of independence want to hold a referendum and declare independence in 2021, on the 300th anniversary of Danish colonial rule on the island.

The independence of Greenland, as they expect in the United States, will not lead to a surge in nationalist sentiments among the Inuit of Alaska and Canada due to their scattered territory and control by the central authorities. But with regard to Chukotka, American strategists hope to use the example of Greenland as a means of influencing the opposition sentiments of the local population.

For example, the residents of the Russian peninsula can be persuaded to put forward demands for an increase in the state status of the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug. And even if nothing succeeds, you can create a pretext for declaring new reprisals against Russia "for violating the rights of indigenous peoples" up to and including sanctions against the use of the Northern Sea Route.

The high probability of such a development of events is indicated, in particular, by the documents of the International Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC), founded in 1977 in Alaska. ICC's headquarters are located in Anchorage, Alaska; there are offices in Nuuk (Greenland), Copenhagen (Denmark), Ottawa (Canada), Anadyr (Chukotka). For the period 2018-2022 the ICC is chaired by Alaska's Dalee Sambo Dorough.

In 2009, the ICC adopted the “Declaration of Sovereignty of Circumpolar Inuit in the Arctic,” which states that although they are located in different countries - the United States, Canada, Danish Greenland and Russia - the Inuit are one people, represented through the ICC. As a people, they have all the rights of other nations inscribed in the Charter of the UN and other international organizations, including the right to self-determination. Other states must respect the Inuit right to self-determination and promote its implementation. No project in Inuit territory can be carried out without their consent.

At the same time, a kind of double sovereignty is being proclaimed. Inuit must retain all the rights of citizens of the United States, Canada, Denmark and Russia, but at the same time have the rights of an individual people based on international law. It is noteworthy that the Inuit are declared almost the only rightholders in the circumpolar zone. Other peoples, such as Yakuts, Nenets, Khanty, Mansi, are completely ignored.

Also alarming is the statement of the "Declaration of Sovereignty" that the worst case with the rights of the Inuit is allegedly in the Russian Chukotka. Meanwhile, there is the Chukotka Autonomous District, and much attention has always been paid to the language and culture of the Chukchi related to the Inuit. Here the geopolitical interest of the United States is clearly manifested, and not concern for the situation of the Inuit.

At the same time, another long-standing American geopolitical venture aimed at Chukotka was thrown into the media - about the construction of a transcontinental railway tunnel under the Bering Strait. And this dubious idea has enthusiastic admirers, including in Russia.

However, the Russian Governor-General of the Far East (1905-1910), military engineer and explorer of these places P. F. Unterberger, in relation to the then existing projects for the exit of the railway through Chukotka to the Bering Strait and the construction of an 86-kilometer tunnel under it, reported to the Minister of Finance V. Kokovtsev that these projects could be beneficial only to the Americans. He proved the fundamental impossibility of laying routes through the ridges of the East Siberian extremity of Eurasia, where in the conditions of the cold pole it would be necessary to pierce many hundreds of kilometers of mountain tunnels. American entrepreneurs, who promoted this plan under the royal court, were ready, on concession terms, to build a section of several hundred kilometers from Anadyr deep into Russian territory to the beginning of the ridges. Unterberger rightly argued that in the end, only this part would be built, forever tying Chukotka economically to American Alaska.

Now these projects more than a century ago are again being thrown into the Russian public consciousness: they say, they will help to attract gigantic American capital. Maybe. Who will this capital work for?

Let us note that, while supporting separatist movements around the world in its own interests, Washington does not in vain think about the fact that a "return wave" of these sentiments could cover America. What is happening now on the streets of American cities makes such a prospect very likely.

And do the Inuit need to turn their habitats into an American military training ground?