SETERMOEN, Norway — Norwegian Maj. Gen. Lars S. Lervik has been chief of the Norwegian Army since 2020, based in Bardufoss, in Northern Norway. As of early 2025, the force is made up of approximately 9,000 personnel which includes soldiers, civilians and conscripts, as conscription is mandatory for both men and women.
Lervik has been an avid supporter of assisting Ukraine. The Norwegian Army, alongside other military branches, has trained over 6,000 Ukrainian soldiers in the country as well as in the United Kingdom as part of Operation Interflex.
Before this role, Lervik was the commander of Brigade North, the largest unit in the Norwegian Army. In an interview with Defense News, he discussed the timeline for Norway’s boost in defense posture, urgent equipment requirements for his military branch, cooperation with other Arctic nations, and Russian activity in the region.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
You have been an advocate for Norway to invest more significantly and more rapidly in its defense capabilities. How fast would you like to see this happen, considering the capability gaps that Norway is currently facing?
We have a window of opportunity and obligation to do as much as possible to increase our ability as a country and to NATO as a whole. We are trying to do as much as we can as fast as we can to increase our combat power and our defense posture.
In some areas, such as buying new equipment, some things may take two to three years because that is the procurement process and the average time that it takes to produce systems as well. In other areas, such as manning, I’d like to see that happen now – recruitment, both in terms of getting people back in uniform who previously served in the Army while also increasing the number of conscripts coming in as well and the number of officers being trained.
What is the most urgent equipment you need from an army perspective?
They are in terms of acquiring new types of capabilities. [That includes] rocket artillery, more air defense systems, more infantry fighting vehicles, and the list goes on. But from a general standpoint, our focus and what we are looking to do is generate more firepower while also simultaneously investing further in developing unmanned systems and protection against them.
Some of the equipment the Norwegian Army relies on is American-made, systems that aren’t necessarily made to operate in harsh Arctic conditions. Considering the increased push recently for European nations to buy more from European manufacturers to reduce dependency on the U.S., do you have a preference for European equipment – is that a priority for you?
The way we think is more along the lines of: Whatever is best we want to get, as long as we can get it to operate and perform well in our type of environment, and as long as it doesn’t come from parts of the world we don’t want to buy from.
We don’t want to buy Chinese drones for instance but whether it’s American or European is not a concern. We are all members of the same alliance that is NATO.
From a military perspective, I’d like to buy the best available equipment. It could be Swedish, American, German, or Norwegian systems. Norway makes excellent air defense systems – using American ammunition, that is.
Nordic nations announced over the last year ambitions to operate as a joint air force and cooperate more closely in this domain. Are there similar aspirations to establish a joint Arctic Army for instance?
We are in the process of setting up not a Nordic one per se, but a new NATO Land Command in Finland [formally called Multi Corps Land Component Command to operate under the alliance’s U.S.-based Norfolk Joint Force Command]. It will include both Nordic and Arctic countries as well as others, tasked with leading the alliance’s land forces operations in Northern Europe.
That will make it possible to operate as a joint force – but it is important to note that we will still be and have our individual armies, but will be working together, shoulder to shoulder. For instance, we are in the process of looking to acquire the same infantry fighting vehicles, which will make it easier to fight between all of us.
What about any plans to set up some kind of information-sharing alliance amongst Arctic nations specifically which would include Canada and the United States?
We [already] have some kind of cooperation like that. We have a Cold Weather Operations Centre of Excellence, which sort of acts like that, under the NATO umbrella. It brings together Arctic allies, where we share best practices on everything ranging from how to handle climate change in this environment to what kind of equipment we need, how we train and more.
By some accounts, Russia is considered to be more advanced in terms of Arctic military presence and number of military bases in the region than NATO. At this stage, do you believe that this is true, or do you think we overestimate Russian Arctic capabilities?
What we have seen is that Russians, because they live in the Arctic, are very capable of operating in that type of environment. But at the same time, we have been surprised by how badly Russia has performed [in some areas]. On the other hand, they are still in the fight — that has demonstrated that they are learning as well. We are trying to keep very close attention to what happens when it comes to Russian activity in the Arctic.
Elisabeth Gosselin-Malo is a Europe correspondent for Defense News. She covers a wide range of topics related to military procurement and international security, and specializes in reporting on the aviation sector. She is based in Milan, Italy.
