Denmark leads NATO drills in Greenland without U.S. as Arctic tensions with Russia grow.

Denmark’s Armed Forces announced and then publicly documented Arctic Light 2025 through a series of official updates. The exercise runs in Greenland in September and brings together more than 550 personnel from Denmark alongside contingents from France, Germany, Sweden and Norway. The Danish releases frame this as a large, joint activity designed to stress-test operations in true Arctic conditions. The Royal Danish Air Force F-16 fighter jets flew from Kangerlussuaq, alongside a Danish Iver Huitfeldt class frigate, helicopters, and supporting assets that include a French tanker aircraft. There was also a short but telling stop by Danish F-16s at the American-run Pituffik Space Base, underscoring how distance, cold and logistics can dictate tempo in Greenland. The Iver Huitfeldt class brings area air defense with vertical launch cells for SM-2 and ESSM, a 76 mm naval gun up front, and a flight deck sized for an MH-60 class helicopter. The F-16s are late-career but well upgraded, and in the Arctic they are as much about sovereignty enforcement and search support as they are about combat air patrols. As Denmark invited European NATO members, US didn't receive an invitation. Denmark wants to demonstrate its capabilities with its European allies, without relying only on U.S. Armed Forces.
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During Arctic Light 2025, Danish F-16 fighters and the frigate Niels Juel operated alongside NATO partners in Greenland, testing endurance in extreme Arctic conditions and underlining the alliance’s determination to counter growing Russian activity in the region (Picture source: Danish Armed Forces).

The frigate HDMS Niels Juel acted as a visible hub during a distinguished visitors day, hosting Nordic ministers and international media. That kind of exposure matters because it shows the ship’s command-and-control role in a sparse theater where line of sight, weather and ice can slow everything. In theory, Niels Juel is an air defense frigate but in practice, in Greenland, it is also a communications relay, a helicopter host and a platform for boarding teams and search crews. The combat system integrates long-range surveillance and fire control radars with layered missiles, giving a protective bubble for allied movements if required. In a crisis, this is the ship fitted for a convoy or coordinating a patchwork of air and surface tracks where civilian, scientific and military traffic mix.

The air component is where Arctic Light 2025 feels different from European exercises further south. Danish F-16s operate from a single runway airfield at Kangerlussuaq and use tanker support to stretch endurance over long, empty stretches of ice and water. Ground crews contend with cold-soaked equipment, limited hangar space and the simple fact that a spare part is a long way off. That learning transfers directly to future fleets. Whether Denmark flies F-16s or eventually F-35s in the Arctic, the rearming, the de-icing, the comms plan and the airspace coordination build on the same playbook.

A frigate with a modern combat system can provide surveillance and identification support for aircraft flying far from upland radar sites. Helicopters operating from the ship extend the eyes and ears for maritime domain awareness, hunting for small boats or ice leads, and they can move boarding teams to check vessels in inhospitable waters. Add a tanker and you get persistence. It is the kind of combined-arms operations that NATO forces practice in the North Atlantic, but in Greenland the margins are thinner and the distances bigger, which makes the coordination a real test.

Establishing a reliable air picture, keeping aircraft on station long enough to matter, protecting a task group, and maintaining the ability to respond to emergencies from a ship or from the shore are the main objectives of the exercise. Boarding drills and helicopter evolutions point to constabulary duties that are a daily reality in the Arctic. Live-flying around Kangerlussuaq with a tanker overhead shows the air arm can police a very large area and still get to base safely. The visit to Pituffik Space Base adds a practical note. If the air force needs a safe harbor, or a quick coordination touchpoint, it is important to start building procedures.

The context around this exercise is the larger strategic competition in the Arctic. Russia has modernized northern bases and keeps a steady watch over the Northern Sea Route. China describes itself as a near-Arctic state and invests heavily in polar research and ice-capable shipping, with dual-use implications. For Denmark, Greenland is central: it is a vast, semi-autonomous territory inside the Kingdom of Denmark, and it anchors the North Atlantic approaches. Exercises like Arctic Light are meant to show presence and competence, reassure allies, and quietly remind any observer that Denmark can coordinate activity there with partners. Media coverage around the exercise noted limited or no formal participation by U.S. units in this iteration, even as cooperation continues day-to-day through places like Pituffik. Denmark is proving its ability to conduct large-scale military exercises in Greenland while still working within NATO frameworks.

Written by Evan Lerouvillois, Defense Analyst, Army Recognition Group.

Evan studied International Relations, and quickly specialized in defense and security. He is particularly interested in the influence of the defense sector on global geopolitics, and analyzes how technological innovations in defense, arms export contracts, and military strategies influence the international geopolitical scene.