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The Danish foreign minister fist-bumped his ambassador and then rushed up to Greenland\u2019s foreign minister and lit her cigarette. They had just met with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. In the Jan. 14 meeting, they discussed U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s desire to \u201cown\u201d Greenland, the Greenlandic people\u2019s firm opposition to being owned, and how they can all move forward in light of this impasse.<\/p>\n
As the smoke settled between the high-level diplomats outside the embassy\u2019s car, a new view was settling in across the Atlantic Ocean. Whatever happens next, Denmark, and its relationship with the United States, has changed irreversibly.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
The Danish foreign minister fist-bumped his ambassador and then rushed up to Greenland\u2019s foreign minister and lit her cigarette. They had just met with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. In the Jan. 14 meeting, they discussed U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s desire to \u201cown\u201d Greenland, the Greenlandic people\u2019s firm opposition to being owned, and how they can all move forward in light of this impasse.<\/p>\n
As the smoke settled between the high-level diplomats outside the embassy\u2019s car, a new view was settling in across the Atlantic Ocean. Whatever happens next, Denmark, and its relationship with the United States, has changed irreversibly.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe put all<\/span> our eggs in the United States\u2019 basket. We\u2019re \u2018super-Atlanticists.\u2019 We\u2019ve gone far further in our support of the U.S. than many other nations. We\u2019ve really prioritized the relationship to the U.S., but it will never be the same again,\u201d said Mikkel Runge Olesen, a senior researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies.<\/p>\n \u201cThe most trans-Atlantic politicians are the most bitter and skeptical. [Danish Prime Minister] Mette Frederiksen and [former NATO Secretary-General] Anders Fogh Rasmussen, for example,\u201d Olesen said. \u201cI think, from a Danish perspective, the idea of the USA as our security strategy is gone. Now we\u2019re looking for a European alternative. It\u2019s been an expensive lesson. We trusted the Americans, and we never should have done that.\u201d<\/p>\n The Jan. 14 meeting did nothing to assuage Danish opinion. Trump has not curbed his enthusiasm for owning Greenland\u2014or \u201cconquering\u201d it, as Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen put it at a press conference after the meeting. According to Rasmussen<\/a>, there is still deep disagreement on the issue, but the three parties agreed on creating a high-level working group.<\/p>\n Immediately after the meeting, the European Parliament issued a strongly worded statement in support of Denmark and Greenland. But something has changed in Europe. It\u2019s no longer just strong statements\u2014several nations are now committing to boots on the ice.<\/p>\n France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia have all responded to a European military exercise in Greenland and are sending troops there. In addition to opening a permanent French Consulate in Nuuk in early February, French President Emmanuel Macron has said that more military is on its way to the Arctic. \u201cAn initial team of French soldiers is already on site and will be reinforced in the coming days by land, air, and sea assets,\u201d he said<\/a> in an address to the French armed forces on Jan. 15.<\/p>\n Even if it\u2019s just a few officers, the message is a strong one. \u201cImagine a U.S. helicopter lands in Greenland, what do they see when they step out? Nobody? A dogsled? Or a row of European soldiers? It makes a big difference,\u201d said Christine Nissen, a chief analyst at Think Tank Europa. \u201cBy raising the stakes, Denmark makes it more difficult to go a different path than diplomacy.\u201d<\/p>\n For Nissen, this is part of a more seismic shift in European thinking.<\/p>\n \u201cYesterday\u2019s world has suited Europe really well,\u201d Nissen said. \u201cWe\u2019ve set everything up around it. Our entire society is based in a free world, international trade. We can import both security and energy and small cheap thingamabobs from China and not have to do anything ourselves to keep the model we have. This is a goodbye to all that. It takes time to react to, that\u2019s why there\u2019s been this paralysis.\u201d<\/p>\n The result is likely to be a deepening of European unity. After Russia, the United States is now the second major power to pose a threat to European territory. This creates a reason for both anti-Russian and anti-American segments of European opinion to come together and argue for a stronger Europe.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we\u2019re seeing right now is everyone moving closer together in the European Union,\u201d said Marlene Wind, a professor and director at the Center for European Politics at the University of Copenhagen. \u201cA united Europe is not what Trump wants. He wants a divided Europe. So, this is a bit of an own goal.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve learnt that we shouldn\u2019t venture into U.S. dependency again, because what if there\u2019s a new Trump down the line?\u201d Wind said. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to have our IT infrastructure, weapons, and security tied up to a character who so very clearly hates the EU and Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n The calls for strategic autonomy are now coming from all sides. A week ago, German Brig. Gen. Frank Pieper responded to Washington\u2019s raid on Venezuela by posting<\/a> online, \u201cGermany and Europe can no longer reliably base their existence on the USA and its nuclear umbrella. CONCLUSION: Germany needs its own nuclear weapons.\u201d<\/p>\n Of course, Europe can\u2019t just stop relying on the United States overnight. Pilots are trained to fly Lockheed Martin planes. Palantir supplies Europe with surveillance technology. Joint NATO exercises require systems that work together, meaning U.S. systems. In other words, Europe is already in the U.S. military industrial complex and getting out requires a lot more than switching from Apple to Nokia.<\/p>\n But that doesn\u2019t mean Europe isn\u2019t going to do its best. \u201cThis fall, Denmark made its largest miliary expenditure ever, 58 billion kroner [$9 billion] on a new ground-based air defense system,\u201d Nissen said. \u201cThey chose a European solution. We haven\u2019t had an air defense system since 2004, so there was no lock-in effect like with the F-35s. So, when we buy something new that isn\u2019t American, it\u2019s also a declaration for the future, that we\u2019re locking in on European solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n Europe\u2019s transition is not going to be easy. But the continent\u2019s leaders now believe it is necessary. For Nissen, \u201cit\u2019s a path of opposites. On the one side, there\u2019s the structural connection and the great difficulty it would be to sever that, but on the other side, you have to do it. Because it\u2019s not a long-term solution not to.\u201d<\/p>\n The glacial decoupling from the U.S. defense industry is going to hurt the United States, Nissen said. European countries have increased their defense spending the last few years. Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine and Trump\u2019s continued threats of punishing nations not living up to NATO\u2019s required spending helped that. Most of that money has gone straight to U.S. arms suppliers. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute<\/a>, \u201cFor the first time in two decades, the largest share of US arms exports in 2020\u201324 went to Europe.\u201d This means, Nissen said, that \u201cthere will be a lot of angry lobbyists from the defense industry if Europe stops the imports.\u201d<\/p>\n While Europe prepares<\/span> for a long-term shift in its relationship with Washington, its leaders are still trying to smooth over tensions.<\/p>\n Trump has provided many contradictory and incoherent reasons for wanting Greenland. In his meeting with Rubio, Rasmussen tried to address the most recent one: Trump\u2019s supposed fear of Russia or China taking over the island. At a subsequent press conference, Rasmussen said that he and his colleagues highlighted Denmark\u2019s investments in Arctic defense, explained that the United States could invest and base forces in Greenland, and noted that the United States has actually decreased the number of troops present on the island over the years. He had also pointed out that a Chinese warship hasn\u2019t been spotted around Greenland a decade.<\/p>\n Speaking with Danish reporters after the conference, Rasmussen offered one additional point. Trump, he said, previously wanted to own the Panama Canal but now seems to have dropped that obsession. If Europe can keep him occupied long enough, Rasmussen suggested, then perhaps he will also forget about Greenland.<\/p>\n The change in Europe is real. After all, European forces are still on the way to Greenland. But it seems European leaders haven\u2019t completely given up on the strategy of hoping and waiting either.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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