Svalbard Could Be the Arctic’s Next Geopolitical Flashpoint
While Donald Trump’s bid to grab control over Greenland from Denmark has been attracting all the headlines, the focus on the Arctic is also making Norway anxious. Its northern territory Svalbard could become another bone of geopolitical contention.
Norway’s crown prince, Haakon, speaks at the monument at Skjarringa as he visits Svalbard on August 14, 2025, marking the one-hundredth anniversary of Svalbard becoming part of the Kingdom of Norway. (Lise Aaserud / NTB / AFP / Getty Images / Norway OUT)
“Let them take Svalbard” was the headline on January 13 for the Norwegian tabloid VG.
This was actually a distortion of comments by Croatian president Zoran Milanović, giving the misleading impression that he was offering Donald Trump an alternative territorial conquest to Greenland. But it reflects an underlying Norwegian anxiety about the future of its northern islands.
Milanović had labeled Greenland “useless” in comparison to the Svalbard archipelago in a press conference four days earlier that the Norwegian press picked up on. Much of the water around the latter, a Norwegian territory governed according to a unique 1920 treaty, is ice-free all year round thanks to the warm waters of the Gulf Stream.
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