Trump suggests U.S. should take ownership of Greenland
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Trump suggests U.S. should take ownership of Greenland
President-elect Trump indicated he wants Greenland under U.S. control as he named PayPal co-founder Ken Howery as his pick for United States ambassador to Denmark on Sunday.
The latest: Greenland Prime Minister Múte Egede made clear on Monday that the autonomous territory that’s part of its kingdom of Denmark was not for sale.
“Greenland is ours,” Egede said on Facebook. “We are not for sale and will never be for sale.”
The big picture: Trump said during his first administration that he was looking into the U.S. buying Greenland and canceled a state trip to Denmark after Danish officials said it was’t for sale.
He made his latest comments on Greenland after demanding earlier in the weekend that Panamanian authorities lower fees for U.S. ships to transit the Panama Canal or return its control to the United States.
Driving the news: “For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social on Howery.
“Ken will do a wonderful job in representing the interests of the United States.”
Representatives for both Trump and Denmark’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediately respond to Axios request for comment in the evening.
Background: The U.S. has on several occasions since 1867 considered or attempted to buy Greenland — the world’s largest island that’s not a continent.
Greenland is part of the continent of North America, but it has close geopolitical ties to Europe and has received EU funding as it’s classed as an overseas territory associated with the bloc via Denmark.
Between the lines: The territory has access to the Arctic, where there’s been a race between nations for resources in a region that research shows is already feeling the impacts of climate change.
Russia has in recent years sought to claim territory up to Greenland’s Exclusive Economic Zone.
Greenland’s natural resources include gold, silver, copper and uranium and there’s believed to be significant potential for oil in the waters off the territory.
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Four more years of this shit.
And he's not even president yet.
C'mon, what better reason do we need to just take Greenland ? Besides the non-Trump has given. You know someone has told Trump there is great resources of value there, and Trump wants to cash in, aas usual. What a fckn buffoon!
Wait! He's going to want America to own the moon. He'll argue that when Neil Armstrong planted a flag on the moon he claimed it for the USA, and the SCotUS is going to agree with him.
[✘]
There is no doubt that because of global warming Greenland is becoming an exceptionally valuable asset and a small country like Denmark would realize its potential and not sell it to any other nation (or very rich individual like Musk).
It does certainly sound silly now but it isn't the first time the US government has expressed interest in purchasing Greenland for various strategic reasons. The last time was indeed shortly after WWII as the Cold War began and there were some military/security reasons for the effort.
From the article:
Would be interesting to know more details on the circumstances of this and how it plays into Trump's recent remarks. As we know from what happened in Ukraine, Putin might have other ideas up his sleeve and it isn't a stretch to think that there may be some valid reason to revisit the idea of purchasing part or all of Greenland with Denmark and Greenland. But it can't be in the form of threats, Greenland will need to agree to the terms freely, which up to this point sounds like it ain't gonna happen.
Greenland is important to US national security. LOL.
Trump wants glory and or money. Thats all it is.
Oh well shit, why didn’t you say that before? I’ll ignore the article and the links therein then and just go with your expert opinion.
How long have you been with the State Department, DoD, CIA, DHS?
Why is that funny? Looking into this a bit more, turns out that the Biden Administration agreed that Greenland was extremely important from a security standpoint on several fronts including both military strategy and access to specific resources. See the following from May 2021
A RARE Opportunity: How Greenland came to be central to the Biden Presidency
It turns out that Trump also floated the idea of buying Greenland in 2019, and had some support from the Pentagon and some of the same people who were concerned about the strategic value of Greenland in the Biden Administration. More info here from January 2022:
A year into Biden’s presidency, U.S. military plans for Greenland remain unclear
So, while it is unlikely that "buying" Greenland will be the winning strategy, the concerns behind Trump's remarks have been echoed in many corners of the US and Danish security apparatus since before Trump's first term, through Biden's Administration, and up to today. I'd just prefer to hear the experts explain it rather than hear Trump butcher the real facts and concerns.
Apparently Trump is not merely a developer and builder, but a visionary figure too? I will give him this: he persists!
Nice. He's got dibs on the Northwest Passage. What a rube.
Indeed. The way he phrases things is like a third grader on a playground. Would be better if he kept his mouth shut and let the sources of the info he is thinking about do the talking.
I don’t understand why this upsets people. Trump is talking about buying Greenland, not invading it. The United States has purchased land before, and we generally look back on it as a good thing.
Merry Christmas.
I don’t think people are upset, it’s just that we went through this in his last term as president and the Danes told him to fuck off. The population of Greenland is 60,000 with 90% being indigenous people, Inuit to be exact.
There is huge mineral deposits there, mainly those that are for components for EV etc.
Currently the US has one air base in Greenland at the height of the Cold War we had close to 50 bases in Greenland and we abandoned them and now after decades of rotting are posing huge environmental problem in Greenland. In addition the air base was constructed without thought to the people that had lived there for thousands of years and they were forced to move without compensation. How to make friends and influence people is our motto, also know as colonization.
BTW we a B 52 super fortress crashed there with four thermonuclear bombs on board and when detonated left a lot of the land contaminated.
I did not know any of this. Thank you so much!
Trump doesnt ask Denmark if they want to sell Greenland, he tells Americans that we must have it, as if that settles the matter. If this were to happen, it would be done as a money making venture for him and his cronies. If we "must" have Greenland, lets do it after Trump is in the garbage pile of history.