Greenland’s future

When Danish King Frederik touches down in Nuuk next week, flag-waving Greenlanders are set to give him a warm reception to match the territory’s unusually high winter temperatures. As snowstorms pummel parts of Denmark, Greenland’s capital has received barely enough white powder “to build an igloo for a mouse,” one local told me.

The three-day tour will be King Frederik’s third trip to the Arctic island since he took over the top job from his mother, Margrethe, who abdicated in January 2024. “The morale of the Greenlanders must, of course, be kept up, and it is a pleasure for me to meet with as many as possible at eye level,” he told reporters during a recent state visit to Lithuania.

Even though NATO can stop breathing into a paper bag because US President Donald Trump has seemingly backed down from his European tariff threat and the Danish and Greenlandic foreign ministers avoided a "Zelensky moment" during talks with US Vice President JD Vance, Denmark remains on alert. “The diplomatic track is, at least for now, back on track,” Rasmus Leander Nielsen from Ilisimatusarfik (University of Greenland) said, referring to discussions about Greenland’s future moving from the media and social platforms to the meeting room.

Technical talks have officially kicked off. Greenland and Denmark must find something shiny (perhaps dust off the existing 1951 deal) so “Trump can lose in a way that allows him to claim a success,” one long-time Greenland-based political observer said.

Trump’s antics have boosted Greenland’s fledgling tourism industry, particularly with American visitors.

While the world awaits an outcome, public displays of solidarity towards Greenland are coming thick and fast. Cue a small buildup of European military personnel, visits by British MPs and the Canadian governor general, as well as Paris and Ottawa opening new consulates in Nuuk.

The timing of King Frederik’s Danish government-approved visit is thus no coincidence.

“There will be pictures of Greenlanders warmly welcoming King Frederik with flags and kaffemik (coffee and cake). The pictures will reach American media and Trump will see them,” says Danish author Gitte Redder.

“The Danish royal family has always played a strong role in being a bridge that brings Greenland and Denmark together.”

In 1921, when the Norwegians questioned Denmark’s rights to unpopulated parts of Greenland, King Christian X (the current king’s great-grandfather) and Queen Alexandrine made the first royal visit to Greenland to shore up the country’s colonial hold over the island.

Redder, author of multiple books about the Danish royal family, including the recently published Greenlanders’ Royal House, says former Queen Margrethe had at least 20 private and official visits to Greenland over her 52-year reign.

Queen Margrethe also helped with fashion diplomacy, of a kind. The global seal fur market collapsed in the 1970s and 1980s following a Western boycott after French actress Brigitte Bardot conflated the clubbing of baby seals in Canada with Greenland’s traditional seal hunting industry, Redder said. Queen Margrethe’s decision to continue wearing her seal fur coats as an act of solidarity was a point Greenlanders never forgot.

Her son’s bond with Greenland also cuts deep.

King Frederik was 14-years-old when he visited for the first time with his parents in 1982. In his early 30s, he joined a four-month sled dog expedition. He and his Australian-born wife Queen Mary gave their youngest children, twins Princess Josephine and Prince Vincent, the Greenlandic middle names of Ivalo and Minik. The four visited Greenland in 2024.

“Greenland has a big place in the King’s heart,” Redder said. “He wants to show up and give a signal to the Greenlanders, but also to President Trump and the White House, that we are the united kingdom of Denmark. Greenland and Denmark are together no matter what.”

Symbols of Greenland have grown in prominence. There are plenty of ice and sun flags at the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics as Greenlandic brother and sister biathletes Ukaleq Slettemark and Sondre Slettemark make the kingdom proud.

For the first time, in Copenhagen this January, Greenlandic flags were also seen flying on poles around the city.

The show of unity cuts through. A January survey of 610 Greenlanders by Danish pollster Sune Steffen Hansen found 76% of those surveyed said it would not be an advantage for Greenland to join the United States – 17% were unsure and 8% were favourable.

While the diplomatic tightrope walk continues for Greenland and Denmark, there are at least two domestic silver linings. Trump’s antics have boosted Greenland’s fledgling tourism industry, particularly with American visitors. And the political parties of Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen (Social Democrats) and the fist-bumping, polar bear cufflink-wearing Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (Moderates) have experienced an uptick in voter support according to a recent poll of 1012 Danes. Frederiksen’s party looked on the nose after dismal losses in November’s municipal elections, where they lost the mayorship of Copenhagen for the first time in 100 years.

A national election is due before November and now there are rumblings that Denmark could go to the polls as early as March.

Enough intrigue ahead to fill another series of the Danish political drama Borgen.

The possibility of American use of force to acquire Greenland has been openly contemplated by President Donald Trump and is being taken seriously in Europe. “If the sovereignty of a European ally were affected, the cascading consequences would be unprecedented,” says French President Emanuel Macron. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen says it would mean the end of NATO alliance. Former Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell says it would "incinerate" NATO. 

Europe will have to pool its strategic sovereignty in the same way it has pooled its economic sovereignty.

In his latest column, Financial Times Chief Foreign Affairs Commentator Gideon Rachman considers the full political and economic implications. He notes that NATO's demise would generate an urgent need for European NATO members to build a successor body: 

The risks for European countries of a divorce from the US would clearly be very high. They would need to move fast to establish a new security pact to replace Nato. The countries that signed a joint letter supporting Denmark — Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain — could form the basis of that alliance, along with the Nordics. The EU and the UK combined have the wealth and population numbers to deter Russia. But it would cost a lot of money and might require painful steps — like the establishment of compulsory military service.

Rachman is absolutely right about Europe's collective capacity: compared to Russia, the EU has four times as many citizens and roughly ten times the GDP. It also has a substantial military-industrial base that produces world-leading weaponry. Arguably, Europe would not even have to increase its defence spending in a post-American world. As Adam Tooze has argued, the problem is not the amount of money European nations spend on defence but the disastrously inefficient ways they spend it.

But bringing together Europe's demographic, economic and industrial strengths in this way is largely an exercise in arithmetic. In the political sense, these countries are not sufficiently united to be counted together. And this is why an American break with NATO would be so significant - not because it would stretch Europe's economic and military capacities but because it would raise political dilemmas that Europe has been able to avoid as a consequence of American leadership.

European integration, always an elite-driven project, now has fragile democratic foundations.

The famous question attributed to Henry Kissinger - "If I want to talk to Europe, who do I call?" - has never had to be addressed because deep down, everyone knows the answer is “Washington, DC”. But if that is no longer to be the answer to Kissinger's question, then what is? Is it Berlin? Paris? London? Warsaw? 

It can't be any of those places because choosing one would risk reviving the exact inter-European rivalry that the post-war project of strategic and economic integration was designed to subsume. “The coming together of the nations of Europe requires the elimination of the age-old opposition of France and Germany”, said the 1950 Schuman Declaration, which led to the creation of what today we call the European Union. So why would either Berlin or Paris now agree to the other becoming Europe's leader? And why would any European nation submit to French or German leadership of the continent, especially when both countries face the imminent prospect of populist right-wing governments? Another massively complicating factor is that German leadership of Europe would require a German nuclear weapon.

So, if Europe is indeed entering a post-American era, the only plausible answer to Kissinger's question is “Brussels”. Europe will have to pool its strategic sovereignty in the same way it has pooled its economic sovereignty, creating a single European foreign policy underpinned by a unified military with a European nuclear deterrent. Europe would need to become a single great power. 

Yet “Brussels”, as a symbol of European unity, now appears too tarnished to carry such a weight. The post-World War II European integration project has been an overwhelming success, but for complex reasons it is now discredited such that it offers no viable pathway towards pooled strategic sovereignty. European integration, always an elite-driven project, now has such fragile democratic foundations that it can't hope to support an initiative that would surpass the creation of the eurozone in ambition. 

The irony is that perhaps only one force could confer popular legitimacy upon such a project: an armed attack by Russia, the very thing that the elevation of Europe to unified great-power status would be designed to prevent.

The first Trump administration aspired to acquire Greenland; the second is now seriously increasing the pressure. Greenland, a large island in the Arctic, has been part of Denmark since 1814. Today, it is a Danish autonomous territory and the largest by land area of the country’s three parts, the others being Denmark and the Faroes.

The Trump administration appears to be approaching a point of radically rethinking its global alliance network.

A few days ago, President Trump suddenly spoke of a timeline of 20 days or maybe two months; a takeover within three years is being discussed. The administration has proposed various ways to acquire Greenland, including convincing its approximately 60,000 people to join the US, a buyout, and forming a compact of free association like those the US has with some Pacific islands.

In 2025 Denmark objected to the US undertaking covert influence operations in Greenland. The US has refused to discuss the future of Greenland with the Danish and Greenlandic governments. Now, in the wake of the Venezuela raid and with talk of US dominance of the Western Hemisphere, the US has firmly linked military options with Greenland.

Denmark has long been a strong US ally and was a founding member of NATO in 1949. Since the Cold War, Danish armed forces have fought with the US in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iraq, and Afghanistan where 44 Danish soldiers were killed, the highest per-capita loss rate of any coalition force member except for the US. Like Australia, Denmark's armed forces use US-made equipment extensively. Also like Australia, Denmark is a Level 3 manufacturing partner in the F-35 fighter program, making mainly airframe components.

This deep relationship may soon end abruptly. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has said that an American attack on Greenland would end the NATO military alliance. While it is unclear what other nations might do, Denmark would likely leave NATO and thus the US alliance in such a situation. The US relationship with Denmark would never be the same again.

In many respects, Denmark has been as good, or better, an ally to the US than has Australia. This raises three issues.

First, Australia’s confidence in the US alliance, based at least partly on reciprocity, may be misplaced. Australia participates in US-led wars expecting that the US would return the favour if Australia was at war. Australian ministers and officials often remind us that Australians have fought alongside the US since World War I. Australia’s loyalty, it is hoped, will mean the US is obliged to help Australia militarily in a future crisis. But Denmark’s Greenland experience suggests this belief is unfounded. Danish loyalty is clearly considered irrelevant by the Trump administration. Thus, Australia needs to revise its stance. In particular, Australia’s current military involvements in the Middle East need re-examining; these could be gaining Australia nothing.

It may soon be time for Australia to join European and NATO nations in expressing concern. If there is no pushback, the administration will assume that allies are content with its treatment of Denmark.

Second, it seems that the alliance is increasingly one of interests, not values. Australia and the US appear to share an interest in balancing Chinese military power in the Indo-Pacific, but this is perhaps becoming the sole rationale for the alliance. The US appears willing to sacrifice Danish interests for even minor gains. This is also evident in America's reluctance to commit clearly to defending NATO’s Baltic nations from Russian invasion. Such patterns suggest the US alliance may be narrowing to include only steadfast partners like Australia – and even then, only as long as they align with current US priorities. The concern is that these priorities are national interests decided by the US without consultation, so they may change quickly and perhaps radically.

Third is the question of whether Australia should push back against US declarations about Greenland.

Australia opposes Russia’s attempts at territorial expansion, rejects China’s claim to owning most of the South China Sea, and approves of the UN charter on self-determination. The Greenland case appears to fall into the category of hostile takeovers.

European nations are slowly combining to oppose the Trump administration, although they are cornered in also wanting US help with Ukraine. An element of US divide and conquer is emerging, where Europe will be pressured into accepting American territorial expansion. Some European nations released a joint statement: “Greenland belongs to its people, and only Denmark and Greenland can decide on matters concerning their relations.” Greenlanders are opposed to the American bid.

The Trump administration appears to be approaching a point of radically rethinking its global alliance network. The value of collective defence is being savagely downgraded. Success in Greenland might reinforce America’s – and perhaps other great powers’ – lurch towards unilateral nationalism.

It may soon be time for Australia to join European and NATO nations in expressing concern. If there is no pushback, the administration will assume that allies are content with its treatment of Denmark. This style of destructive alliance management might then spread to European nations and the Indo-Pacific. Better outcomes may come from middle powers standing together, rather than waiting to be assaulted individually.

If the Greenland situation worsens, the Australian government will eventually be forced to take a stand. 

As light fades across Copenhagen, a Danish foreign ministry senior official prepares to burn the midnight oil, monitoring every utterance about Greenland from the Trump administration.

From the ministry’s sixth floor, the night watcher – who has access to a bed for brief naps during the 5pm to 9am shift – is charged with circulating a morning report on overnight developments and has a telephone tree to wake up Denmark’s top officials should an emergency arise.

The night watch shift has become permanent, according to Danish newspaper Politiken and comes as Denmark’s Washington DC embassy has ramped up public diplomacy staffing and pivoted to operating in a “diplomatic grey area” – talking to people with ties to Trump outside the formal US power structure.

The historically close ally relationship has been under unprecedented strain since US President Donald Trump began talking up America’s need to take control of the autonomous Danish territory “one way or the other” for what he called national security reasons.

His son Donald Trump Jr’s jaunt to Nuuk in January and Vice President JD Vance’s trip to the ageing US Pituffik Space Base in March put a cow on the ice to use an old Danish idiom.

The Danes have been operating on a crisis footing ever since Trump and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s fiery 45-minute phone call in January. Trump’s references to Greenland in a speech to a joint sitting of Congress in March also heightened tensions.

Locals say the anxious mood in Greenland has calmed somewhat in recent months, with daily conversations returning to regular programming – the Arctic island’s relationship with Denmark, its independence dream, the cost of living, social issues, climate change, fishing, and infrastructure.

“In the beginning, there was a lot of noise – a mix of anger, hurt, dark humour and eye-rolling. Many people felt it echoed older colonial patterns: powerful outsiders talking about Greenland as an object, not a place where people live,” Ujammiugaq Engell, the director of Nuuk’s Local Museum, told me.

“Now the general ‘vibe’ feels more like low-grade background worry than active panic. It’s not that people don’t care – we definitely do – but I believe it’s very human not to be able to stay in a state of high alert about one topic for months on end. We know that things could change at the drop of an orange hat, but we still have to go to work, raise kids, deal with housing problems, groceries, the weather, all of it.”

The American strategy with Greenland is to “fuel Greenlandic frustrations with Denmark and test the limits of unity”, according to Danish media reports.

The Trump saga is set to loom large over two separate routine annual trilateral meetings expected to be held in Nuuk on Monday and Tuesday (8 and 9 December) between Greenland, Denmark and the United States.

The meetings represent an attempt at “business as usual” despite uncertain times, according to Danish Institute for International Studies senior researcher Ulrik Pram Gad.

The joint committee established in 2004 covers trade, minerals, education and science – its past communiques hardly set the world on fire. While the permanent committee, which has been around since 1991, has closed meetings and is focused on America’s military presence in Greenland.

“(These upcoming meetings) are an indication that perhaps the Danish and Greenlandic governments are eager to restart some sort of dialogue with the US on Greenlandic affairs. They are very eager to put these deliberations into tracks that have been used before – to normalise relations,” Arctic expert Martin Breum said.

It’s believed that Greenlandic Foreign Minister Vivian Motzfeldt will represent Greenland.

Breum is keen to see who else will be in the room, given that the meetings are usually at officials level. It would be “highly unusual” if Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen took part in the meetings, Breum said: “I don’t think that has ever happened”.

He’s also curious about whether the newly arrived US Ambassador to Denmark, Kenneth Howery, will use the talks to make his first trip to Nuuk. After riding in a horse-drawn carriage to present his credentials to Danish King Frederik in November, Howery has talked up cooperation, but has not walked back Trump’s comments about acquiring Greenland.

Trump hinted at Howery’s mandate when he announced that the PayPal co-founder would be posted to Denmark.

“For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity. Ken will do a wonderful job in representing the interests of the United States,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social website.

The American strategy with Greenland is to “fuel Greenlandic frustrations with Denmark and test the limits of unity”, according to Danish media reports. The US had attempted to set up a high-level political meeting between America and Greenland, behind Denmark’s back, but the new Greenlandic PM Jens-Frederik Nielsen, who was elected in March, turned down the offer.

In August, Denmark’s foreign minister hauled in the US Chargé d'Affaires for a dressing down over rumblings that the Americans have run covert operations in Greenland aimed at influencing public opinion.

When the delegations finally get together, there will be much to catch up on.

In June, the Trump administration revised a military command map, shifting oversight of Greenland from the US European Command headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany, to the US Northern Command in Colorado Springs.

The move means that “an attack against the US that passes through Greenlandic airspace or waters will be able to be defeated from the US without prior coordination with Stuttgart”, according to Breum, who noted it fitted in with Trump’s so-called Golden Dome project.

Whatever is on the agenda at the talks, there’s likely to be more sleepless nights ahead.

“As long as we are talking the White House, Donald Trump, Greenland, anything could happen at any time,” Breum said.

They’re masters of the waiting game in Greenland. They have to be to survive such a hostile climate. Wild weather frequently disrupts flights or sea journeys on the Arctic island, where there are no roads connecting towns.

The Greenlandic language reflects such uncertainty – no word means “see you later”. “Takussamaarpugut” translates to “I hope to see you at an undetermined point”.

But like the midnight sun and bone-rattling blizzards, Greenlanders find themselves waiting out another irritant – four more years of US President Donald Trump, who has upped the ante on his 2019 bid to buy Greenland, citing national security.

Greenlanders won’t be won over easily.

Trump’s refusal to rule out using military force to annex the autonomous Danish territory turbocharged this year’s Greenland election campaign and public debate around independence. Shy and reserved Greenlanders suddenly found themselves in the international spotlight as Donald Trump Jr jetted into Nuuk to lunch with the homeless, ahead of his father’s inauguration.

March’s election saw the largest international press pack ever descend on Greenland. Weeks later, Vice President JD Vance dropped in to the US Pituffik Space Base, home to an early warning missile radar system, to deliver a snarky lecture to Denmark about neglecting Greenland’s security. (The irony of the shrinking US military presence in Greenland was lost on him. The base has 150 military personnel, down from 10,000 during the Cold War.)

Vance, whose wife cancelled an uninvited visit to a Greenlandic dog sled race because of an expected frosty reception, invoked a Beijing bogeyman in his pitch to Greenlanders: “If the people of Greenland have their future controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, it’s not going to make their lives better off.”

But Greenlanders won’t be won over easily – a poll found 85 per cent do not want to join the United States. As Ulrik Pram Gad from the Danish Institute of International Studies pointed out: “Why would Greenlanders take a deal from Trump that gives them less than they already have? Why would Trump-the-deal-maker want to pay huge subsidies on a welfare state he does not want for his taxpayers at home to secure mining rights and military control that he already has for free?”

The United States already has something close to “full military sovereignty over Greenland”. This is in part thanks to the exploits of a rogue Danish envoy to Washington during the Second World War (depicted in the 2020 film The Good Traitor).

On my recent 12-day visit to Greenland, it appeared the initial panic about an imminent invasion had subsided. Greenlanders were relieved that tariff chaos and multiple diplomatic crises were keeping Trump distracted.

Out on the streets, there were occasional reminders of the drama. I spotted one Danish tourist in a red MAGA – Make America Go Away – hat. And at local fashion label Bibi Chemnitz streetwear store in Nuuk, “Greenland is not for sale” t-shirts and hoodies have sold out twice this summer.

There are enormous structural economic challenges for the island with a scattered population of 56,000.

“Not for sale, but open for business” is a favourite maxim of Greenlandic politicians. This is because in order to gain independence from Denmark, Greenland must diversify its economy.

“There is too little focus on developing a self-sustaining economy and too much focus on dreaming about independence as something that just falls from the sky,” a long-time observer of Greenlandic politics lamented during my travels.

There are enormous structural economic challenges for the island with a scattered population of 56,000, according to Aarhus University professor and economist Torben Andersen, who chairs the Economic Council for Greenland. The economic base is narrow – fishing is to Greenland what oil is to Norway. A block grant equivalent to A$1.08 billion from Denmark makes up around 50 per cent of treasury revenue.

The territory is also contending with a brain drain, an ageing population and a declining birth rate. Sixty per cent of the workforce is unskilled labour, and there is practically full employment and a growing dependency on foreign workers. There are hopes that tourism and mining can bring future prosperity. But there are handbrakes on both – including a lack of hotel capacity, major infrastructure deficits, and borderline business cases for many mining projects.

“Raw materials are at a standstill,” according to Danmarks Nationalbank and a Perth junior miner’s rare earth Kvanefjeld project is mired in a legal dispute because of a zero tolerance for uranium extraction, even as a by-product.

For Denmark, Trump’s interest has been a wake-up call. Copenhagen’s adage, “one kroner spent in Greenland is one kroner not spent in Denmark,” no longer holds weight.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen doesn’t want the kingdom to crumble on her watch. Cue major defence spending announcement, justice sector boost, an action plan to combat racism and a sudden proactive willingness to fund infrastructure projects. (Contrast this with Denmark’s reactive 2018 funding for three international airports to keep out Chinese investment.)

Greenland’s new Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, 33, from the centre-right pro-business party Democrats, is a former badminton champion. He will need to be nimble as he confronts the task of governing, economic reform and the fallout from the Trump spectacle.

Nielsen, who backs gradual independence, is leading a fragile coalition of four parties – comprised Democrats, Inuit Ataqatigiit, Siumut, and Atassut – spread across the political spectrum. On the opposition benches is Naleraq, which wants rapid independence.

For Nielsen, the Trump crisis is a sticky wicket. Although Greenland suddenly has leverage over Denmark, many are wary of being “scared back into the arms” of the former coloniser.

“Mette Frederiksen ate Jens-Frederik Nielsen, and he said thank you,” is a phrase you hear around Greenlandic political circles.

While older Greenlanders have a strong appreciation for cross-cultural family bonds and educational opportunities from Denmark, youngsters I met expressed frustrations over a Danish sense of superiority and whitewashing of the past. Three hundred years of Danish colonial legacy is yet to be fully unpacked. An investigation is underway into past abuse incidents, including stolen children and 4500 Greenlandic women being involuntarily fitted with birth control devices in the 1960s and 1970s. But reconciliation efforts have been at a snail’s pace.

“There’s so much trauma we have to heal from post-colonialism,” a Disko Island man in his 30s told me, adding that the story of intergenerational trauma can be seen in Greenland's drug and alcohol abuse and family violence statistics.

Despite many youngsters’ yearnings for an independent Greenland, there is also pragmatism. If Greenland pulls the plug on Denmark too early, there’s a fear of being “recolonised” by the United States.

“We have the will, but not the manpower,” an Ilulissat woman in her 20s told me.

“Maybe it takes 30 to 40 years.”

As they say in Greenland: “Ajunngilaq” – it is what it is.

Lisa Martin travelled to Greenland as a guest of Intrepid Travel.

Acquiring Greenland would now appear to be a foreign policy priority for the incoming Trump administration. Reviving his 2019 proposal for a US takeover of the territory, an idea thought to have been shelved following his 2020 election loss, Trump last week made his ambition for Greenland plain.

Greenland is part of Denmark and a territory within the Danish realm. Despite doubts that have been cast over Copenhagen’s sovereignty, in 1933 an International Court ruled in favour of Denmark in a dispute with Norway over title to the world’s largest island. That ruling has been continually accepted in the years since and there are no competing claims by other Arctic states, including the United States.

There is an American military base in Greenland – the Pituffik Space Base formerly known as Thule Air Base. The base was originally constructed in 1951 during the Cold War, with Denmark one of the founding members of NATO. The role and mission for the base has evolved over time, but there have been no recent public discussions regarding an expansion of the base, or the building of additional US military facilities in Greenland. Yet these are all possibilities following negotiation with Denmark, and the US has many such arrangements in place globally.

So given that the US already has a military presence in Greenland, what is the driver for Trump’s interest in the island?

National security has been given as a justification, and Trump has made specific reference to Chinese and Russian ships in the vicinity of Greenland. Russia is of course an Arctic state, and China is seeking to advance its position as a “near-Arctic State” and has increasingly become active in the region. However, both Chinese and Russian ships enjoy the freedom of navigation consistent with the international law of the sea, a right which the United States regularly asserts especially in the South China Sea. Any US efforts to control the freedom of navigation adjacent to Greenland would therefore be counterproductive to its strategic goals elsewhere.

In recent years it was always understood that Greenland was gradually moving towards independence and while no timetable has been set, negotiations have been ongoing.

Greenland is also known to have reserves of rare earth minerals. As climate change continues its impact and the Greenland ice sheet gradually melts, these minerals are becoming more accessible. The United States would certainly have an interest in gaining access to these minerals, and there are existing legal frameworks and policies in place that already allow for some mining to occur in Greenland. However, Trump would be mindful that across parts of the Arctic there is a strong environmental consciousness that may resist any large-scale mining activity. This runs counter to Trump’s “drill baby drill” slogan that he has sought to promote for Alaska and in American waters.

How then could the US acquire more permanent and substantial interests in Greenland consistent with international law? There is always the prospect of cession, whereby Denmark would agree to transfer Greenland to the United States. While there is a long history of territory being ceded in this manner, Copenhagen has made clear that Greenland is “not for sale”. Greenlanders would need to be consulted about this option, and it is unlikely they would agree to shelve their own national aspirations and become a strategic pawn in great power rivalry.

Greenland is well advanced on a path to independence. The momentum behind that movement needs to both be respected and understood for the opportunities it presents. Greenland’s political and legal background and status here is important. Greenland was a post-Second World War UN non self-governing territory, and formally became part of the Danish Realm in 1953, and transitioned to “Home Rule” in 1978. Under this arrangement Greenland is recognised as a “distinct community”, which was further advanced by the 2009 Greenland Self-Government Act that further extended Home Rule to encompass certain matters associated with Greenland’s foreign relations. Nevertheless, Copenhagen retains ultimate responsibility for the island including for its defence and security. In recent years it was always understood that Greenland was gradually moving towards independence and while no timetable has been set, negotiations have been ongoing between the Greenland government and Copenhagen to achieve this outcome.

An independent Greenland presents an opportunity for the United States to achieve some of the goals that Trump aspires to. US practice with other islands is instructive. The US has up to six different existing categories for the legal and constitutional status of an “insular area”; that is territory that is neither part of a US state or a federal district. These categories include Commonwealth status, incorporated territory, unincorporated territory, organised territory, and unorganised territory, and encompass islands as diverse as Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands. The US also has in place separate “Compact of Free Association” arrangements with the Federated States of Micronesia, Republic of the Marshall Islands, and Palau. These Pacific countries are all recognised as independent and are UN member States, but their defence and security and certain aspects of their international relations rest with the United States.

This is a model that could be applied to an independent Greenland. Self-determination processes between Copenhagen and the Greenland government in Nuuk could be fast tracked to result in Greenland’s independence sooner than was anticipated, while at the same time negotiations were being advanced with Washington for a Compact of Free Association. Ultimately this is a matter for decision by Greenland and whether any proposed Compact with the United States is an act of free choice by Greenlanders.

Suggestions by the Trump administration that the United States is exploring the acquisition from Denmark of Greenland has been greeted with global derision. Greenland politicians have pointed out that the island is “not for sale” and are insulted to think that they would become part of just another Donald Trump real estate deal.

However, is the notion of the United States acquiring Greenland that absurd?

Throughout history, there are many examples of territory being transferred, and the United States has been a particular beneficiary of this trade in land. Examples include the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 from France and the Alaska Purchase from Russia in 1867. Parts of present-day California, Nevada, Utah and Arizona were also acquired from Mexico in 1848 under treaty for the payment of $15 million. Even Australia has acquired territory including the Australian Antarctic Territory from Britain in 1933, and Christmas Island from Singapore via Britain in 1958.

The acquisition of new lands in former times, however, needs to be distinguished from processes that would apply today, especially in the case of Greenland, which has a population of 58,000, of which 90% are Greenlanders with the remainder predominantly Danish or from Scandinavia. Greenland is also geographically more closely connected to North American than it is to Europe. Its closest neighbour is Canada across the narrow Nares Strait, while the Greenland capital Nuuk is closer to Boston in the US than to the Danish capital Copenhagen.

The Danish interest in Greenland can be traced back to Viking explorers in the 10th century and eventual Danish colonisation in the 18th century. The status of Greenland was contested in the 19th and early 20th century between Denmark and Norway, and in 1933 the Permanent Court of International Justice ruled in favour of the Danes. Greenland’s status as effectively a Danish colony was disrupted during the Second World War when, with Denmark under German occupation and Greenland well-located strategically for the Allied forces, part of the island came under US control.

Following the end of the war, while control reverted to Denmark, circumstances for Greenland had changed. The most significant legacy of the war was the US airbase at Thule, which continued operations during the Cold War and today is the northernmost US overseas base and the only one located within the Arctic Circle.

The other change was a gradual acknowledgement of the rights of Greenlanders to self-determination. In 1953, Greenland was made a part of the Danish Realm, with the result that it gained representation in the Danish Parliament, followed in 1979 by Home Rule. The adoption in 2009 of the Self-Government Act has provided for additional levels of autonomy that could pave the way for Greenland ultimately becoming independent, and Denmark recognises this is one possible outcome of increasing autonomy for Greenlanders.

Setting aside the potential resource benefits for the United States if it were to acquire Greenland, the geopolitical strategic significance would be considerable. It is not widely appreciated that the Arctic today is being actively contested both for its potential maritime resource riches and its potential commercial and military shipping routes. By virtue of its particular location, Greenland may be able to generate an extended continental shelf well beyond its current 200-nautical-mile limit to reach as far as, if not beyond, the geographic North Pole, thereby countering Russian claims to that area.

Greenland could also prove important in thwarting Chinese aims in the Arctic. China asserted in 2018 that it was a “Near-Arctic State” and that it was entitled by international law to gain access rights to the region, especially navigational rights in the Arctic Ocean. While so far China’s Arctic interests do not appear territorial, there is certainly the potential for China to exert influence throughout the Arctic in ways that the United States may wish to resist, such as investment in the development of new Arctic ports and shipping infrastructure in Greenland.

How then could the United States seek to acquire Greenland? First, nothing could occur without the consent of Denmark, but Copenhagen would also be mindful that whatever it does needs to account for the rights of the Greenlanders to self-determination. To that end, it is not inevitable that Greenland become independent. Self-determination can be acquired in other ways, including remaining as part of the Danish realm with greater levels of autonomy.

However, self-determination could also include a positive act by the Greenlanders in support of becoming a part of the United States. There are a number of ways they could get there. Full statehood under the US Constitution could be available, as in the case of Hawaii, or as a territory as in the case of American Samoa, Guam, and Puerto Rico, all of which have local legislatures and certain levels of autonomy.

Ultimately, whether Greenland becomes a part of the United States, remains with Denmark, or becomes a new independent state is a matter only the Greenlanders can decide.