Enemies and Partners in the North: Environment, Security, and Soviet–Norwegian Collaboration on Cold War Svalbard

This paper examines Soviet-Norwegian relations and the coal mining industry in the Norwegian High North following World War II. Based in several towns on the Svalbard Archipelago, the Norwegians and Soviets were the two main parties on the Arctic islands who carried out coal mining in this remote and harsh location. Svalbard is perhaps the only place in the world where the Soviets maintained a permanent outpost beyond the borders of the Soviet Union proper. Using archival sources from the Svalbard governor’s office, this research looks at how environmental hindrances in the Arctic shaped Soviet and Norwegian citizens’ interactions on Svalbard in the 1950s-1970s, creating a unique status quo where more-than-human northern conditions constantly forced the two opposing sides to work together and help one another. The paper shows that the Norwegians and Soviets on Svalbard had a much closer relationship than previously believed, deepening our understanding of how these two Cold War rival camps interacted as friends and neighbors under the Svalbard Treaty and in a difficult Arctic environment.