A lot of people think of Russia and the United States as being on opposite sides of the world,
with Russia dominating Eastern Europe and North East Asia, and the United States is
the big daddy of the West.
Despite crack flat earth theories, the world is very much a globe and Russia and one of
the biggest states in America are neighbors with the ability to look one another in the
eye over a very small stretch of ocean.
What if Russia decided to traverse those icy waters and kick down Alaska’s front door?
Hello and welcome back to Life’s Biggest Questions.
I am your host Rebecca Felgate and today we are asking What if Russia invaded Alaska.
Before we torpedo into this video, I just want to ask you guys to hit that thumbs up
button and also let me know what you think would happen if the United States and Russia
got into a row.
EEeesh…suffice to say, nobody thinks it is going to be pretty.
Okay, so Russia and Alaska are divided by the Bering Strait, which is 55 miles wide
at its narrowest point, meaning the United States and Russian Lands are just about visible
to one another from the shores of the mainland.
In the middle of the square sits the islands of Diomede and Big Diomede.
The smaller of the island, Diomede is United States territory, and Big Diomede is Russian
land.
Just 2 miles of water separates these two islands, and in the winter, hikers can walk
from one to the other.
While the proximity is one thing, it is not as if Alaska is right next to the heart of
the Kremlin; the neighboring land is far-flung remote areas of Siberia.
If Russia was to start mobilizing their troop to the far east of their territory, the Americans
would probably notice and likely be ready to defend an attack.
When we say invade, it is very unlikely that Russia would or could annex Alaska like they
did Crimea; they know they simply couldn’t capture the land…so I highly doubt they
would send over any of their active army of 1 million troops.
They couldn’t send any of their 20 thousand tanks, either….
But they could utilize their 3.8 thousand rocket projectors and their air strength of
3.9 thousand aircraft.
But again, these days not a lot can happen without the States knowing..
it just depends if it could mobilize its defenses faster than the Russians could get theirs
to Siberia.
Of course, if Russia sent any kind of missile to Alaska, the United States would respond
quickly and decisively.
The worst Russia could throw at Alaska would be a nuclear missile, which, depending on
which of the 7 thousand in the arsenal they chose, could obliterate much of the state,
and definitely could destroy Anchorage and harm many of its population of 298 thousand.
But why?
What would be the point?
Not only does Alaska have missile defense in place, this act of aggression would undoubtedly
spark a hot war between two countries embittered in cold war for much of their modern history.
We know from previous episodes of Life’s Biggest Questions that the United States and
Russia both have the ability to destroy one another.
In fact, we have heard Trump boast about his big red button several times, and we have
heard that Vladimir Putin thinks he could destroy the states in minutes….
This mutually assured destruction would be the worst case scenario to come from an Alaskan
invasion, and honestly, even if nukes weren’t involved, encroaching on North American soil
would likely lead to world war three.
Canada, who of course share a border with Alaska and the rest of the United States,
would be the first to join the fray, and of course, Great Britain would be there for their
buds across the pond, without the need for the permission of the EU.
The EU would hope for a peaceful resolution, but if push came to shove, they would of course
back the united states.
Interestingly this would mean Russia would be surrounded by enemies to their east and
west, which is never a good situation to be in.
China would also look for a peaceful resolution and would perhaps try to stay out of the fray,
possibly secretly please that its two main competitors were too focused on distracting
one another to vie for economic dominance.
Again, even if we took nukes out the question, warfare is not the same these days.
A hundred years ago, Russia maybe could have talked their way into Cuban land, tried to
grab Hawaii, skirted through Canada and surrounded the US, but these days aerial surveillance
has stopped the element of surprises needed to pull that off and aerial attacks mean that
land strategy is no longer a war winner.
What if Russia invaded Alaska…
it would be a huge, messy, costly mistake that at best would spark decades of suffering
and at worst would destroy swathes of the modern world as we no it.
I will end by saying this…The Russians made a huge military mistake in 1867 when Czar
Alexander the second sold Alaska to the United States for just 7.2 million dollars.
If Russia still owned that land today, the Geopolitical landscape as we know it today
would be very, very different.
So, that is one question answered for you.
What do you think would happen if Russia invaded Alaska?
What shall we talk about next here on Life’s Biggest Questions?
Let me know in the comments section down below.
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