China’s Arctic advance could revive Trump’s Greenland ambitions

ARCTIC

A new weekly service to Felixstowe is binding Beijing and Moscow more closely – and drawing Britain into a struggle for the High North that is already reshaping US strategy.

CHINA’S new Arctic trade route to Europe could reignite Donald Trump’s campaign to take control of Greenland as the US, Russia and China compete for dominance of the warming High North.

On 15 August, Chinese shipping company Sea Legend began the first regular cargo service between Ningbo and Felixstowe through the Northern Sea Route.

The weekly service transforms China’s Polar Silk Road from a strategic ambition into a commercial reality, cutting a journey of more than 40 days through the Suez Canal to a reported 18 to 20 days.

The choice of Felixstowe as its first European destination also drags Britain directly into a geopolitical contest it has watched from the sidelines.

Dr Dwayne Ryan Menezes, founder and managing director of the London-based Polar Research and Policy Initiative, says the UK is becoming embroiled in the High North “whether or not it is paying attention”.

The route passes through the Bering Strait and along Russia’s vast northern coast. It can be used commercially for only three summer months and cannot accommodate the largest ships.

Plans exist to extend the season to four months by 2028, while Sea Legend wants year-round operations within a decade.

For Beijing, the immediate attraction is resilience. China depends heavily on oil and trade passing through the Strait of Malacca and remains exposed to disruption at Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb, the Red Sea and Suez.

Jonah Kaplan, Sibylline’s Principal APAC Analyst, says Beijing is attempting to address those vulnerabilities before a crisis allows rivals to exploit them.

“China is constantly playing a game of building self-sufficiency, making the world more reliant on it than it is on the world,” he says.

“If it finds a way to mitigate the risk of disruption to other routes, then it is in an advantageous position. It has more leverage in negotiations.”

The Arctic passage will remain a hedge rather than a replacement for Suez.

Around 103 vessels used it in 2025, a negligible volume compared with established sea lanes. Western operators face high insurance costs, environmental hazards and the danger of breaching sanctions by dealing with Russian authorities. Maersk, CMA-CGM and Hapag-Lloyd have pledged not to use it.

It also binds Beijing and Moscow more closely. Russia provides permits, navigation systems and nuclear-powered icebreaker escorts, while China supplies trade, investment and dual-use technology to an isolated Russian economy.

Sibylline analyst Ed Johnson says Moscow presents the partnership as a relationship of equals, but its dependence on Chinese markets for gas, timber, metals, diamonds and other raw materials gives Beijing the greater advantage.

That imbalance is likely to deepen.

China has five icebreaking-capable vessels, plans a nuclear-powered addition and possesses vastly greater shipbuilding capacity than the US. Russia controls access today, but China has the economic and industrial power to shape what passes through it.

The arrangement also reinforces Moscow’s disputed claim to administer the Northern Sea Route. Washington regards it as an international waterway, but China must work through Russian regulatory and technical systems and sail close to Russia’s coast.

“You have a very large global player validating and reaffirming Russia’s geopolitical positioning in the Arctic,” Menezes says.

The strategic consequences extend beyond trade.

China declared itself a “near-Arctic state” in 2018 and has expanded its polar-capable fleet. Although no Chinese warship has been recorded crossing the Arctic,

Western governments suspect some scientific research has dual-use applications. Chinese and Russian coastguards conducted a joint Arctic patrol in 2024.

The US is responding.

As of January, its coastguard operated only one heavy and two medium icebreakers. Washington approved $9 bn for polar ships and infrastructure in 2025 and agreed a £6.1bn deal to acquire up to 11 medium icebreakers from Finland.

And the expanding Chinese presence could give Trump a reason to revisit Greenland.

He has previously cited the danger of Russian and Chinese encroachment to justify US ownership of the strategic territory, despite Washington already operating the Pituffik Space Base there.

Johnson says an American seizure remains unlikely and interprets Trump’s most extreme demands as a negotiating device designed to force allies towards his preferred outcome.

“With Trump, it is a negotiating position,” he says.

“He will go to the furthest extreme and then walk it back to something actually quite moderate and reasonable, to pressure allies or perceived allies to behave according to his will.”

Expanding an American base through NATO would require negotiation and compromise.

Johnson argues that Trump prefers bilateral leverage and the freedom to cast himself as the decisive actor rather than work through a multilateral alliance of more than 30 members.

Greenland is not the only potential flashpoint.

There is also a realistic possibility that Washington will increase pressure on Canada to open the Northwest Passage. Ottawa considers it part of its internal waters; the US maintains that it is an international strait. It remains less navigable than the Russian route, but retreating ice will gradually increase its value.

Menezes argues Britain and Europe must stop treating the Arctic as a distant security frontier or scientific laboratory.

Ports, surveillance systems and dual-use infrastructure will be needed to monitor vessels entering European waters and counter sanctions evasion.

He identifies Scapa Flow, the natural deep-water harbour which sheltered the Royal Navy during both world wars, as a neglected asset that could support surveillance, transshipment and an enhanced British presence in the High North.

“What we haven’t done in a very long time is see the North as a trade corridor for the future,” he says.

“The North is going to open up as an economic zone for us. The question is: how do we deal with that?”

Kaplan warns that neither the present volume of shipping nor the absence of an immediate military threat should obscure the longer-term contest,.

He adds: “If you give China the head start and China and Russia can dominate this geopolitical theatre, that is going to put them at a strategic advantage.”