The Battle for Greenland: Drones in the Arctic
Part One of the Extreme Environments Series: UAVs in Ice and Snow
If you send 40 soldiers to Greenland, what is that for?
What message does it send? …
It seems like everyone is just waiting for America to cool down on this topic, hoping it will pass away. But what if will not? What then?
—Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy
I hope that they will stay in our alliance, but I don’t know what will happen.
—Mette Frederiksen, Prime Minister of Denmark
Flying in a Winter Wonderland: some of the many headscratchers arctic and icy conditions present to UAV and general aviation. Source: Paper “A Review of Icing Research and Development of Icing Mitigation Techniques for Fixed-Wing UAVs”
The future of ice-free aviation in the Arctic? Resistive de-icing, in this case by company Ubiq Aerospace, is one of the technologies desseminated in the article. Source: Twitter
Join Us As We Cut Through the Hype
Did you know that there are small drones flying in the Arctic right now, whose blades and wings and batteries don’t degrade in performance due to ice buildup? Solutions like the heated blades by D-ICE hold the promise of Arctic flight without regret. But what about their hard limitations? Read on to find out everything about the leaders and losers, and dos and donts, and cans and cants, and surprising use cases, plus the very latest solutions to some of the most daunting challenges of operating UAVs in the Arctic.
But first, let’s get the geopolitics out of the way:
Questions?
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Getting the Geopolitics Out of the Way
What Trump Said
In January 2025, President Trump renewed his assertion that the United States should acquire Greenland. What began as seemingly rhetorical posturing escalated through a series of increasingly concrete steps. But Trump’s claims are far from news. Grab a strong alcoholic liquid, and let’s revisit the entire timeline (The Atlantic has a good version if you want to dive deeper; feel free to skip this part if you just had a meal):
Aug 18, 2019: Trump confirms interest in acquiring Greenland; describes it as “Essentially, it’s a large real estate deal.”
Aug 20, 2019: Trump announces he is canceling/postponing a planned Denmark visit after PM Mette Frederiksen rejects the idea as “absurd.”
Dec 22-23, 2024 (reported Dec 23): Trump posts on Truth Social: “For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.”
Jan 2025: Trump escalates beyond “interest,” saying the U.S. “would tariff Denmark at a very high level” if it blocked U.S. takeover efforts.
Jan 7, 2025: Donald Trump Jr. visits Greenland, amplifying speculation and diplomatic reaction.
Conservative MP Rasmus Jarlov: “this level of disrespect from the coming US president towards very, very loyal allies and friends is record-setting”.
Trump: “”Make Greenland great again!”
Jan 12, 2025: Vice President-elect JD Vance says “there’s a deal to be made in Greenland”.
Jan 4, 2026: Denmark’s PM urges Trump to “stop the threats” against Denmark/Greenland.
Jan 5, 2026: Trump: “We do need Greenland, absolutely”, it is “surrounded by Russian and Chinese ships.”
4 May, 2025: Trump “won’t rule out military force”: “I don’t rule it out. I don’t say I’m going to do it, but I don’t rule out anything. No, not there. We need Greenland very badly. Greenland is a very small amount of people, which we’ll take care of, and we’ll cherish them, and all of that. But we need that for international security.”
Jan 13, 2026: Trump: “there are Russian destroyers, there are Chinese destroyers and bigger, there are Russian submarines all over the place… We’re not going to have Russia or China occupy Greenland…”
Jan 17, 2026: Trump post-announces additional 10% import tariffs (effective Feb 1) on eight European countries, to rise to 25% on June 1, conditioned on a Greenland purchase “deal.”
Jan 19, 2026: in a message exchange with Norway’s PM Jonas Gahr Støre, Trump writes: “Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China… There are no written documents, it’s only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also.”
Jan 21, 2026 (Davos): Trump says he will not use force to obtain Greenland; reported versions include: “people thought I would use force… I don’t want to use force… I won’t use force.”
Greenland is big, very big, but not as big as the Mercator Projection technique which we use to stretch Earth’s true surface into a rectangle.
Another Sluggish Reaction by the EU?
Some security and geo-strategy folks in our network say that those are empty, baseless threats, that this is unheard of (it is), that there will never be an attack of one NATO member on another, that he’s just trying to use Greenland as a negotiation pawn for more tariffs, more EU purchases of US goods and the cancellation of the Digital Markets and Services Acts. That this has “future TACO” written all over it. Maybe that will persuade Trump.
Maybe Trump is as capable as anyone at reading a map, and sees Greenland’s strategic position in... its strategic position.
We haven’t gotten to that, yet. First, we’ve got to get the oil.
Donald Trump on democracy building in Venezuela after the US’s recent attack
Or maybe, just maybe, he’s not going to let go of his claims because of the oil and gas? In entirely unrelated news, the USGS was recently tasked with estimating the Western Greenland undiscovered gas and oil reserves and found that there might be some 7.8 billion barrels of oil and 91.9 trillion cubic feet of gas (that’s ~18 & 15 percent of total US proven reserves, right on their doorstep - and that’s only the Western edge, and only offshore). And that’s “just” the oil. Greenland is home to some of the most vast natural resources on the planet (as well as some of the most intact geological and (living) fossil records, for now still safely protected under its vast ice sheet.
HUGE! a recent study by the United States Geological Survey (USGS).
Is the push for Greenland just plain stupid or 4D chess? We think it makes sense to view the geo-strategic implications through a more nuanced lens. Trump likely wants a bit of everything, and he is unlikely to fully let go of his territorial claims. He’s also notorious for not liking it too much when being told no.
The Trump manual: 1) gift. Tim Cook’s “one of one” gold and glass bootlicking attempt.
Old NATO (or The Artist Formerly Known As NATO/TAFKAN, if you like that one better), heads of government of the EU, and, who knows, likely soon the Pope and the Dalai Lama are trying their best to appease and persuade Trump of to back off of this act of strategic self harm and global destabilization, and, who knows, maybe they will be successful. Maybe no “one of one” gift will pry his hands off of Greenland’s sovereign territory. Maybe. But:
None of this matters for defense.
It doesn’t matter because we need to perform military planning, defense technology supply chain management, as well as logistics, training, procurement, posture, doctrine and strategy design before trouble arises, so that we can stay out of trouble, and, if need be, fight tonight. It’s called readiness, and, as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Canadian Forces recently demonstrated, in defense, readiness is not just a virtue, it is one of the major duties. And, may we add, no matter how irrational something some people surmised the US president might order tomorrow might have sounded yesterday, many, many of the folks who realized irrational and unpredictable are the new normal. Plus, if you see it from an ice-cold, geostrategy-numb, Borg-like resource maximalist perspective, there’s a valid point to taking Greenland. But we’re not here to talk politics, or to assert our opinion on anything anyone does, we’re here to understand the way unmanned systems would be used to try and do so, and to try and prevent it.
Thus, in this article, we will do what we always do at TECH WARS, leave potential political considerations surrounding current discussions, as well as potential aftermath/fallout crystal-balling, aside, and instead focus on the technical, tactical, operational, strategic, logistic, and defense economic aspects, investigating the what and how of unmanned arctic warfare.
The situation which has brewed up raises fundamental questions about the future of Arctic defense: whose unmanned systems will work in these extreme conditions, and whose will fail? How could a European Union plus Canada plus Ukraine alliance defend Greenland using unmanned systems? Are purchases of US-manufactured materiel and of that manufactured by startups with significant American strategic investment strategic risks to New NATO’s security? Could defenders mount something similar to the United States’ “Hellscape” scenario? And, critically, what would actual Arctic unmanned systems warfare look like and what’s missing today and needs to be built to be ready tomorrow?
Let’s talk about unmanned defense and fighting in ice and snow and darkness. Welcome to the Extreme Conditions Series, Part One: Battle for Greenland: Drones In the Arctic.
This hypothetical scenario will, as we will see, prove to be the ultimate “pick your battles” battle for both sides. Let us introduce you to our protagonists: we will be referring to the US as the US (as it looks more and more like soon the only ally the US will have left will be the man in the mirror), and the EU, other European nations like the UK, Canada, and potentially Ukraine as “New NATO” (because it sounds catchy). We will of course detail each of these players’ potential individual contributions if and when appropriate. But first, we need to ask ourselves the questions why unmanned systems, especially those of the ‘novel’, smaller, mostly commercial-of-the-shelf-sourced and increasingly AI-driven (which is what we will mean when referring to unmanned or autonomous systems in this article) are so important for the defense of and so incredibly vulnerable in the Arctic.
The article you’re about to read contains about 10.000 words of dense, bleeding-edge insights and knowledge.
What You Will Learn In This Article
Why Unmanned Systems in the Arctic?
The Extreme Environment Challenge
The Unfortunate Environmental Factors
It Gets Worse the Closer You Look
The Arctic is Changing Rapidly
The Many Use Cases for UAVs In Arctic Defense
Strike/Bomber
ISR
Resupply
Little-known and Specialized Mission Profiles (which are particularly useful in the Arctic, like de-icing)
Arctic Risks for Unmanned Systems, and Why They Matter Just As Much for Most Non-arctic Militaries
Everybody’s Business
How Not to Test
Arctic Challenges for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)
Data Link and Communications
Power and Battery Performance (and solutions)
Blades, Wings, Engines, Actuators, and Moving Parts (and solutions)
Sensors and Optical Systems
Could AI and Swarming Save the Day?
Operations and Human Factors
Crucial Space-Domain Assets and Capabilities
Logistics Considerations
Outlook: a Silver Lining
Recommendations for MoDs, Industry and Investors
Wrap-up and Conclusions
Sneak Peek & Your Chance to Drive What’s Released Next (>10 researched chapters we couldn’t fit, length-wise)
First things first: the author of this article and its publication is and will remain subscribed to the idea of the transatlantic friendship and alliance, and hopes sincerely that this fictional scenario will never become reality.
With a big thank you for your continued support as always, let’s get to it!
NORth: 54 Leopard 2A7 are being redesignated 2A8 NOR because of plenty of adaptations ordered by the Norwegian MoD, many of them to fighting in ice and snow. Photo: Norwegian MoD
Why Unmanned Systems in the Arctic?
One might argue that lots of existing manned and larger systems have been tried and tested in arctic conditions since decades, and should thus be the go-to options. This is true, and systems from the Gripen to the Patria 6x6 to even the Leopard 2A8 have been designed and tested with arctic operations as a clear, and sometimes the main, use case.
Yet, for the European Union, the use of unmanned systems in the Arctic represent not just a tactical choice but a strategic imperative. Not only because many of the asymmetric operational constraints which the introduction of unmanned systems to the battlefield have imposed on manned systems, but also because, strategically, there is no other way for New NATO to even put up a fight against a potential arctic invader; at least without shooting itself in the foot. Let us explain.
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If we assume for our thought experiment (see the title of this article) an actual full-frontal confrontation, then, without leveraging unmanned capabilities, New NATO risks stretching itself catastrophically thin between an eastern front of more than 5.000 kilometers in length (we’ve discussed the near-impossibility this challenge presents for any ambitions for a dronewall in depth on TECH WARS preciously) and a western front more than 3.500 kilometers off its Western coast. Not only do the same cost-exchange ratio inversions apply for asymmetric warfare with unmanned against manned systems (and the US would likely double down on unmanned systems).
Shooting stars: An APS hits a target during a test of the US Army’s 70th Brigade Support Battalion. Photo: US DoW
The cost-exchange ratio is important enough to warrant a little refresher, so let’s exemplify briefly: even if the very large amount of 30 one-way strike UAV costing €2.000 each were being expended against a single Leopard 2A8, and if even only 10 of them managed to strike their target, for example the engine deck or the turret ring (which is multiple times the amount that it would take to get the job done), the cost-exchange ratio would still be a mind-boggling 1:500. This does not factor in the loss-exchange ratio of 0:4 (highly skilled tank operators), and the opportunity cost of losing a main battle tank far, far away from the factories where they are being produced on an island which might be navally blockaded by your enemy; a tank which was likely on its way to an important mission which might now not be possible anymore. Let that sink in.
Indeed, likely, way less drones would be needed, not least because the Leopard 2A8’s Rafael-designed and Rafael-, General-Dynamics- (another US company…), and KNDS-joint-venture-produced Trophy Heavy Vehicle Active Protection System (HV APS) carries a total of six ready rounds split across two guns, one on each side. After these six shots are expended, the crew (typically the loader or commander) must physically exit the turret or reach out to external storage bins to manually reload the magazines behind the launchers. Cool. Sure, the tank would not be on its mission all on its own. But there are other reasons why deploying higher amounts of manned systems to the Arctic would be a very bad decision.
Deploying high-value conventional systems, and especially substantial manpower, to the Arctic would also create a dangerous double-front scenario for an embryonal alliance which is already stretched thin in terms of arsenal and soldiers force cohesion and ideas of how to position itself strategically and in terms of doctrine. Should European forces commit heavily to Greenland’s defense, the incentive for Russia to exploit vulnerabilities on the eastern front could increase dramatically. Unmanned systems offer a way to maintain presence and capability without the same level of manpower commitment, allowing Europe to dampen this potential strategic pincer.
Let’s set the scene and discuss the environments (plural) that we’re talking about when we talk about the Arctic, and how they shape the challenging conditions for unmanned systems operations.
When it’s cold outside: a gorgeous Christmas afternoon at Pituffik Space Force Base, Greenland. Photo: National Catholic Register/US Space Force
The Extreme Environment Challenge
Extreme environments are, well, extreme. They put both men and materiel to the test in ways that permissive environments simply can’t. Building systems for permissive environments (like the temperate environments which all Ukrainian and most current central European equipment is designed for) and validating their functionality in controlled settings is a relatively straightforward, and, unfortunately, widely applied strategy towards achieving higher claimed technological readiness levels (TRL). Doing the same in harsh environments, repeatedly, is exponentially more costly, harder, and frustrating, and thus avoided by most if not dictated as a requirement. Quick question: What’s the first thing you think of when thinking about Greenland? Ice?
Unfortunate Environmental Factors
Environmental conditions beyond ice matter. Storms, ice storms, heavy rain, clouds, and fog can all massively influence arctic operations, and there are more nuances than you can imagine.
Wind speeds, gusts, wind strength, and wind directions are critical environmental factors that must be considered. Sunlight availability also matters significantly. For any solar-supplemented systems, Arctic winter conditions with minimal daylight hours create obvious limitations.
It Gets Worse the Closer You Look
Here’s a more detailed selection of some of the nasty environmental challenges which all things, including unmanned vehicles (UxVs) encounter in the Arctic/in Greenland:
Temperature reality by season and place: winter ranges from “near-freezing but wet” in the far south to “deep freezer” in the far north, with the ice-sheet interior colder still; summer is short, cool on most coasts, and can stay below freezing on the high ice sheet.
The most disruptive shifts are not averages but crossings of the freezing point: rain or wet snow, then a fast drop below zero turns roads, decks, antennas, and exposed surfaces into glaze ice overnight.
Wind is often the show-stopper: Greenland’s steep terrain turns weather systems into sudden coastal windstorms, especially in the southeast where cold air can pour downhill and accelerate through fjords with little warning.
Around the southern tip and nearby straits, wind can jet and surge as it wraps around headlands and is forced along the coast; this creates short-lived but severe wind corridors over water and near-shore airspace.
Visibility can collapse quickly and stay low: fog, ice fog (tiny ice crystals), low cloud, blowing snow, and whiteout conditions can erase horizon and depth cues even when it does not feel like a major storm.
Coastal “micro-weather” is driven by the ice edge and open water: when very cold air flows over relatively warmer open leads, sea smoke can form suddenly as a shallow, dense veil; when moist air rides over cold water or sea ice, thick coastal fog becomes common.
Light is a weather-like constraint: months of darkness in winter and nonstop daylight in summer, plus low sun angles, glare off snow/ice, and flat light, can make the environment feel visually “featureless.”
Sea surface conditions around Greenland shift quickly with wind and season because strong currents run along the coasts and drifting sea ice and icebergs are common, so a route that is open water one day can be partly ice covered the next, especially near straits and the ice edge.
Under the sea, the environment is not steady: changes in water temperature and saltiness can change how sound travels and add background clutter, complicating what can be detected and tracked below the surface.
The Arctic is Changing Rapidly
The Arctic has harsh environmental conditions including extreme cold and remoteness that hinder readiness and power projection.
• The region is warming nearly four times faster than the global average.
• Summer sea ice has declined by about 40% since 1980, and ice-free summers are described as possible within decades.
• Thawing permafrost is destabilizing runways and infrastructure.
• Erratic freeze - thaw cycles are disrupting logistics, making operations more accessible but less safe for sustained operations.
• Thinning/melting ice is changing operating conditions, including opening areas that were previously inaccessible (e.g., under-ice environments).
• Melt-driven shifts in salinity and temperature are altering sound propagation, increasing acoustic clutter and complicating passive sonar performance.
Are your systems ready for this?
The Many Use Cases for UAVs In Arctic Defense
Continued below
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