China’s Coast Guard is for the first time operating in the Bering Sea as Beijing increasingly uses the Northern Sea Route for shipping, the U.S. commander of the 17th Coast Guard District said this week.
Two Chinese Coast Guard vessels, accompanied by two Russian Border Guard patrol vessels, were identified by a HC-130J Super Hercules crew from Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak, district commander Rear Adm. Megan Dean said in a news release. The crew observed the four ships about 440 miles southwest of St. Lawrence Island.
“This marked the northernmost location where Chinese Coast Guard vessels have been observed by the U.S. Coast Guard,” the release noted.
The Chinese Coast Guard said in a statement that the joint patrols “significantly expanded” its operational range in the Arctic, allowing its vessels to operate in unfamiliar maritime environments.
For more than a decade, China has claimed status as a “Near Arctic” power with substantial commercial and scientific interests in the region and demanded a voice in future Arctic governance. Taking a step in that direction, in 2018 China announced that it intended to develop a Polar Silk Road to cut sailing times between Europe and Asia, as it’s doing now to avoid the ongoing attacks on international shipping in the Middle East.
Beijing also wants to open the High North to development, particularly in energy exploration and mineral extraction. Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent sanctions imposed on Moscow, the Kremlin has wanted more investment by China to shore up its economy.
The Chinese statement went on to say that patrols like this show its coast guard’s ability “to perform critical missions, enhancing its involvement in both international and regional maritime governance.”
This is the second first in the Arctic in recent months. This summer, China dispatched three research icebreakers to the region to conduct oceanographic and bathymetric studies that have use for commerce and its military. Beijing previously sent two icebreakers.
In the U.S. Coast Guard release, Dean added: “This recent activity demonstrates the increased interest in the Arctic by our strategic competitors.”
Dean said the four vessels were moving northeastward, remaining within Russia’s exclusive economic zone in the waters between Russia and Alaska, when they were identified and observed.
China’s increased coast guard and maritime research Arctic presence is happening as President Xi Jinping sent Russian President Vladimir Putin a congratulatory message on their countries’ 75 years of diplomatic cooperation. In the note, Xi said he was ready to expand cooperation with the Kremlin in line with their “no limits” agreement announced in 2022.
The bilateral cooperation between the two countries extends to new shipbuilding technology for Arctic operations and coordinating shipping, as they appear to be doing in the Northern Sea Route, USNI News previously reported. The route is usually open from mid-June to November.
China delivered its fourth research icebreaker in late June. How involved Russia may have been in the ship’s design is unknown.
The joint Russian-Chinese patrol, which began Sept. 21, coincided with China observing its National Day on Oct. 1. On that day in 1949, Mao Zedong announced the formation of the People’s Republic of China, ending the Communists’ long civil war with the Nationalist government. That government fled to Taiwan upon Mao’s victory.
This is also the second time since mid-September that the U.S. Coast Guard has reported increased Russian naval activity in these waters. While on patrol in the Chukchi Sea, the crew of USCG Stratton (WMSL 752) observed four Russian Navy vessels transiting southeast along the Russian side of the maritime border between the U.S. and Russia, Dean said in a Sept. 16 news release.
The Russian surface action group included a Dolgorukiy-class submarine, a Severodvinsk-class submarine, a Steregushchiy-class frigate and Seliva-class tug, the Coast Guard said. The release added that the four ships were trying to avoid ice and operating in accordance with international rules while inside the United States’ exclusive economic zone.
The Russian ships were participating in its Oceans 24 exercise that included joint operations with the Chinese in the Pacific. More than 400 ships participated in the exercise in the Baltic and Mediterranean seas and the Atlantic and Arctic oceans.
In these instances, the U.S. Coast Guard said its aircraft and cutter were operating under “Operation Frontier Sentinel, an operation designed to meet presence with presence when strategic competitors operate in and around U.S. waters.”
July marked another dimension in the changing Arctic security environment between the U.S., China and Russia.
In July, the North American Aerospace Defense Command reported that for the first time, U.S. and Canadian fighters tracked Russian and Chinese bombers flying together in the Alaska air defense identification zone. Following the incident, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters: “if it happened again, if there’s any kind of a challenge from any direction, I have every confidence that [U.S. Northern Command] and NORAD will be at the ready and be able to intercept.”
That same month, the Pentagon warned in its new regional strategy that “growing cooperation” between Russia and China has the “potential to alter the Arctic’s stability and threat picture.”
The High North remains the “shortest and least defended threat sector” to the U.S., Army Lt. Gen. Thomas Carden, the deputy commander of U.S. Northern Command, said after the Arctic strategy’s release.
On Oct. 1, USCG Healy (WAGB 20) departed Seattle for its fall operations in the Arctic, according to Lt. Cmdr. Jeannie Shaye, a spokesperson for the U.S. Coast Guard Pacific Area. The icebreaker’s summer mission was cut short by an electrical transformer fire that forced the ship to return to homeport for repairs and inspection.
This fall’s first mission supports the Arctic Port Access Route Study.
“The cutter will perform bathymetric mapping in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas … to analyze current vessel patterns, predict future vessel needs, and balance the needs of all waterway users by developing and recommending vessel routing measures,” the Coast Guard release said about the deployment.
Capt. Michele Schallip, the icebreaker’s commanding officer, said in the release that the “crew, port engineering staff, and General Electric Verona worked diligently during our in-port to ensure the cutter is ready to safely operate in the remote, unforgiving Arctic environment.”
