Why a ‘confrontational posture’ won’t help China in the Arctic

China should avoid taking a “confrontational posture” over a new security pact between the United States, Denmark and Greenland as it might end up being excluded from engagement on the emerging Arctic order.

That was the warning from Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s National Institute of Strategic Studies (NISS), a Chinese think tank, in a report released on Wednesday.

It also said the US was unlikely to turn the northern polar region into its “exclusive strategic backyard”. The report noted that Russia as well as America’s Nato allies including Canada and European nations could constrain how far a “northward Monroe Doctrine” would go.

The new pact signed by the US, Denmark and Greenland on September 22 allows America to establish two new military bases in Greenland and gives it a formal say in vetting foreign investment in “sensitive” sectors on the world’s largest island, an autonomous Danish territory. Those sectors include but are not limited to critical infrastructure and resource extraction.