Arctic Security and Defence Initiative

The Arctic is a defining element of Canada’s geography and one of its most important contributions to global security. Yet Arctic policy has too often been treated as a specialized or cyclical concern rather than as a permanent dimension of Canadian foreign, defence and national security policy.

The Initiative will connect Canada’s Atlantic, Pacific and continental positions and integrate Arctic priorities across foreign policy, defence, economic security, technology, industry and infrastructure. It will assess a changing strategic environment shaped by Russia’s military posture, China’s efforts to expand its polar influence, growing Russia–China cooperation across the North Pacific–Arctic nexus, and shifts in the United States’ global and continental commitments. It will also identify opportunities for Canadian leadership through NORAD and NATO and with Nordic, North Atlantic and North Pacific partners.

A central focus will be the capabilities required to translate sovereignty and strategy into sustained presence and action. This includes domain awareness, defence modernization and procurement, dual-use infrastructure, defence-industrial capacity, science and innovation, critical technologies, supply chains and economic security, as well as resilience against foreign interference and other sub-threshold threats.

Northern and Indigenous partnership will be fundamental to the work. Through research, private dialogue, public programming, direct advice and sustained partnerships, CSS will work to entrench an Arctic orientation in Canadian statecraft and strengthen Canada’s ability to turn policy into capability and action.