For a long time I took Trump’s interest in acquiring Greenland for the U.S. (proposed during his first term in 2019) as nothing more than a play for legacy—a jewel that could be added to the American (and Trump’s own) crown and made a point to boast over. In the first version of this article, I said that Trump was indeed very serious about purchasing Greenland—so serious that he sent close members of his family to the arctic nation.
The pot-shot style X posts that Greenland, Denmark, and the United States exchanged at the time eventually fell off as Trump found other things to do in the world and the Europeans got back to dealing with their many, many, perpetual crisis.
However, since the raid on Venezuela that resulted in the capture of Maduro, the Trump administration has once again set its sights on Greenland. Trump, in his usual brazen and confident fashion, has made some a series of implied invasion threats and in the last two days threatened to “take Greenland the hard way” if his demands for ownership over the island are not met. This has led to a rapid escalation to separate but related Danish, European Union, and NATO proposals to deploy more resources and funding to Greenland and even unsubstantiated rumors that Denmark had instructed its troops to “shoot first, talk later” if the United States attempted to invade Greenland.
All of this is somewhat tragic. Trump should not be antagonizing other Western countries, not because their leadership are really our friends, but because the Danish and other Europeans are our civilizational brothers.
Trump should not spend so much time antagonizing our most natural allies. After all, the United States has its own myriad of domestic policy issues that require the sort of forceful rhetoric that Trump has been directing toward Greenland—therefore, Trump needs to put forward a serious proposal to annex the island that would garner the support of the Greenlandic people.
Greenland is not, as some believe and many simply do not yet know, simply an extension of Denmark populated by a bunch of Danes who’ve never seen a tree. Rather Greenland is populated by a unique Inuit people. The Greenlanders have their own language, culture, traditions, and a near universal adherence to the Lutheran branch of Christianity. In short Trump is not proposing buying (or invading) a chunk of Denmark but instead purchasing an entirely unique nation.
Trump is also not the first president to want to purchase Greenland. Administrations in 1867, 1910, and 1946 all had internal discussions over taking control of Greenland with Secretary of State William H. Seward (who did succeed in purchasing Alaska from Russia) nearly completing negotiations to purchase both Greenland and Iceland from Denmark in 1868.
Quite obviously those negotiations never gave rise to a transfer of sovereignty and Denmark’s king remains Greenland’s sovereign to this day.
Now, in the 21st century and in an era of rising ethnic and national consciousness, Trump is going to need to make a unique pitch to the people of Greenland if he wants their backing in acquiring their homeland.
Why Does the US Want to Buy Greenland?
There are several major motivations behind the continued interest of the United States in purchasing Greenland and they have evolved over time, but the most significant in our age is that Greenland remains strategically important and has in recent years been found to harbor incredible amounts of natural resources.
Perhaps key to US interests for national security and strategy is that the Northwest Passage (NWP) along Canada’s northern coast is now ice free for much of the year and in some years remains almost entirely open to shipping traffic. Greenland will, if ice trends continue, become a major stop along that passage and security requirements in the region will increase almost exponentially. The US feels it is in their best interest to have a sovereign claim to the area and it is not likely that Canada is going to give up any of its islands.
As the region opens up to the world economic exploitation of its natural resources is also going to become viable. Greenland is home to some of the largest confirmed deposits and speculative deposits of rare Earth minerals on the planet and the US Geological Survey believes Greenland may have 50 billion barrels of oil beneath its surface. With all of this potential comes the real chance of making the United States free from a dependence on Chinese rare earth metals production, something which the Chinese would dearly like to avoid. The Danish Institute for International Studies has published reports about the Chinese interest in taking over rare earth deposits in Greenland and consolidating its hold on the planet’s supply, the US is obviously not eager to allow this to happen. Greenland has very real implications for US and European strategic autonomy.
Making the Case to Greenland
The key to acquiring Greenland and transferring it from Danish to American sovereignty will be getting the Greenlanders on board, something that will not be easy. The Trump administration must first recognize Greenland is a nation, not just a piece of land inhabited by anyone from anywhere. Greenlanders deserve the respect and culturally autonomy that any unique people in the United States have garnered (think the Navajo).
In my proposed structure, Greenland could retain its unique identity and governance structure, while also gaining more local powers than it currently has under Danish stewardship. This arrangement crucially takes from existing precedent within American law and would extend Greenland powers over areas such immigration and who can buy and sell land on the island. Greenland should not have to sacrifice its unique identity to the multicultural insanity currently destroying the American nation.
1. Autonomy in Governance: Greenland should retain its unique government structure. The High Commissioner of Greenland would be a presidential appointee representing American government interests while the Greenlanders would retain their local parliament and prime ministerial system of government. This would also include retaining local Greenlandic law in the same way that almost all US states have their own legal systems. Greenland would also gain powers such as having its own police system like any American territory (currently Denmark maintains policing authority).
2. Immigration Control: One of the most significant factors in convincing Greenland to ascent to becoming an American territory will be extending it autonomy over immigration policy. Currently the United States has another territory with autonomy to make its own immigration law, American Samoa. American Samoa’s immigration laws are so stringent that mainland U.S. citizens cannot study or retire in the territory and may only live there for the duration they have local employment. There is no way to become a permanent resident and buying land is extremely difficult unless you are an ethnic Samoan.
The United States could and should promise to extend this same autonomy to Greenland, allowing the Greenlandic nation complete autonomy to set its own immigration policies and prevent the island from falling victim to America’s own mass immigration problems.
3. Economic Development and Resources: Greenland would benefit immensely from being part of the American economic system. American private capital, federal dollars, and other investment could radically increase the standard of living and quality of jobs in Greenland, though this would come at a cost to the American taxpayer. Currently Denmark government spending is responsible for more than half of the revenues of the Greenlandic government, though this is not a huge sum for a territory with just 75,000 residents and is a financial burden the US treasury could bear.
Trump has made some progress with point three, reportedly ‘mulling’ a plan to offer Greenlanders $100,000 payments to agree to join the United States. This would be a $6 billion injection into Greenland’s economy, a sum twice the size of Greenland’s annual GDP of $3.33 billion. Trump might also consider offering a small sum to every Dane, perhaps $5,000 dollars or so, to incentive their backing of the plan.
Conclusion
Trump is clearly not insane as the mainstream media would have us believe. His interest in Greenland is one that the American state has had for centuries and the island is becoming more strategically and economically important with each passing year. With that said, I do not believe that his raging antagonism of the Europeans is helping the matter and he should be wary of ruining the good will of nationalists in Europe over the issue of Greenland when it can so readily be resolved through negotiation.