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Carl Bildt may see President-elect Trump’s Greenland greed as “flabbergasting”, but he still takes it seriously.
Sweden’s 30th prime minister, Carl Bildt, penned an article this week warning that President-elect Donald J Trump’s aggressive rhetoric regarding the “absolute necessity” of the United States owning Greenland is “no laughing matter”.
Trump last declared his interest in acquiring Greenland in 2019, saying the US should simply buy the nation. The response from other nations was mostly one of humorous derision and the Prime Minister of Denmark – which then, as now, technically holds sovereignty over Greenland – was even plainer.
“Greenland is not for sale. Greenland is not Danish. Greenland belongs to Greenland,” Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said in August 2019.
Now, just weeks before he takes office, Trump has restated his goals for the US acquisition of the world’s largest island, and this time, rather than buying it, the first-ever felon to be elected US President has refused to rule out a military option to settle the matter.
Not for sale
Trump’s territorial desires this time around prompted Denmark’s foreign minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, to confirm Denmark’s views on Greenland’s destiny.
“We fully recognise that Greenland has its own ambitions,” Rasmussen said.
“If they materialise, Greenland will become independent, though hardly with an ambition to become a federal state in the United States.”
Even France and Germany have warned Trump off. Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, reminded the President-elect last week that “the inviolability of borders applies to every country – regardless of whether it is east of us or to the west – and every state must respect that, regardless of whether it is a small country or a very powerful state”.
France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said in a separate statement that while he did not believe a US invasion of Greenland was on the cards, he admitted: “We have entered an era that is seeing the return of the law of the strongest.”
Clearly, Europe is alarmed that Trump would play so fast and loose with words of a military solution, but Bildt’s tone – in a piece published by non-profit media organisation Project Syndicate – is more serious still.
“Flabbergasting as such pronouncements may seem, they are no laughing matter,” Bildt said.
“Greenland is an important and sensitive diplomatic issue. Its status should be treated with care and compassion, lest a much larger crisis ensue. That would not serve anyone’s interests.”
Path to independence
Greenland adopted home rule in 1979, and Denmark has largely left it to its own devices in the knowledge that sovereignty and independence would occur in time, and at the pace that Greenland’s residents wished to proceed. As Bildt points out, the country can stage a referendum whenever it wishes, but it’s likely too soon to do it right now.
As the Lowy Institute’s Donald R Rothwell pointed out in his own piece at The Interpreter, there are certainly legal options for Greenland to be subsumed into the United States. Denmark could legally cede the island to the US, though said, that is remarkably unlikely. The US itself could also offer Greenland the same status as Puerto Rico, as an “insular area” – though given Trump’s treatment of Puerto Rico during his first term, that is not likely to be attractive.
The US could also recognise Greenland as a sovereign and independent nation – when that day comes to pass – by offering it a Compact of Free Association that would leave Greenland as a nation in its own right but would place the US in control of its defence and some of its foreign relations. This is the arrangement that the Republic of the Marshall Islands and Palau – members of the United Nations – have with the US.
But the issue of associating with the US – which is admittedly far geographically closer to Greenland than Denmark – comes with some unique cultural problems, as Bildt explained.
“For better or worse, Greenlanders are committed to the Nordic welfare model and will not want to abandon it in favour of the US’ model,” Bildt said.
“Although Greenland is not part of the European Union, its people are, by dint of being citizens of Denmark. More than half of the island’s public budget is covered by the Danish government, and 90 per cent of its exports (mainly shrimp) go to the EU, where they have privileged access.”
Why Greenland?
But it’s not the people that are in question, and while the island’s largely Inuit population may be right to be suspicious of any US acquisition of Greenland, the real prize is geographic, both in terms of access and enlarging the United States’ nautical influence well into the Arctic – an area already contested for its maritime resources and shipping routes – and in the rich resources of the island itself, particularly rare earth minerals.
However, as Bildt pointed out, “the investment climate for extracting these resources is far from ideal, given the new political uncertainty around the island, the lack of manpower, and the fragile natural environment”.
Geopolitically, Trump has referred to the presence of Chinese and Russian vessels in the region as a problem to be dealt with but owning Greenland would not change the widely accepted international laws of the sea. Laws, such as freedom of navigation, which – as Rothwell pointed out – the US regularly enforces 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,” Rothwell said.
It’s hard not to agree with Bildt, when he said, “Trump’s indecent proposal, delivered at the barrel of a gun, is not only absurd but dangerous.
“Greenland’s evolving light-touch relationship with Denmark is clearly the best option for the island.”
