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Trump’s $60m Antarctic infrastructure cut is a blow to US influence at the South Pole

Trump’s $60m Antarctic infrastructure cut is a blow to US influence at the South Pole
The Ocean Giant cargo ship docks at McMurdo Station, Ross Island, East Antarctica on 29 January 2023. (Photo: Lauren Lipuma / Creative Commons)
Tiara Walters
By Tiara Walters
6 Apr 2025
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US President Donald Trump has slashed tens of millions in emergency funds, says a senior former diplomat who wrote state policy for the white continent. As China and Russia announce plans to build new stations, America’s foothold at the bottom of the world hangs in the balance.

Tucked away in a spending pot under fire from the Trump administration, the sum may seem modest. In fact, $60-million represents just 0.0008% of the $7.3-trillion US federal budget.

But President Donald Trump’s 24 March memo to Congress — which axes the $3-billion in emergency funds he deems unnecessary — includes a $60-million cut critical for upholding America’s strategic presence in Antarctica. 

Fresh water for American scientists at the US South Pole station is just one of the life-saving projects at risk, former US Antarctic policy head William Muntean told Daily Maverick at the weekend.

Muntean headed US Antarctic policy between 2018 and 2023, and says flight safety upgrades and the construction of a strategic cargo pier at McMurdo Station are also at risk of being abandoned.

And yet the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station is more than a state-owned life-support system in an extreme, icy environment, where temperatures plunge to around -65°C in winter.

Built in 1956 at Earth’s southernmost point, the continuously occupied research station has sat like an intersecting placeholder atop all seven of Antarctica’s territorial claims for 70 years.

It is an iconic, global symbol of geopolitical stability on a contested continent that has never seen the blood of human war — thanks to the 1959 Antarctic Treaty, the disarmament pact initiated by none other than the US. 

Muntean: US ‘presence is one key reason’ for fêted South Pole peace


Signed by 29 veto-holding states including China and Russia, the treaty is celebrated for devoting 10% of Earth to peaceful pursuits such as science, tourism and conservation. 

It also agrees to disagree on historic territories claimed by Argentina, Australia, Chile, France, New Zealand, Norway and the UK.

Spending just 0.0008% of the federal budget was essential to keep the region peaceful, argued Muntean, now a non-resident senior associate with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.  

“The US physical presence is one key reason that Antarctica has successfully been peaceful since the 1950s, despite overlapping and unresolved sovereignty claims and potential economic exploitation and competition,” said Muntean.

The aurora from one of the most active geomagnetic storms in years lights up the sky above the South Pole telescope, 11 May 2024. (Photo: Kevin Zagorski / Creative Commons)


‘It will only harm US national interests’


“The US operates the region’s largest station, McMurdo, and the most geopolitically significant: the South Pole,” said Muntean, who helmed the US Antarctic division when the emperor penguin was listed under the US Endangered Species Act in 2022. The former 20-year career official also led the consensus reaffirmation of the mining ban.

“Just like potential activities on the Moon or Mars, governments must build all the specialised operational facilities and logistics vehicles to transport material and people to work in Antarctica,” he contended.

“They also must ship all the food, fuel and supplies to operate in this remarkably hostile environment.

“The US does all of this with an investment of less than $1-billion per year. Cutting funding for key infrastructure, such as the pier needed to supply these two key vital American stations, will only harm US national interests while not addressing any fiscal need.”  

Asked if the President would reconsider retaining a fraction of the federal budget to maintain Antarctic security, the US embassy of South Africa referred us to the US National Security Council’s strategic communications division at the White House. The White House did not reply to our detailed questions within four hours by Sunday 8.30pm SAST.

Russia announces plans to build a new station


Though Trump’s withdrawal of support for a lifeline of US Antarctic operations could mean the loss of American influence, in recent years long-standing members China and Russia have displayed increasingly assertive, geostrategic intent.

Like the US, Russia reserves a historic basis to claim territory in all or parts of Antarctica, but agrees not to do so while the non-expiring pact remains in force. 

Even so, it has engaged in territorial posturing by using multiyear oil and gas “scientific” surveys to map East and West Antarctica’s resource potential — as uncovered by Daily Maverick’s investigations. 

The revelations sent Chile President Gabriel Boric and Defence Minister Maya Fernández to the South American state’s Antarctic claimed territory with messages for anyone with “crafty aspirations”, the Associated Press noted in a follow-up report. 

Perceived to be working together at annual meetings to veto widely supported conservation plans, both China and Russia have unveiled new, state-of-the art stations in East Antarctica since January 2024.

Russia's government station, Vostok 2.0, was part-funded by the Russian billionaire and natural gas magnate Leonid Mikhelson. 

The day after Trump issued his Antarctic cuts, Russia’s polar institute announced plans to build a West Antarctic wintering base in the continent’s only unclaimed, least accessible sector. This new scientific facility, facing the Pacific Ocean, is to feature a strip for “long-haul” aircraft.

This comes just weeks after China said it would also build a new station — its sixth — in the unclaimed sector.  

Russian and Chinese polar authorities did not respond to requests for immediate comment. 

Who will Trump put on his new icebreakers? 


The Trump administration, Wired magazine reports, recently fired senior US Antarctic Programme officers, leaving remaining staff uncertain about the chain of command in an unforgiving environment. Hundreds of government scientists have been purged from Noaa, the US climate and weather agency.

The Ocean Giant cargo ship docks at McMurdo Station, Ross Island, East Antarctica on 29 January 2023. (Photo: Lauren Lipuma / Creative Commons)



These disruptions in scientific continuity raise awkward questions for Trump’s polar pet project, which seeks to rival larger Chinese and Russian icebreaking fleets by building US counterparts. 

Without policy certainty that assures job security, the $1-billion project could bleed laid-off scientists to other, more accommodating, treaty powers.

A limited US presence, which has ensured 1,400 beds, to date more than any other powers, could also reduce American capacity to inspect other stations. 

“The treaty allows countries to conduct unannounced surprise inspections,” Muntean, a February 2020 inspector of China’s Ross Sea station, pointed out. “However, countries can only take advantage of this deterrent and transparency if they have the logistics and operational capacity to conduct inspections. So, reducing funding only reduces US oversight capacity.”

Not ‘truly’ for emergency needs


The Senate budget committee, chaired by the outspoken Republican Susan Collins, raised its own, strongly worded objection to the $3-billion cut on 27 March. 

Co-signed by Senator Patty Murray, the committee’s Democrat vice-chair, their bipartisan letter told Trump budget chief Russell Vought that the president’s actions were illegal. 

The president “must concur with all or none of Congress’ emergency designations”. He “does not have the ability to pick and choose which emergency spending to designate”. 

Trump, according to the Congress memo, stated: “I do not concur that the added spending is truly for emergency needs.” 

But Muntean countered that “the US’s physical presence — along with its leadership in the Antarctic Treaty System and the longstanding policy to reject sovereignty claims — has for decades kept this region from being a source of international discord. 

“Given the strife in the rest of the world, it is in the US national interest to make the tiny but cost-effective investments necessary to keep Antarctica peaceful.” 

Trump’s budget plan was approved by the Senate in the early hours of Saturday. It must now pass through the House before it can take effect. DM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REeWvTRUpMk

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