Hans Island Showdown

An international showdown is brewing. This time, it’s Canada staring down Denmark in a dispute over ownership of Hans Island.

Canada may be pulling back from overseas military commitments, but is planning to “flex its muscles” with an exercise on home soil by sending a warship, a squadron of helicopters and 200 troops to the high Arctic this summer.

Hans Island is like the Falklands…

The operation, code-mamed Narwhal, is the first time the military will have a joint naval, air and land force operating so far north.

without the sheep…

Colonel Norris Pettis, commander of the Canadian Forces northern area, told The National Post that the operation is about “sending a message that this land is important to us…that we can put troops, and aircraft and ships, on the ground to respond to whatever we might be called upon to deal with.”

or the people…

Both countries claim ownership of the barren and uninhabited island.

it’s about the size of a Home Depot parking lot.

A Danish warship sailed past Hans Island in 2002 and a group of soldiers disembarked and reportedly hoisted the Danish flag, an act Canada claimed was a violation of its sovereignty.

The bastards!

Canada has launched a five-year plan to increase its military presence throughout the Arctic, including satellite surveillance and far-reaching patrols of soldiers on snowmobiles.

A sleeping giant awakes.

14 Replies to “Hans Island Showdown”

  1. Beltway Traffic Jam

    Today’s linkfest: Jeff Jarvis discusses the virtues of brevity. Daniel Drezner has an interesting piece on human rights protests in Syria. The “Other” Kate decries…

  2. I’m just glad to know that the mighty Canadian army is guarding the Northern Frontier against the marauding Vikings.

  3. I am not a person who is involved in politics of land disputes for that matter, but is there no way to have some sort of joint ownership? Am I being naive?

  4. Well, in contrast to my flippant post, there is a concern for Canadian interests over this worthless piece of rock. The ice in the Northwest Passage is melting, and it may become a legitimate shipping route. So, if you want to better understand what’s at stake – look at a map.
    Still, we have no one to blame but our own government – 40 years of social spending and nannystate building has- been underwritten by the American Taxpayer. So long as US national security interests aligned with our own (namely the threat from over the pole), we could afford to sit smugly under an umbrella of American power, and allow our own military to decay, while pouring money into a bottomless pit of social entitlements.

  5. War: Canada vs. Denmark.
    It’d be a tough call I think, think two paralyzed at the neck people trying to have a fight .
    Aside from neither side really caring to get shot over the issue. I’m fairly sure that even if it got to military nonsense the militaries of both countries would look at the politicians and say: “Are you out of your little pea-mind?”

  6. Don’t we sit under that umbrella already? I guess that is what you are saying, the government is there already, so why not just continue to do so. So can you tell me, who took claim of this land first? Is this what the whole battle is about? And yes the ice is melting but realistically, how long before it melts?

  7. To the guy to asked who claimed the island first… I don’t know it… But a pretty good guess is DENMARK, since the name of the island is Hans… Hans is a Danish name and also on of our kings had that name… We also claimed it in 1916… did Canada even exist then??

  8. Hans Island, take 2

    The BBC has this report on the escalating Danish/Canadian row over Hans Island. Much web space has been devoted to…

  9. Hans Island, take 2

    The BBC has this report on the escalating Danish/Canadian row over Hans Island. Much web space has been devoted to…

  10. Hans Island, take 2

    The BBC has this report on the escalating Danish/Canadian row over Hans Island. Much web space has been devoted to…

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