Russia builds Arctic air defense shield

Russia’s military will establish a new Arctic air defense division in 2018, military representatives told Izvestia. It is to cover the territory “from Novaya Zemlya to Chukotka,” the newspaper reports.

Both new and existing units will be included in the structure, which is to be “capable of discovering and destroying enemy aircrafts, cruise missiles and drones.”

According to military representatives, the air defense division will help protect Moscow and the Ural region against attack from the North.

Russia’s current missile force capacities in the region are concentrated in the western part of the Arctic and first of all in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk Oblasts.

The country has over the last years bolstered its Northern Fleet with a wide range of new missiles. In 2015, the country moved the S-400 Triumph, the new generation anti-aircraft weapon system, to the region. That was followed by the deployment of the Bastion mobile coastal missile systems in 2016.

In late 2015, a regiment of S-300 surface-to-air missile system was deployed in Novaya Zemlya, the Arctic archipelago. In November 2016, military representatives confirmed that a Bal missile system was soon is on its way to the Northern Fleet.

The establishment of the new air defense division comes as Russia is developing a series of new and upgraded bases along its Arctic coasts, including in the Franz Josef Land, Novaya Zemlya, Severnaya Zemlya, the New Siberian Islands, Cape Schmidt and Wrangel Island.