Whether it was Will Rogers or Tony Soprano, the old suggestion to “buy land, God’s not making any more of it” is good real estate advice, but it’s hardly an iron law. First of all, God does make more land from time to time. And so do humans. This raises a second famous piece of advice, also of unclear authorship. When it comes to real estate only three things matter: location, location, and location.
And that brings us to Greenland.
Donald Trump wants to acquire it. Nay, he says we need to acquire it. The last time he was president, he floated the idea and was roundly mocked for it. But not by me, and I am hardly averse to mocking Trump when the moment calls for it. For myriad reasons, it would be in our interest for the United States to annex, lease, absorb, or otherwise acquire the giant island. The most important of these reasons is, of course, location.
That’s why I’ve long thought acquiring Greenland—peacefully!—was a good idea. (Indeed, last year, I despaired of the “Greenland effect”—the phenomenon whereby Trump’s embrace of a good idea makes it less popular.).
But my opinion doesn’t count for much. James Stavridis, the former supreme allied commander of NATO, and hardly a MAGA toady, agrees. He writes that the Mexico-sized island “is a vital element of the Greenland-Iceland-UK ‘gap’ that guards the northern approaches to the Atlantic Ocean from Russian naval forces.”
It’s also believed Greenland has huge deposits of crucial rare-earth minerals, essential to all manner of high-tech industries, industries China is trying to control or dominate, in part by establishing a near monopoly on such resources.
Long before anyone appreciated the importance of this stuff, the Truman administration recognized the value of Greenland and tried to persuade the Danes —who administer the quasi-independent nation—to part with it. The Danes politely said no. But the issue was mostly resolved a few years later when Denmark became a founding member of the NATO alliance. They agreed to work with us on using it to bolster Western defenses.
Trump claims that’s not good enough. In a recent press conference, Trump refused to rule out the use of force to take Greenland (and the Panama Canal).
“For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity,” Trump insists.
The best defense—really the only defense—of Trump’s rhetoric is that it’s a negotiating tactic: Start with an outlandish ask, and then find a compromise that would have been impossible without it.
Again, the problem with this classic example of turd-polishing Trump’s rhetoric—“take him seriously, not literally” as they say—is that Denmark and Greenland are already generously cooperating with the U.S. on national security issues. We literally have a vital military installation in Greenland already.
So, what could that compromise be? Some special leasing deal for mining? Okay, maybe. But, surely, there’s a better way to pursue that with a longtime ally than threatening military force?
Acquiring Greenland is a serious idea, but pursuing it in an unserious way is worse than not pursuing it at all.
If Trump went full Putin and invaded Greenland—or even seriously threatened to by deploying ships to intimidate Denmark—it would likely spell the end of NATO. The supposed rationale for controlling Greenland is to deter Russia and protect the “freedom” of the world. But Putin would see the implosion of NATO as a small price for the transformation of Greenland into an arctic Puerto Rico. (By the way, Trump floated the idea of trading Puerto Rico for Greenland.)
Even more annoying: Trump and his sycophants have spent the better part of the last decade insisting that the GOP was kidnapped by “neocon” warmongers and imperialists hell-bent on “provoking” “foreign wars” for abstract goals like “freedom.”
Say what you will about the calumnies and blood libel against “neocons,” none of them floated the idea of provoking a foreign war with democratic allies.
But when Trump threatens exactly that, well, that’s just so cool apparently. The people who insist that Trumpian nationalism is a Very Serious Idea invariably find themselves having to bend their Very Serious Arguments to the fact that Trump doesn’t care about arguments and ideas. He’s just a real estate guy who likes putting his name on stuff.
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