Yes, absolutely. Russia has considered itself to be at risk in the north since the 1960s. This is nothing particularly new.
At first blush, it would make very little sense, I think, to most westerners. The notion that there may be a NATO attack on Russia in the Arctic or elsewhere seems preposterous—and I would argue it is preposterous—but that is not always the way it is viewed in Russia.
You don't need to take my word for that or the word of any academic expert. You can simply look at what Russia is deploying in the north. It's billions of dollars of high-end anti-shipping and anti-air defence weapons, most of which have a fairly limited range. These are not weapons that can reach out into the Arctic Ocean much beyond the Russian coasts. By definition, these are defensive weapons.
It makes sense that Russia would feel slightly insecure about its Arctic. This is a region that produces a very good chunk of the Russian GDP. Most of Russia's hard currency earnings come from oil and gas, and a lot of that comes from the Arctic.
Looking forward 20 or 30 years, we can see that the future of Russian oil and gas production is going to be predominantly in the Arctic.