![]() ![]() The High North hardly featured at all in NATO strategy. However, the strategic importance of the area had been perceived quite differently by the central organisation of NATO and SACEUR. The most northern areas became less important for the United States. By then, the nuclear-armed long-distance strategic missiles had emerged as the main Cold War weapon. This US-led offensive use of the region lasted from the beginning of the Cold War until the early 1960s. In addition, the United States supported a great build-up of Norwegian forces for the same purpose. In parallel, the Anglo-American carrier fleets operated in the Norwegian Sea for force projection, as well as for air protection for the strategic bombers. From its earliest years, the transit route of US nuclear-armed strategic bomber fleets passed over the northern parts of Scandinavia toward the central areas of the Soviet Union. The Scandinavian Peninsula was important throughout the Cold War. SACLANTs concerns about the High North in the 1960s However, it is worth remembering that Supreme Allied Commander Atlantic (SACLANT) failed in initial attempts in the 1960s to get the political leadership in NATO to focus on the emerging Soviet naval threat in the High North and North Atlantic and to expand the continental focus of the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR). ![]() The strategic nuclear deterrent submarines and the Bastion Concept came to be recognised as the centrepiece of Russia’s second strike capability. These ‘Bastions’ became heavily defended by attack submarines, surface vessels and air power. The Northern Fleet came to define the Barents Sea (and later the Sea of Okhotsk) as closed areas for these SSBNs. Combined with SS-N-6 missiles, the Yankee SSBNs, which became operational in 1967, had an approximate 2500 km range which allowed them to patrol at great distance from the US coasts in the mid-Atlantic.Ī few years later, the arrival of the Delta SSBN equipped with SS-N-8 missiles gave the Soviet Union the potential even to launch attacks on the United States from home waters in the Barents Sea. The Yankee class is considered the first true Soviet SSBN, despite the earlier Hotel class. The Soviet Union developed their Yankee and Delta classes of strategic submarines in response to the George Washington class of US submarines, which were equipped with Polaris missiles.
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