Höfundur: Ambassador Jenny Hill

Ob­ser­va­tions from Cana­da’s ex­pe­ri­ence for the Ice­landic con­text.

At the World Eco­nom­ic Fo­rum in Davos, Prime Min­is­ter Mark Car­ney warned that the in­ter­na­tion­al sys­tem is un­der­go­ing a rup­ture – shift­ing from a rules based or­der that sought, how­ev­er im­per­fect­ly, to gov­ern state be­hav­iour through norms, to a more tra­di­tion­al, pow­er dri­ven in­ter­na­tion­al land­scape. One where great pow­ers more open­ly and blunt­ly pur­sue their in­ter­ests us­ing their tools of state­craft to con­vince or co­erce oth­er states to align. These tac­tics could in­clude weaponiz­ing spe­cif­ic trade, fi­nance and sup­ply chains to turn­ing broad­er se­cu­ri­ty and eco­nom­ic in­ter­de­pen­dence into vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty for mid­dle and small ac­tors. In this new (old) world, if small­er states lack cred­i­ble de­ter­rent mil­i­tary pow­er, re­silient so­ci­eties and pro­duc­tive and se­cure economies, we risk be­com­ing ob­jects of great-pow­er com­pe­ti­tion rather than ac­tors with agency with­in the sys­tem. While the Davos speech is fo­cused on geopol­i­tics and eco­nom­ics more than tra­di­tion­al de­fence spend­ing or mil­i­tary strat­e­gy, se­cu­ri­ty, au­ton­o­my and sov­er­eign­ty are cen­tral themes – and the par­al­lels are eas­i­ly drawn.

For Cana­da and Ice­land – coun­tries that have ben­e­fit­ted from a sys­tem fo­cused on rules rather than raw pow­er – this fram­ing cap­tures an un­com­fort­able but clar­i­fy­ing re­al­i­ty.

In a more volatile and con­flict-prone sys­tem, coun­tries with­out ac­cess to cred­i­ble hard pow­er don’t just lose in­flu­ence, they risk los­ing agency al­to­geth­er. We may think we can stay safe by ac­com­mo­dat­ing great pow­ers’ in­ter­ests and avoid­ing con­fronta­tion, but Prime Min­is­ter Car­ney warns that com­pli­ance will not buy safe­ty. Go­ing along to get along can make mid­dle and small­er states more vul­ner­a­ble to ex­ploita­tion giv­en the im­bal­ance in eco­nom­ic and mil­i­tary might with larg­er pow­ers, with “the pleas­ant fic­tion” of a rules-based sys­tem no longer in place with its but­tress­ing guardrails.

So what is the way for­ward giv­en this con­text?

Prime Min­is­ter Car­ney’s core mes­sage is that small­er and mid­dle pow­ers can­not pas­sive­ly adapt to the rup­ture – we need to ac­tive­ly re­shape our po­si­tion in the sys­tem. The most ef­fec­tive means to do so is to co­or­di­nate and act col­lec­tive­ly. Not to try and get the most re­cent world or­der back, but rather to en­sure that what­ev­er new sys­tem comes about is one where small­er and mid­dle pow­ers are still able to de­fend their core na­tion­al in­ter­ests. To be clear, the sug­ges­tion is not that small­er and mid­dle pow­ers will be the ones shap­ing the sys­tem, but by band­ing to­geth­er (in­clud­ing with those with hard pow­er), a suf­fi­cient crit­i­cal mass can be cre­at­ed that will ne­ces­si­tate great pow­ers tak­ing into ac­count our in­ter­ests. Oth­er­wise, the out­come could be dire. In Prime Min­is­ter Car­ney’s now oft-quot­ed words – if we aren’t at the ta­ble, we’re on the menu.

Prime Min­is­ter Car­ney’s per­spec­tive pro­vides a prag­mat­ic and con­struc­tive path for­ward for small­er and mid­dle states. It also brings to the fore­front im­por­tant ques­tions such as what it means to be a cred­i­ble ally and with whom mid­dle and small­er states should seek to part­ner with and on what.

As all coun­tries seek to nav­i­gate this new geopo­lit­i­cal re­al­i­ty, Cana­da’s ap­proach to coali­tion build­ing could serve to in­form Ice­land’s think­ing and in­ter­na­tion­al re­la­tions ap­proach.

While it goes with­out say­ing that Cana­da and Ice­land are NATO al­lies and have shared in­ter­ests as Arc­tic coun­tries, we also both nav­i­gate a very close re­la­tion­ship with the Unit­ed States, have acute­ly vi­tal strate­gic ge­o­gra­phies that ad­ver­sary states would seek to ac­cess in war time, and have sparse­ly pop­u­lat­ed coun­tries that make in­fra­struc­ture and de­fence lo­gis­tics com­plex.

PROX­IM­I­TY WITH­OUT IL­LU­SION: THE RISE OF VARI­ABLE GEOM­E­TRY

Cana­da and Ice­land both live with a struc­tur­al re­al­i­ty: a unique­ly close re­la­tion­ship with the Unit­ed States. For Cana­da, our ge­o­graph­ic prox­im­i­ty has de­liv­ered sig­nif­i­cant se­cu­ri­ty ben­e­fits and could cer­tain­ly con­tin­ue to do so in the fu­ture. But in a more con­test­ed and volatile strate­gic en­vi­ron­ment, Cana­da is pair­ing that re­la­tion­ship with a de­lib­er­ate ef­fort to broad­en and deep­en ties with a wider net­work of part­ners. This is not an ei­ther/or ap­proach, but com­ple­men­tary – de­signed to build re­silience, ex­pand op­tions, and re­in­force col­lec­tive sta­bil­i­ty. For Cana­da, these part­ner­ships take the form of vari­able geom­e­try: flex­i­ble, is­sue spe­cif­ic align­ments that bring to­geth­er dif­fer­ent con­stel­la­tions of al­lies and part­ners de­pend­ing on the chal­lenge at hand.

At the core of both ap­proach­es is a sim­ple prin­ci­ple: a cred­i­ble part­ner or ally is a se­ri­ous one that does not rest on as­sumed good­will or am­bi­gu­i­ty – rather it is one that demon­strates its cred­i­bil­i­ty through vis­i­ble in­vest­ments, real ca­pa­bil­i­ties, clear com­mit­ments and the will to act de­ci­sive­ly when re­quired.

Cana­da has been sig­nalling this shift in con­crete terms by ac­cel­er­at­ing the de­liv­ery of real, op­er­a­tional ca­pa­bil­i­ties to strength­en Arc­tic se­cu­ri­ty and con­ti­nen­tal de­fence, while re­in­forc­ing the foun­da­tions of its na­tion­al pow­er. Over the next five years, Cana­da is mov­ing to field over the hori­zon radar sys­tems to ex­tend ear­ly warn­ing cov­er­age across its North­ern and Arc­tic ap­proach­es along­side mod­ern­ized NO­RAD com­mand, con­trol, and com­mu­ni­ca­tions. It is also in­tro­duc­ing new mar­itime pa­trol air­craft, air­borne ear­ly warn­ing ca­pa­bil­i­ties, in­te­grat­ed air and mis­sile de­fence sys­tems, and en­hanced un­der­sea sur­veil­lance. At the same time, Cana­da is ex­pand­ing and up­grad­ing for­ward op­er­at­ing lo­ca­tions to sup­port a more per­sis­tent, mo­bile, and scal­able mil­i­tary pres­ence across the Arc­tic.

These ef­forts are be­ing re­in­forced by struc­tur­al re­forms to ac­cel­er­ate pro­cure­ment and de­ploy­ment for the de­fence sec­tor and strength­en eco­nom­ic re­silience, in­clud­ing the es­tab­lish­ment of a De­fence In­vest­ment Agency, pub­li­ca­tion of a De­fence In­dus­tri­al Strat­e­gy and set­ting up a Ma­jor Pro­jects Of­fice. The lat­ter will stream­line and ac­cel­er­ate the plan­ning, ap­proval, and de­liv­ery of com­plex in­fra­struc­ture projects of na­tion­al sig­nif­i­cance. Tak­en to­geth­er, these steps re­flect a clear fo­cus on pace and scale: en­sur­ing Cana­da can more rapid­ly ac­quire, in­te­grate, and sus­tain the ca­pa­bil­i­ties re­quired to de­tect, de­ter, and re­spond to emerg­ing threats.

A more ca­pa­ble Cana­di­an mil­i­tary that is able to de­fend North Amer­i­ca, the Arc­tic, and the North At­lantic re­in­forces Cana­da’s val­ue with­in NATO and be­yond. Cana­da’s ap­proach to de­fend­ing it­self, pur­su­ing its core in­ter­ests, and en­gag­ing with NATO right­ful­ly oc­cur through the lens of our own ge­og­ra­phy, and how that ge­og­ra­phy shapes our na­tion­al de­fence needs. Cana­da’s in­ter­ests un­der­line the util­i­ty of a fo­cused ‘Cana­di­an pil­lar’ with­in NATO that con­cen­trates on de­fend­ing the Arc­tic ap­proach­es to North Amer­i­ca, as well as play­ing a lead­ing role in se­cur­ing the North At­lantic. This is why Cana­da is also re­build­ing core ca­pa­bil­i­ties through ma­jor in­vest­ments in con­ven­tion­al­ly pow­ered sub­marines, naval sur­face fleets, and ad­vanced air­craft to en­able Cana­da to con­tribute cred­i­bly across a range of op­er­a­tional frame­works.

These ca­pa­bil­i­ties are not only na­tion­al as­sets; they are con­tri­bu­tions that can be in­te­grat­ed into dif­fer­ent al­lied con­fig­u­ra­tions as cir­cum­stances de­mand – whether through NATO, re­gion­al group­ings, or ad hoc coali­tions. In a vari­able geom­e­try en­vi­ron­ment, such ver­sa­til­i­ty is es­sen­tial: the same ca­pa­bil­i­ties must be able to un­der­pin de­ter­rence in the North At­lantic, sup­port Indo-Pa­cif­ic part­ner­ships, or re­in­force Eu­ro­pean se­cu­ri­ty, de­pend­ing on evolv­ing needs.

For Ice­land, which does not main­tain a stand­ing mil­i­tary, se­ri­ous­ness is demon­strat­ed dif­fer­ent­ly, but no less mean­ing­ful­ly. Ice­land’s strate­gic val­ue with­in NATO, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the Green­land-Ice­land-Unit­ed King­dom (GIUK) gap, gives it out­sized im­por­tance in North At­lantic se­cu­ri­ty. Its con­tri­bu­tions – host na­tion sup­port, air polic­ing fa­cil­i­ta­tion, in­fra­struc­ture pro­vi­sion, sit­u­a­tion­al aware­ness, and po­lit­i­cal re­li­a­bil­i­ty – are es­sen­tial to al­liance op­er­a­tions. Ice­land’s abil­i­ty to en­able al­lied pres­ence and move­ment, and to pro­vide a sta­ble and pre­dictable op­er­at­ing en­vi­ron­ment, is it­self a form of strate­gic ca­pa­bil­i­ty.

In an era of rup­ture, prox­im­i­ty to great pow­ers height­ens both risk and re­spon­si­bil­i­ty. For coun­tries like Cana­da and Ice­land, be­ing a cred­i­ble ally is not about match­ing great pow­ers – it is about con­sis­tent­ly demon­strat­ing that they can be re­lied upon when it mat­ters most – and to a wide-range of part­ners. In these part­ner­ships, al­lies are not sim­ply seek­ing sym­me­try; they are seek­ing se­ri­ous­ness. Hard pow­er is im­por­tant, but equal­ly vi­tal is de­pend­abil­i­ty, ca­pa­bil­i­ty and the will to act rapid­ly. When these as­pects are strong and clear­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ed, small­er and mid­dle states can shape ex­pec­ta­tions and ex­er­cise mean­ing­ful agency and be a cred­i­ble ally with­in a larg­er con­stel­la­tion of ac­tors.

DIS­TANCE IS NO LONGER IN­SU­LA­TION: BUILD­ING RE­SILIENCE IS CRIT­I­CAL

Like Ice­land, Cana­da is ge­o­graph­i­cal­ly dis­tant from cur­rent ki­net­ic con­flicts. That dis­tance once trans­lat­ed into com­fort. It no longer does. In a sys­tem de­fined by rup­ture, rapid tech­no­log­i­cal ad­vance­ments and the re­asser­tion of raw pow­er, our ge­og­ra­phy is no longer a sanc­tu­ary. Threats can now ar­rive through ca­bles, sig­nals, mar­kets, weath­er sys­tems, in­for­ma­tion flows, and space-based as­sets – of­ten to­geth­er, and in ad­di­tion to more tra­di­tion­al but no less lethal threats from hy­per­son­ic and oth­er long-range mis­siles, which could ar­rive to North Amer­i­ca less than thir­ty min­utes.

The abil­i­ty to pre­vent or ab­sorb dis­rup­tion, main­tain con­ti­nu­ity, and deny lever­age to ad­ver­saries be­comes as strate­gi­cal­ly im­por­tant as tra­di­tion­al de­fence ca­pa­bil­i­ties.

Cana­da has in­creas­ing­ly treat­ed re­silience – en­er­gy se­cu­ri­ty, cy­ber de­fence, sup­ply chains, se­cure com­mu­ni­ca­tions, and north­ern lo­gis­tics – not as do­mes­tic house­keep­ing, but as al­liance ca­pa­bil­i­ty. In a con­text where eco­nom­ic in­ter­de­pen­dence can be weaponized, these sys­tems are no longer neu­tral; they are con­test­ed ter­rain. So­ci­eties that can ab­sorb shocks and main­tain op­er­a­tional con­ti­nu­ity not only pro­tect them­selves, they also re­duce the like­li­hood of be­com­ing a weak link amongst their al­lies that can be lever­aged by ma­li­cious ac­tors.

This log­ic ap­plies equal­ly – and in some re­spects more acute­ly – to Ice­land. Its ge­o­graph­ic dis­tance from con­flict zones does not shield it from sys­temic risk; rather, its po­si­tion in the North At­lantic places it at the in­ter­sec­tion of strate­gic flows that are once again con­test­ed. Ice­land has al­ready tak­en im­por­tant steps in this di­rec­tion: strength­en­ing cy­ber­se­cu­ri­ty frame­works, main­tain­ing ad­vanced air sur­veil­lance sys­tems and in­vest­ing in the re­silience of crit­i­cal in­fra­struc­ture, in­clud­ing ports, com­mu­ni­ca­tions, and en­er­gy sys­tems. Its role in en­abling al­lied op­er­a­tions through the GIUK gap re­in­forces that re­silience at home trans­lates di­rect­ly into al­liance val­ue.

At the same time, the log­ic of rup­ture sug­gests that more will be re­quired – by all par­ties. Con­tin­ued in­vest­ment in cy­ber and hy­brid de­fence ca­pa­bil­i­ties, pro­tec­tion of sub­sea ca­bles and crit­i­cal in­fra­struc­ture, strength­ened civ­il pre­pared­ness frame­works, con­trol over data, en­er­gy, com­mu­ni­ca­tions and sup­ply chains mean that en­hanced co­or­di­na­tion with a wide range of part­ners will be es­sen­tial. Plan­ning for dis­rup­tion – not as an ex­cep­tion but as a base­line con­di­tion – will in­creas­ing­ly de­fine cred­i­bil­i­ty. Ice­land’s strong gov­er­nance, high lev­els of so­cial trust, and track record of man­ag­ing nat­ur­al dis­as­ters pro­vide an ex­cep­tion­al foun­da­tion.

Cana­da and Ice­land share the com­mon chal­lenge of how to en­hance their de­fence and re­silience ca­pa­bil­i­ties in sparse­ly pop­u­lat­ed re­gions – and to do so in a way that re­sponds to lo­cal com­mu­ni­ty needs and in­ter­ests.

The vari­able geom­e­try ap­proach also ap­plies here – these ar­eas of strength­ened re­silience ben­e­fit from co­op­er­a­tion among dif­fer­ent group­ings of coun­tries based on in­ter­est and ca­pa­bil­i­ties and can take on mul­ti­ple shapes, such as shared re­search and de­vel­op­ment in Arc­tic se­cu­ri­ty, de­vel­op­ing part­ner­ships around spe­cif­ic val­ue chains to se­cure safe sup­ply (i.e. crit­i­cal min­er­als), joint pro­cure­ment and fi­nanc­ing for de­fence and re­silience in­fra­struc­ture and do­main aware­ness in­for­ma­tion shar­ing.

Cana­da’s les­son is clear: rel­e­vance to­day is in­creas­ing­ly is­sue based. Ally­ship with­in a vari­able geom­e­try ap­proach al­lows small­er and mid­dle pow­ers to lead in nich­es rather than com­pete in scale. Cred­i­bil­i­ty in al­liance terms does not re­quire uni­ver­sal­i­ty. A jack of all trades, giv­en lim­it­ed re­sources and the scale of the chal­lenge, is a mas­ter of none. Rather it re­quires se­lec­tiv­i­ty, pru­dent man­age­ment of fi­nite na­tion­al pow­er, and the will to act. Ice­land’s spe­cial­ized ex­per­tise in ar­eas such as mar­itime aware­ness, re­new­able en­er­gy re­silience and cri­sis re­sponse makes it a valu­able con­trib­u­tor into broad­er and col­lec­tive ef­forts as it has the abil­i­ty to de­liv­er in crit­i­cal times of need.

WOR­THI­NESS IS A PRAC­TICE, NOT A CLAIM

Al­liances do not col­lapse dra­mat­i­cal­ly; they erode qui­et­ly when pre­pared­ness lags be­hind rhetoric. NATO’s cred­i­bil­i­ty has suf­fered from this dy­nam­ic since the end of the Cold War, as most mem­ber states in­clud­ing Cana­da al­lowed mil­i­tary ca­pa­bil­i­ties and de­fence in­dus­tri­al ca­pac­i­ty to at­ro­phy. To­day, mem­ber states now need to take far more rapid and cost­ly ac­tion to cor­rect na­tion­al ca­pa­bil­i­ty and cred­i­bil­i­ty gaps. Cred­i­bil­i­ty must be demon­strat­ed to ad­ver­saries and al­lies alike through ca­pa­bil­i­ties, scaled and re­silient de­fence in­dus­tri­al bases, ro­bust bud­gets, clear strate­gic sig­nalling, and po­lit­i­cal at­ten­tion.

Prime Min­is­ter Car­ney’s Davos speech chal­lenged coun­tries to “name re­al­i­ty” and build strength at home so they can act with con­fi­dence abroad. For small and mid­dle states, this is an op­por­tu­ni­ty. Our abil­i­ty to think clear­ly, in­vest wise­ly, and co­op­er­ate se­lec­tive­ly can re­main in­dis­pens­able. For all coun­tries, this does mean that as a start­ing point, we need to see the world as it is, not as we wish it would be. This doesn’t mean we toss as­pi­ra­tion out the win­dow but rather are clear-eyed about cur­rent re­al­i­ties and make de­lib­er­ate, con­crete steps to cre­ate and lead the change we want to see.

CON­CLU­SION: BE­ING A CRED­I­BLE ALLY

Be­ing a cred­i­ble ally to­day does not re­quire uni­for­mi­ty or grand ges­tures. Nor can it rest on rep­u­ta­tion, his­to­ry, or state­ments of align­ment alone. In an era of rup­ture, cred­i­bil­i­ty must be built and re­built through re­al­ism, re­silience, and readi­ness – paired with a will­ing­ness and abil­i­ty to act, and to do so with oth­ers when it mat­ters most.

Cana­da and Ice­land are nav­i­gat­ing some com­pa­ra­ble chal­lenges: how to re­main in­dis­pens­able with­out be­ing dom­i­nant, how to man­age a unique­ly close but asym­met­ric re­la­tion­ship with the Unit­ed States and how to con­vert fi­nite re­sources into mean­ing­ful strate­gic ef­fect. In this con­text, the an­swer lies not in scale but in se­lec­tiv­i­ty – in iden­ti­fy­ing where one can con­tribute de­ci­sive­ly, and do­ing so con­sis­tent­ly.

What Cana­da’s ex­pe­ri­ence sug­gests is that al­liance rel­e­vance is no longer sta­t­ic; it is some­thing that must be ac­tive­ly main­tained across a shift­ing land­scape of part­ner­ships. An­chored in en­dur­ing re­la­tion­ships but able to op­er­ate across flex­i­ble con­fig­u­ra­tions, coun­tries like Cana­da and Ice­land can still ex­er­cise real agency – if they are able to have strate­gic clar­i­ty about the en­vi­ron­ment they face and de­lib­er­ate in how they re­spond.

If we do in­deed take the world as it is, not as we wish it to be, be­ing a wor­thy ally is not a sta­tus, it is a dis­ci­pline. It re­quires sus­tained in­vest­ment, dif­fi­cult de­ci­sions, and the abil­i­ty to de­liv­er when called upon. For mid­dle and small pow­ers alike, the path for­ward is not about match­ing great pow­ers, but about con­sis­tent­ly and cred­i­bly prov­ing that they can be count­ed on.

JEN­NY HILL is the Am­bas­sador of Cana­da to Ice­land.