"How Long Before The Arctic And Antarctic FUEL WARS?" Topic

Arctic oil reserves:
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Antarctica has it's own potential resources too:
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I see Fuel War scenarios on the horizon . . .

QUESTIONS:
1) But, what do you guys think? Will it happen within 50 years? Sooner? Later? Never?
2) Would it make for fun gaming scenarios?
3) Who should be working on these gaming rules already?
4) Who should be working on 28mm miniatures for this?
5) Who should be working on 15mm miniatures for this?

Thanks.

Dan
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PS. Better have your miniatures ready, and discuss the scenarios for them, before it becomes impossible to talk about the situation once it's a current affairs topic!!!

There was a great Keith Laumer BOLO story set in antarctica where a lone Bolo XX "Resartus" fought against an overwhelming attack (The honor of the Regiment?)

the quicker the ice melts the quicker we can drill there…

No. . . different story. Don't recall the name though.

I'd say 50 years at least. . . in a sci-fi future where alternative energies aren't being relentlessly developed.

In the real world, probably the same length of time, but the U.S. won't be participating because of our obsession with renewable energy.

Be something cooler to be fighting about though. That's just this side of fighting on pluto or something.

There's a techno-thriller about a Russian-NATO war in the Antarctic called Thunder at Erebus which is pretty good.

I think it would likely be China versus 3rd world nations or contractors under the control of energy companies. Of course, those companies could exert influence to have their home country come to military action for "nation security" reasons.

Soon. The Russians are being arse-picks and encroaching on Canadian territory and we are also fussing with Denmark over boundaries near Greenland. The previous US president was insisting that newly opened Arctic waterways in Canada had to be considered international waters.

All brought on by the melting of ice and opening of waterways. Such activity and debates will only increase. Mind you, there are TMPers here who live with Palm Trees in very temperate climes who tell us folks up north who are living with the melting ice that it really isn't happening. Well, it sure is and there's lots of treasure to fight over, regardless of whose territory it has been under for more than a century's worth of maps before the arctic began thawing.

It's hard to say if anything will happen. Canada has always been pretty cheap with its military budget and as a result is not going to be able to stand up to any big comer despite the fact we are probably better equipped than even the Russians for operations in arctic conditions – it was a major part of my training year every January to March. There's also the issue that the nations jostling for control of the North West Passage are pretty much democratic, even Russia, and supposedly it's a rare event for democracies to put up their dukes!
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Tim

Havn't we already had one???

The Falklands???

"The Falklands"*?

Doesn't quite have the same feel as an entire continent or sea full of ice, and all the dangers that come from it:

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Plus lots and lots of ice vehicles, snowmobiles, troops in extreme winter gear, and even dog teams.

Dan
* You mean the Malvinas, right? :)

So . . . once the only other option for fuel (oil/coal) and other resources ends up being Antarctica . . .

Do you guys think that any of these land claims will be honored, or that the claiming nations will offer some sort of resistance if their claims are challenged?

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Dan

Three days after Cap and Tax (errrr Trade), gets ratified….

GZG's 15mm Scandinavians, and their tracked exploration vehicle should work. Possibly some of their wheeled buggies as well.

I think we will be fighting over those places re: fresh water before we fight over them for fuel. Re: time frame, next 75 years. And mostly battles at sea/ air.

Dan-- "* You mean the Malvinas, right? :)"

No I mean OURS!!! ;p

Control of the sea would be vital--despite there being long range air transports most of the Antartctic is divided between northern hemisphere countries--So places like South Georgia, Falklands etc would be very important….An interesting scenario would maybe start with the Argies kicking off against the Chilians on the mainland of South America and the conflict quickly spreading to Antarctica…All very difficult due to the bad weather but with the UK helping Chilie the Argies would soon find things difficult!!

Your "Sci-Fi" question has already been eclipsed by reality. The only question is when will the first conflict take place.

The attached article is about Russia increasing its Arctic Military to defend energy resources It is dated June 11, 2008

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I don't know about Antarctica, but as several posters above have pointed out, the initial jockying for position for the Arctic has already started.

Yes, figuring out how to properly use that flat, king-sized, white bedsheet for terrain can be perplexing……

;-)

LOL

Dan

I think Metagames did a minigame on this very subject.

the quicker the ice melts the quicker we can drill there…

or vice versa :o)

Probably never.

Which do you really think people are going to do; work out a split and then get into a bidding war for contracts, or go for a strategic nuclear exchange?

The only people that can project serious military power into the arctic are the US, Europe, and Russia. The only people that can project serious military force into the antarctic are, well, the US. Russia and Europe could send nuclear subs down there, too.

Note that the only countries that are significant players are also the largest nuclear weapons holders. We never went to war over the middle eastern oil reserves, and nobody's about to invade Brazil, either. This will be settled with money, not bombs.
-Kle.

I think we will be fighting over those places re: fresh water before we fight over them for fuel. Re: time frame, next 75 years.

None of the nations that have the capability to fight over these regions will have any problems with fresh water. If it magically becomes a problem, they have the money to desalinate.

Water wars will only ever be a problem for the third world, and maybe the bottom of the second world.
-Kle.

Okay, you are fighting over oil resources in Antartica, how do you get the oil back to your country? Oil tankers are noghting but hugh targets, easly damaged or destroyed.

Answer: As Frank Herbert thought up in his book "under Pressure" – Transport Submarines. Now you can have submarine battles to get the oil fleets through! And it's not that far fetched, several transport submarines have been built in the past during both WW1 and WW11 including two built in WW1 that could only be classified as civilian submarines as they had no weapons and were only used to run blockades. The Germans built a few transport subs too, but theirs were armed.

The trouble with subs as cargo vessels is that so much of their internal volume is taken up with necessary equipment that they can't carry much of a payload. Make one big enough to carry a worthwhile cargo, and it becomes an unmissable target. Also, is it hard to keep the boat under water when it's full of a substance (oil) that is lighter than water? Finally, even if a tanker sub can't be caught, the loading facilities would have to be big, easy targets for air attack.

Unless someone with a fanatical ideology gets a foothold in either area, the matter will be settled with money, not weapons. Argentina and Chile, as the closest jumping-off points to the Antarctic, would gain a lot more by being middlemen than by trying to grab a piece of a pie they couldn't keep.

I worked out who the OP was from the title.
You've become predictably weird CC.
;^)

Based on climate-gate, global warming is a hoax and instead the ice age is coming. Probably won't happen for awhile. Besides the U.S. could be the largest oil producer soon just from oil shale and resource production. The U.S. oil reserves are already greater than Saudi Arabia. The price of oil will drop making arctic oil expensive. Antarctic oil would even be more costly.

But that is no reason we can't fight arctic wars.

I disagree, Cke1st. Most of the inside of a sub is air, and Crude Oil isn't much less dense than seawater.

An Ohio-sized pressure hull (replacing the entire missile compartment with an oil tank) gives you: 20' radius squared times 200' long is 80,000 cubic feet, divided by 7.4 cubic feet per 55-gallon barrel, is (very) roughly 10,000 barrels of crude oil (allows for pumps etc). In comparison, the Exxon Valdez carries 1,480,000 barrels of oil.

Now, let's optimize that design a bit: two 80 foot diameter pressure hulls, like a Typhoon, and all that 'dead space' between the hulls. As a rough estimate, you can get that up to 90,000 barrels of oil with a hull less than 600 feet long and 180 feet abeam. The Exxon Valdez is almost 1000 feet long and 160 feet abeam, so stretching the VLCC-SS to 1000 feet gives you a capacity of about 270,000 barrels, roughly a fifth the capacity of the Valdez.

The VLCC-SS is pretty much impervious to weather and is potentially much faster (any serious sub needs nuclear power, so 25+ knots sustained in any weather is perfectly feasible), so that helps even the scales even more.

The initial cost of the VLCC-SS would be pretty ugly, though the continuous operation wouldn't be as bad. You'd need a crew of about 35, maybe 40, and those huge pressure hulls would give them a good amount of room per person.

I don't see the world coming to military blows, barring some really small-scale spec-ops sparring (hey, wait, that's my favorite type of gaming!). It's too hard to project power into those regions, and the powers that can do it have really big guns.

You know, Tim, much as Francis Fujiyama might like it, one democracies put up their dukes it gets mighty ugly mighty fast

That being said, in the Arctic the North American side has a lot of advantages, not the least of which is contiguous geography and people actually living there, albeit not many

Now, in contrast, there is all that empty land in Antarctica – - –

Would make for a neat game, even if somewhat unfeasible in real life

I don't think there will be a war for oil in the Arctic or Antarctic. The wells and transportation would be too vulnerable. There would most likely be an agreement on who gets to drill where.

Still the price of oil would have to be very high to pay from those places. If it was that high then new expensive technology would be used to take oil out of closer existing wells. There are potentially between 4.5 and 5 trillion barrels of un-squeeze out oil in the US alone.

Yes, unfeasible in real life.

Much more likely to have the Sahara spread further South causing population upheavals. Spreading war and disease throughout the continent and into the Middle East and Europe.

But, but, but,

Surely the Secret Antarctic Nazi Bases have the drilling rigs all set up anyway? ;-)

Meanwhile, if China and India are going to be the 21st Century new superpowers, then how about Canada and Russia for the 22nd Century new superpowers?
(with honourable mention to Alaska, Denmark/Greenland – likely full of emigrated Dutch- ,Norway and Finland)

Of course, if tankers start running from the Antarctic, you can bet the Somali pirates won't be far behind…..

Actually, I have to put the nod towards the Russians for controlling most of the Arctic.

1) They already have acknowledged claims on roughly half that land right now.
2) They have more troops that can get there faster than the US&Canada.
3) They have more icebreakers to get naval power there.
4) Their 'Coast Guard' is as well-armed as their Navy (although it's part of whatever they call the KGB today).

Honestly, I can see something like the battletech rules of engagement for these scenarios: Any/all combat will take place away from the oil heads/tank farms/refineries because everyone wants the wells intact. It costs too much $$ to have to fix stuff in that environment already, so shooting up the place is verboten.

Again, small scale strikes, using Infinity or Force on Force, depending on the exact size of the battle. Infinity has a lot of sleek Powered Armor troops and a few with cold-weather gear in 28mm, and I'd get the GZG Scandinavian troops for 15mm.

Does anyone make 28mm modern/ultramodern troops in cold-weather gear?

In the book, the sub did not 'carry' the crude oil, but towed a huge bladder. If I remember correctly, the oil wells were drilled secretly, then left unmanned while they pumped the extracted oil into huge bladders. When ever one was full a sub would try to sneak into the area and tow it out.

I believe the bladder was supposed to hold millions of barrels at one go (kind of hard to image it not being noticed, hey).

Dan

Actually, I have to put the nod towards the Russians for controlling most of the Arctic.

1) They already have acknowledged claims on roughly half that land right now.

There might be a fight over the area around Wrangel Islands as one was first discovered in the 1800s by Great Britain and another then by the US. The USSR didn't land anyone until the early 1900s to establish their claim.

The Spratleys might be a better choice for an oil battlefield, though not nearly as "SF".
-Kle.

Is this cool or what?

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Dan

awful game

The Arctic has been a battleground ever since the Cold War started – Ice Station Zebra, K-19 the Widowmaker and all that.

Frankly, the whole idea of oil wars in the Arctic and Antarctic is bonkers, just due to the nature of the likely participants.

We just had a discussion about this in a class last semester.

The Arctic will open long, long before the Antarctic, as the ice melts in the north, it will fuel ice buildup in the south.

At least until the temperature warms enough to begin working on coastal permafrost.

As the ice melts in the north, it produces more water vapor in the atmosphere, and because the antarctic ice shelf is mostly over land, its temperature will remain lower, and thus suck all of that additional moisture out of the atmosphere. This fact is part of the evidence used by global warming deniers (that the ice shelf in the south is growing), but it is in fact exactly what Global warming would predict.

At the current rate of warming it will probably be another 20 to 30 years before we begin to see massive areas of the Arctic beginning to open up, and Canada's population will explode. Hell, I am already looking at buying property on several lakes up there in anticipation of having valuable lakeside property with access to the Pacific or Atlantic (or both). That will be some very beautiful country when it begins to be warm enough to support alpine forests like in the mountains to the south.

I also expect the Fuel Wars of the Arctic and Antarctic to be played out in the boardrooms of major corporations or on the ski-slopes that open up as a result, and not on any battlefield.

Check out these ice cavern pieces in clear resin!!!

TMP link

Dan
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For maps …

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Dan

Sooner than you might think:

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Dan

Is it plausible?

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Dan

There will be people fighting over clean water long before they fight over the oil.

I will fight you for a bowl of rice.

Mithmee: "There will be people fighting over clean water long before they fight over the oil."

You mean this?

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Dan

I love it when the 'global warming' scum show up. News flash, the planet is in a cooling cycle, temps are dropping. Nice try, enviro-fascist filth.

As for wars over artic/antartic oil, there are easier places to drill, and the technology to drill deeper progresses every day.

Yup, that is what I am talking about.

By the way I live in the Pacific Northwest and well we have lots of water.

Actually we are getting more today.