Putin is testing NATO on Norway’s remote Arctic islands

BARENTSBURG, Norway — For the best part of a century, the biggest threat to the residents of Svalbard was polar bears. Increasingly, it now comes from Russia. Fears are growing that Moscow could use the sprawling Arctic archipelago — a part of Norway with an unusual legal status — to test NATO militarily amid growing uncertainty over the U.S. commitment to European defense. Allies suspect Russia of probing crucial undersea cables in the waters off Svalbard and staging military-style events that test the limits of the rules governing its presence there.