????爭奪北冰洋石油的戰爭已經打響，隨著極地冰蓋消融，能源公司正把視線投向北極，尋找潛在的超級新油田。4月份，埃克森美孚（Exxon Mobil）與規模龐大的俄羅斯石油公司（Rosneft）宣布締結合作協議，將共同開發喀拉海約有850億桶的原油儲備。今年夏季，殼牌（Shell）預計將在阿拉斯加沿岸的北冰洋開始勘探性的海上油井鉆探。在他的新書《愛斯基摩人與石油巨子》（The Eskimo and the Oil Man）中，鮑勃?賴斯詳細描繪了殼牌如何通過多年努力，終于獲得政府批準，啟動這項規模達數十億美元的項目，并解釋了北冰洋資源爭奪戰的經濟與地緣政治影響。不過，在北冰洋開采石油談何容易，大量核動力破冰船將不可或缺。

????《愛斯基摩人與石油巨子》將于5月份由大中央出版公司（Grand Central Publishing，原華納書局）旗下的Business Plus出版。本文擷取其精萃，供讀者先睹為快。

????美國人在北冰洋石油鉆探方面裹足不前，這讓住在阿拉斯加州安克雷奇的俄國人覺得好笑——俄國國內對此相當樂觀。眼前這位老人已經75歲高齡，已經謝頂，行動也很緩慢，但思維仍然犀利，眼神中不時透露出智慧。他位于庫克船長酒店（the Hotel Captain Cook）的房間樓層很高，桌子上放著臺打開的手提電腦，他用食指指著上面正在播放的一段視頻：一些看起來很健康的男人穿著運動短褲在跑步機上鍛煉。他說英語時語速緩慢、有板有眼。

????“我們最初造出了核彈，”埃夫格尼?帕夫洛維奇?韋里克霍夫說。

????樓下正在召開打開北冰洋資源之門的會議，韋里克霍夫是會議的主發言人。他曾擔任俄羅斯聲譽卓越、同時也是核能領域頂尖研究機構的庫爾恰托夫研究所（Kurchatov Institute）所長，并曾榮獲列寧獎章。

????“后來我們又造出了核潛艇。”

????他曾擔任俄國核裁軍談判員，并在切爾諾貝利核災難爆發后領導了善后事務，因此美國方面也視其為英雄。

????“北極將成為下一個必爭之地。”

????如今，他正在推廣一種使用核能，將北冰洋海床下蘊藏的碳氫化合物開采出來的新方式。俄國方面無人質疑是否應在北冰洋進行鉆探，問題是怎么操作。

????The race for oil in the Arctic is on. As the polar ice cap retreats, energy companies are looking north for a potentially huge new source of crude supply. In April, Exxon Mobil (XOM) and Russian oil giant Rosneft announced a partnership to develop Arctic reserves in the Kara Sea estimated at up to 85 billion barrels. And this summer, Shell is expected to begin exploratory offshore drilling in the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Alaska. In his new book The Eskimo and the Oil Man, Bob Reiss details Shell's (RDSA) years-long effort to win approval for this multi-billion-dollar project and explains the economic and geopolitical ramifications of the competition for control of the Arctic. But getting the oil out won't be easy. It could require lots of nuclear-powered icebreakers.

????Here, an excerpt from The Eskimo and the Oil Man, to be published in May by Business Plus, an imprint of Grand Central Publishing.

????The Russian in Anchorage was amused by American gridlock in the Arctic because it was so different from the bullish attitude back home. He was 75 years old, bald and slow moving, but his mind was sharp and his eyes showed keen twinkling intelligence. His room in the Hotel Captain Cook occupied a high floor. His open laptop sat on his desk and he jabbed his index finger at the video running there, showing healthy-looking men in gym shorts running on a treadmill. His English was slow and measured.

????"First we made nuclear bombs," said Evgeny Pavlovich Velikhov.

????Velikhov—a lead speaker at the conference downstairs on the opening Arctic—was an ex-winner of the Lenin Prize and was president of Russia's prestigious Kurchatov Institute, its leading research and development institution in the field of nuclear energy.

????"Then we made nuclear submarines."

????He had also been a Russian arms negotiator and had been designated by the United States as a hero of Chernobyl after he led efforts to clean up that nuclear disaster.

????"Arctic is next big place!"

????Now, he was promoting a new way to get hydrocarbons out of the Arctic seabed by using nuclear power. In Russia there was no question of whether drilling would proceed in the Arctic. The question was how.