Santa may bring gift from Soviets

In five days Saint Nicholas, Rudolph and the rest of the crew will begin their annual trek from the North Pole. This year, however, there is one big difference.

As Santa and the gang head down toward Europe, their first stop will be the island of Spitzbergen, sometimes called Svalbard, just off the northern coast of Norway in the Arctic Ocean. When they arrive, they will find a whole new political climate among the nations in the Arctic Region.

The thaw in the Cold War, which has dominated the news since the Berlin Wall was breached Nov. 9, 1989, has now reached into the politics and commerce of the arctic region.

Even though Spitzbergen is a strategically important gateway to the North Atlantic - remember the route of Captain Ramius in The Hunt for the Red October out of Murmansk, north and east around the northern tip of Norway and into the Atlantic? - the Soviets have agreed to open the Soviet Arctic to cooperative international initiatives.

According to a recent report by Willy Ostreng, director of the Norway-based Fridtjof Nansen Institute, events in the Arctic region are now moving quickly and in promising directions since the so-called Murmansk declaration by Mikhail Gorbachev in October 1987.

These include multinational efforts to expand research and commerce in the area, and an openness to joint ventures to develop oil, gas and other natural resources on the norther Soviet continental shelf.

But most important, Gorbachev now suggests the time might be ripe to open up the northern sea route, what some call the "Northeast Passage," across the top of the Soviet and down through the Bering Staits that separate Alaska and the USSR.

The Northeast Passage, connecting Europe and the Atlantic to Japan, the U.S. and other Pacific nations across the top of the world, would provide an economic boom for Alaska as an important repair and refueling station.

A journey that would take a month or more by conventional routes could be reduced to 22 days. For example, it would nearly halve the distance between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, shaving more than 7,000 miles off the trip from Hamburg, Germany, to Yokohama, Japan, by way of the Suez Canal. The same goes for cargo ships moving along the route from Japan to the eastern seaboard of the U.S.

This new artery of global commerce would be available to foreign ships, with Soviet icebreakers keeping the channel open 12 months a year. It's a development that would have a beneficial economic impact on the western United States.

As economic interests replace security concerns among nations bordering the arctic region, we find new opportunities to expand wealth and choices for people and communities in the Northern Hemisphere. The political revolution in Central Europe is now unlocking new possibilities for global commerce that will benefit all Americans.

That's a good gift from the North Pole at Christmas 1990.