ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates how the idea of state-immersed science was brought to fruition as a northern geopolitical and economic tool in the Soviet Union. It argues that Nordic scientists, along with other intellectuals in the interwar and Cold War periods, gradually took notice of the major societal role that scientific expertise played in the Soviet Union. Given growing awareness of the cost in terms of human suffering in the Soviet Union under Stalinism, the Russian example challenged Nordic polar scientists and activists to modify. Further develop their polar agendas into geopolitical and geoeconomic instruments well before the Second World War and the geopolitical tension that developed in the Arctic during the Cold War. By retreating inside the house of basic science, Swedish polar research interest to industry also dwindled, but soon its geopolitical importance re-emerged as Ahlmann and some of his Scandinavian colleagues. They are became influential advisers on Nordic policy-making on the Arctic and the Soviet Union.
