The 'Canadian' Northwest Passage

Dear Sen. Murkowski,

As perhaps you already know, last week, Canada's House of Commons unanimously approved legislation that officially designates the Arctic's Northwest Passage as the "Canadian Northwest Passage." This is the same strategic waterway that the U.S. and Russia consider to be international. In the process of calling that bill absurd and meaningless, one Canadian commentator said the newly declared title is similar to things like "The Canadian North Pole" or "Canada's Beaufort Sea."

Sure, that might be funny to some, but we're not laughing. Any implication -- even a facetious one -- that Canada has sovereignty over the Beaufort Sea or the North Pole concerns us. That North Pole comment doesn't bother us too much, though. Finland is already taking a chunk out of Alaska's ersatz-Santa industry, and losing more of it to Canada probably won't hurt much. After all, there's plenty of holiday spirit to go around.

But just as the Alaska Highway is so-named despite the fact that most of it lies in Canada, the Beaufort Sea is mostly Alaska's. To prove it, the U.S. government issued a moratorium at the end of this summer on commercial fishing there. And Alaska would like to sell oil exploration leases in a huge area of the Beaufort that both the U.S. and Canada claim to own. And there's no way leases could be sold if we didn't really own it, right? Anyway, that commentator was right about one thing: Writing a name on something doesn't suddenly transfer ownership. Think of it this way: Canada is quietly but steadily writing its name on all the leftover birthday cake in the Senate break-room.

All that usurpation is worrisome enough, but it also seems that Canada is laying groundwork that will eventually support a huge toll booth for ships passing through the Arctic. Parks Canada recently began a C$5 million study leading to the creation of what is being called, cleverly enough, "a national marine conservation area" in Lancaster Sound, which lies at the eastern end of what we prefer to call "The Northwest Passage to Alaska." As we also learned, the designation would allow marine traffic to pass through, but would prohibit mining, petroleum development and waste dumping in the area. Protecting the environment is great and all. But if ships using The Northwest Passage to Alaska can't dump their toilets on Canada's side, where do you suppose they'll dump them? That's right: Alaska.