NATO has launched its latest Arctic war games under the shadow of renewed strategic competition and political friction inside the alliance.
According to Newsmax, the biennial Cold Response drills began Monday in the European Arctic, with this years iteration placing unusual weight on the role of civilians and national infrastructure in sustaining military operations.
The exercise, now folded into the broader Arctic Sentry mission, is designed to reinforce NATOs presence in the polar region at a moment when President Donald Trumps push to acquire Greenland from Denmark has exposed deep disagreements among allies over how to confront Russian and Chinese ambitions in the High North.
Cold Response, which runs March 9-19, centers on defending NATO territory in the Arctic, where alliance members Norway and Finland share long land borders with Russia and sit astride key sea lanes and air corridors.
The drills have been recast as part of Arctic Sentry, a mission launched to strengthen NATOs footprint in the region and, in part, to ease tensions with Washington after Trump argued that the United States must secure Greenland to counter Moscow and Beijing.
Trump has made clear he views Greenland as a strategic asset that the United States, not Denmark, should control in order to fend off threats from Russian and Chinese interests in the Arctic, arguing that Copenhagen cannot guarantee the islands long-term security.
The governments of both Denmark and Greenland have flatly rejected that premise, reiterating that the vast, resource-rich island is not for sale and signaling that any change in sovereignty remains off the table.
This years exercise will see roughly 25,000 troops from about 14 nations, including the United States and Denmark, deployed across northern Norway and Finland in harsh winter conditions meant to simulate a high-intensity conflict with a near-peer adversary.
The U.S. contribution is expected to total around 4,000 personnel, underscoring Washingtons continued military engagement in the Arctic even as political disputes over burden-sharing and strategic priorities persist within NATO.
In a reminder of Americas global commitments, the U.S. military pulled one squadron of F-35 fighter jets from the drills shortly before they began, a move that raised questions about whether other theatersparticularly the volatile Middle Easthad taken precedence.
Pentagon officials declined to link the decision to any specific conflict, with a spokesperson for U.S. Marine Corps Forces Europe telling Reuters, The U.S. military is a globally deployed force and it is not abnormal for forces to be dynamically re-tasked or reallocated for a host of reasons.
For Norway, which sits on NATOs northern flank and would be on the front line of any confrontation with Russia, the exercise dovetails with a broader national effort to harden society against war and crisis.
Oslo has declared 2026 the year of total defense, a concept that emphasizes boosting the readiness of civilians, private businesses, and public institutions to withstand conflict and other catastrophes while continuing to support the armed forces.
Norwegian officials stress that a modern military cannot function in isolation from the society it defends, particularly in an era of cyberattacks, energy disruption, and information warfare.
We want our military to do its job of defending the country. To do that, we are completely reliant on most aspects of society functioning as normal, Major-General Lars Lervik, head of the Norwegian Army, told Reuters, highlighting the need for resilient supply chains, communications, and health services.
Lervik added that the drills offer a rare chance to test how civilian institutions can directly bolster combat operations, especially in a scenario involving mass casualties among allied forces.
This is also an opportunity to rehearse specifically where civilians can give direct support to the military effort, for instance with the health service treating a higher number of injured soldiers, Norwegian or from allied forces, than usual, he said, underscoring the scale of coordination required.
On Thursday, the Norwegian military will stage a scenario in which hospitals in the countrys north must cope with a surge of wounded troops evacuated from an imaginary frontline in Finland, a clear nod to the possibility of conflict spilling across borders in the region.
The drill is intended not only to test medical capacity but also to expose weaknesses in logistics, transportation, and emergency planning that could prove decisive in a real crisis.
For conservatives who have long warned about the dangers of complacency in Europes defense posture, the Arctic maneuvers and Norways total-defense push illustrate both the necessity and the difficulty of preparing free societies for hard power realities.
While Trumps blunt approach to Greenland has unsettled some allies, his insistence that the West must take the Arctic seriouslyand that adversaries like Russia and China are already doing sohas forced NATO governments to confront uncomfortable questions about sovereignty, deterrence, and shared responsibility.
As Cold Response unfolds across the frozen north, the alliance is effectively stress-testing not just tanks and troops, but the political will and civilian backbone required to sustain a prolonged crisis on its northern frontier.
Whether Europes leaders match their rhetoric with lasting investments in defense and resilience will determine if these exercises amount to more than a symbolic show of unity in a region where Americas strategic concerns, and its expectations of its allies, are only growing sharper.
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