The author of Diplomat Mercy Kuo regularly engages experts in matters, political practitioners and strategic thinkers around the world for their various information on the American policy of Asia. This conversation with Dr. Klaus Dodds – Professor of Geopolitics and Executive Dean of the School of Life Sciences and Environment by Royal Holloway, and co -author of “Unfrozen: The Fight for the Future of the Arctic” (Yale University Press 2025) – is the 453rd in “The Trans -Pacific Insight series.”
Explain the strategic context of high power competition on Greenland.
The strategic context is informed by local, regional, circumpolar and global dynamics.
The largest island in the world and the 57,000 people who call it home are not unconscious of the reasons why the others have coveted it and they, respectively. The island is part of one form or another in the kingdom of Denmark for several centuries, and over time, its status has gone from the colony to the foreign territory and finally to be recognized as a very autonomous part of the kingdom. The current Prime Minister Múte B. Egede embodies a green conviction that there should be “nothing of us, without us”.
Most Greenlanders aspire to the independence of the Danish kingdom but recognize that Copenhagen provides an annual block subsidy to the island worth 500 million euros. Copenhagen undoubtedly sought to maintain external powers at a distance thanks to internal financial transfers and a suite of concessions on autonomy and the rights of elected governments in Nuuk (after two important referendums which clearly indicated that the Groeslands wanted to continue an independence option).
Since the Second World War, the United States has been the dominant military and defense partner with Denmark / Greenland. The United States has established a base in the northwest of the island called Thule (and now Pituffik Space Base), which was initially designed to provide an early response to incoming Soviet bombers and missiles. There was, and is a keen interest in securing the waters between and beyond the gap of Greenland-Iceland-Uk. The 1951 Defense Agreement between NATO Denmark partners and the United States offers a considerable scope in Washington in order to ensure that it prevents others from one day establishing in this part of the Arctic of North America. Forely speaking, Denmark retains responsibility for the defense and security of Greenland. A notable change is that the government of Greenland is very considerably more involved in the development of Danish policy of the Arctic.
Finally, Greenland and the Danish kingdom are nestled in a circumpolar Arctic which until very recently benefited from the advantages of a relative benign geopolitical context. This clearly worsened following the large-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and a fracturing of intra-arctic relations. China is now much more engaged with the Arctic and in recent years have made investment openings to Greenland and the widest Nordic Arctic. Greenland is therefore nestled in an Arctic which is shaken by great rivalries and power tensions. And Donald Trump’s re -election [as U.S. president] In 2024, inaugurated a return to a more transactional and more burning approach to allies such as Denmark and Canada.
Examine the justification behind the “purchase” proposed by President Trump of Greenland.
At least 40% of the United States owes its existence to the purchase in one form or another, the last purchase of this type being the Danish West Indies [today the U.S. Virgin Islands] In 1917. As the purchase of Alaska demonstrated, grabs the then Russian empire, it can be considered a long -term investment. A hundred years later, the Trans-Alaska pipeline carried oil from the northern slope of Alaska to the southern port of Valdez. The United States has proposed in the past to buy Greenland (just like the United Kingdom), so again, it is not unprecedented. While in each case, these offers were rejected Trump returned to the subject he went for the first time in 2019.
The justification itself is simple. Trump thinks that Denmark is a relatively low NATO ally that has largely benefited from the safety umbrella provided by the United States since the early 1950s. But now, with China working in partnership with Russia, there is an additional emergency to guarantee that this edge of the North American land mass is properly secure. If the Greenlanders want independence, it could make them vulnerable to future openings from China. If the United States could “buy” Greenland or even facilitate a free association agreement, then American investment would follow in a multitude of areas, including infrastructure, mines and tourism. The expression “purchase” proposed is therefore a signal that the United States will not tolerate a Chinese presence on the island.
Solid Washington’s messaging in China as an Arctic Power and Russia with its growing militarization of the Arctic region.
In 2019, the Secretary of State of the United States, Mike Pompeo, transmitted a blunt message during a ministerial meeting of the Arctic Council in Finland. The moment and the place of the speech were revealing – the Arctic Council was deliberately set up in 1996 to exclude discussions on defense and security (on American insistence). Pompeo was scathing on the White Paper of China, which knew the country as a “almost-arctic” state and strengthened the division between the Arctic and non-Arctic States. His speech also noted the determination of the United States to counter the Chinese influence in Greenland and to resist any attempt to crop the Arctic Ocean as a future Sea Sea Sea. During the first Trump administration, Denmark and the United States expressed their concerns about Chinese companies and investors seeking to buy an abandoned naval base in the southwest of the island and offers to invest in three international airports. At the time, the Trump administration promised that there would be American investments in airports such as Nuuk to allow improved links with North America and Europe.
The second Trump administration will continue to be wary of the growing military presence of China in the Arctic region, including joint naval and air patrols with Russia in and around the Strait of Bering and the North Pacific. While Moscow has invested massively in the remittlarization of its vast arctic area of the Russian Federation, Chinese companies and investment play a vital role in the facilitation of energy projects and commercial expeditions along the North Sea road. China will have to be careful not to cause Russian fears about secret expansionism. And the United States, under Trump, acknowledged that the United States should develop a larger ice fleet and improve the defense capacities of missiles / homeland drones, while seeking to ensure hemispherical safety of North.
Analyze Copenhagen’s strategic calculation in negotiating an agreement with Washington which benefits Denmark and Greenland.
Denmark is painfully aware that it is a small Nordic state which had to spend more in defense for years. In January 2025, the Danish government confirmed an increase of $ 2 billion to its Arctic command in Nuuk. Even before Trump won the presidential election in 2024, the political leaders of Denmark and Greenland met to discuss Arctic security in the kingdom. But even with a new commitment to a longer -term funding for defense and security funding, Denmark will only reach 2% of GDP by 2030. Denmark spent 1.65% of its GDP in defense in 2023 compared to other NATO countries such as Poland managing 3%.
All this means that Trump’s openings towards Greenland are partially informed by a clear understanding that Denmark has long underestimated and that Greenland could be considered a deadness of security. Copenhagen knows that if he wishes to postpone Trump’s offer for the second time concerning a “purchase”, he was notified on how he ensures the security of the island.
Denmark may wish to remind the United States that the 1951 Defense Agreement still allows Washington flexibility to pursue hemispherical safety objectives. It is very unlikely that Nuuk or Copenhagen resists any American demand to extend its military presence, especially since there is a shared concern concerning Russia and China in the Arctic region and beyond.
Evaluate how the United States could advance hemispherical security thanks to the acquisition of Greenland with regard to major power competition.
There are several ways to give meaning to Trump’s proposal to “buy” Greenland. One is simply that he wants to be immortalized in American history as a man who has widened the United States of 2.1 million square kilometers. It would be approximately the same size as the purchase of Louisiana and larger than Alaska. The second is that he and his advisers really believe that Denmark is too low to ensure long-term security in Greenland, and that the United States must intervene and make it the 51st state (or 52nd if Canada should also be incorporated, as suggested several times). The third reason could be that, as for Ukraine, Trump and his team are interested in the potential of rare earths of the island, and part of the hemispherical security guarantee is to ensure that the United States has secure access to vital resources. Finally, hemispherical security depends on the safe and secure shipping routes and if the Panama canal is unreliable (by drought / climate change or a possible Chinese shooting of the area), waters north of the North American land mass must be protected.
If nothing else, the resurrection of the Greenland “agreement” will undoubtedly exert additional pressure on Denmark and other Nordic countries to ensure that they are ready to further assume the responsibility of European security. Trump’s highly transactional style could eventually produce advantages for the Green population – the American president has given the island an extraordinary increase in attention and advertising. The Greenlander Prime Minister will be impatient to ensure that the island can benefit financially and politically from this interest. To develop the potential of rare land of Greenland, it will take a lot of foreign investment both in money and in qualified work. Greenland might feel that there is an “agreement” to conclude, but not quite the only president that Trump is considering.