BREAKING THE ICE

The Globe fronts and everyone else ignores a report on a potential conflict over Arctic sovereignty brewing between Canada and the United States.

A report commissioned by US Congress rejects Canada’s claim that the Northwest Passage is Canadian territory, and recommends deploying “two massive new polar icebreakers to assert and defend US interests,” the Globe writes.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said he too plans to send armed icebreakers up north to assert Canadian control as global warming begins to make the passage navigable for commercial purposes. (The region is currently patrolled by Coast Guard icebreakers, which are unarmed and manned by civilians.)

The Congress report goes on to compare the Northwest Passage with the Straits of Hormuz, a Middle Eastern passageway for much of the world’s oil, which the US also patrols.