President Trump’s determination to purchase Greenland from Denmark has upended the transatlantic dialogue. What was dismissed as a flight of fancy when originally raised in 2019 has, combined with the president’s recent interest in the Panama Canal, become something far more significant: the beginning of a possible “Trump Doctrine,” reprioritizing the Western Hemisphere as the principal theater of American economic and security interest.
Greenland, as the outer perimeter of the Western Hemisphere, offers a buffer against Russian and Chinese ambitions in the Arctic and North Atlantic. The island is loaded with economically significant minerals, such as copper, graphite, and rare-earth elements. A Trump Doctrine, with a hemispheric focus, would insist that the United States create a stable financial and security partnership with Greenlanders.
The United States has long had an interest in the world’s largest island. In the 1860s, Secretary of State William Seward commissioned a report that contemplated purchasing Greenland. During World War II, the U.S. occupied the island to prevent its falling into Nazi hands; postwar, President Harry Truman tried to buy Greenland. During the Cold War, the Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) Gap formed the principal route by which Soviet submarines menaced America’s East Coast; it remains a crucial outlet for Russian submarines today. Greenland’s security significance is widely accepted in Washington.
Trump’s interest in Greenland, deeply rooted in American strategic thought and diplomatic history, coincides with the island’s increasing independence from Denmark. Beginning with the 2009 Act on Greenland Self-Government, the island has become more autonomous, with greater local administrative control. Greenland’s “Foreign, Security, and Defense Policy, 2024-2033,” an outline of its strategy, makes explicit its desire for ultimate autonomy from Denmark by noting that Nuuk “strive[s] for independence,” a sentiment recently echoed by Prime Minister Mute Egede. The question for Washington, Nuuk, and Copenhagen is no longer if Greenland will separate from Denmark, but when, and what will be waiting for the island’s residents after that happens.
With fewer than 60,000 inhabitants—the second least densely populated place on the planet, after Antarctica—an independent Greenland stands little chance of resisting China’s determination to avail itself of the island’s mineral wealth. Beijing, which preposterously describes itself as a “near-Arctic state,” is embarking on an ambitious icebreaker-construction program and is increasingly active in the region. China’s moves, coupled with Russia’s longstanding interest in the Arctic, make clear that America’s great-power rivals pose a real threat to post-independence Greenland and thus to the emergent Trump Doctrine.
Trump could “purchase” Greenland—or ensure that it is safely situated within the United States security umbrella upon obtaining independence—through several mechanisms. First, Greenland could choose to request entry into the United States as a non-state territory like Puerto Rico, Guam, and American Samoa. Ultimately, such an arrangement would need to be negotiated between Nuuk and Washington and ratified by Congress. An accession agreement could add economic incentives, similar to those offered by the Alaska Permanent Fund, which distributes royalties to residents from the state’s energy wealth. Creating such a fund for Greenlanders could encourage them to support U.S. capital investment in Nuuk’s extractive industries.
Another option to establish greater U.S.–Greenland cooperation post-independence would be to create a Compact of Free Association, similar to American agreements with Palau, the Marshall Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia. While they are independent countries with separate foreign policies, COFA states allow Washington unrestricted military access and full responsibility for their defense. The compact also offers varied economic inducements for signatories. Such an arrangement would let Greenlanders maintain full sovereignty but give the U.S. sufficient defense guarantees to ensure against potential malign activity by Moscow and Beijing.
President Trump faces a world on fire, from Ukraine to Gaza. Yet he also inherits extraordinary opportunities to enhance our core interests, strengthen traditional conceptions of U.S. defense in the Western Hemisphere, and encourage Americans to think beyond the day’s news. Pursuing a new economic and security relationship with Greenland is the type of bold initiative that separates great presidents from ordinary ones.
Alexander B. Gray, a Senior Fellow in National Security Affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff of the White House National Security Council, 2019-21.
Photo by Steffen Trumpf/picture alliance via Getty Images
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Publish date : 2025-02-16 11:00:00
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