The US President and the island: Trump: Greenland will voluntarily join the USA

US President Donald Trump expects Greenland to join the US of its own free will. The island, which belongs to Denmark, will come to terms with the United States, he said, according to journalists traveling on board the government plane Air Force One. “I believe we will get Greenland because it really has to do with the freedom of the world.”

The residents of Greenland wanted to belong to the USA, said Trump – and thereby contradicted the Greenlandic Prime Minister Múte B. Egede. Just a few days ago, he declared that the largely independent ice island between the North Atlantic and the Polar Sea with its 57,000 residents was ready to deepen cooperation. “But Greenland doesn’t want to be part of the USA,” said Egede.

The huge island, six times the size of Germany, is of enormous importance for the global climate, the military control of the Arctic and is rich in raw materials. There are also important shipping routes in the region.

However, Greenland’s relationship with Denmark is also complicated. The island is dependent on financial support from Copenhagen, but many Greenlanders still feel insufficiently valued by their former colonial power. “We don’t want to be Danes. We don’t want to be Americans either. We want to be Greenlanders,” said Egede.

Trump wants to “protect the free world”

Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen spoke to Trump on the phone for 45 minutes in mid-January and, according to her office, referred to the rejection from Greenland that the island was not for sale. The Financial Times reported, citing anonymous sources, that Trump was “aggressive and confrontational” in the conversation.

On board his government plane, the US President said he didn’t really know what claim Denmark had to the island. But it would be a “very unfriendly” act if Denmark did not allow an agreement between Greenland and the USA. It’s about “protecting the free world,” said Trump, who had already sought to purchase the island during his first term in office. The USA has had an air force base on Greenland since the 1940s.

EU soldiers in Greenland?

The chairman of the European Union Military Committee, Robert Brieger, meanwhile spoke out in favor of stationing EU soldiers in Greenland. “There are rich raw material deposits there, and important transport routes for international trade pass by,” the Austrian general told “Welt am Sonntag”.

The stationing of EU soldiers would be a “strong signal and could contribute to stability in the region.” With increasing ice melting as a result of climate change, “a certain potential for tension towards Russia and possibly China” would arise. From his point of view, “it would make sense not only to station US forces in Greenland as before, but also to consider stationing EU soldiers,” said Brieger.

The EU Military Committee is the highest military body within the EU Council. It serves military consultation and cooperation between member states. The stationing of EU soldiers in Greenland is ultimately “a political decision in which many interests have to be taken into account,” said Brieger.