Telegraph today
Trump’s plan to make Greenlanders an offer they can’t refuse
Sounds more than a little ominous?
Really interesting article covering two things
1) Trumps complete “lie” about Russian and China having ships in Greenland water, not ONE local report from Greenland, across many sources, about spitting even ONE ship.
2) Very very interesting info around Greenland’s minerals. A good read if you have time, link below.
It raises yet again how gun-ho Trump is about getting what he wants, lying, cheating and breaking all kinds of protocol because man-child Trump chooses.
My heart goes out to Greenlanders, who appear very content with Denmark and both Greenland and Denmark have cooperated fully with USA re security since the 1950’s.
My view? Come on Europe, pool ALL your resources and stop this idiot before he ruins our entire world with his greed.
What do you think?
Just in case link doesn’t work, salient points from the article are below, warning, it’s long!
.*Trump’s plan to make Greenlanders an offer they can’t refuse
US proposals to buy the island have been met with protests and alarm by locals
Eir Nolsøe is Economics Correspondent at The Telegraph covering stories on government tax and spend, the labour market and monetary policy.
When Aka Binzer-Johnsen prepared her two daughters for school and nursery after the holidays at the start of January, she felt compelled to tell them about Donald Trump. “I asked my daughters if they could remember from last year that Trump really wants our country,” she says. “I tried to explain in a child-friendly way that this is happening again, and if they hear anything, that’s why.”
The 38-year-old mother, her husband Uju and their daughters, aged five and seven, live on the outskirts of Nuuk, the capital of Greenland.
Home to just 20,000 people, life in the quiet town with colourful wooden houses normally feels safe and far removed from the world’s troubles.
But the US president’s threats to seize Greenland have brought a crisis to Nuuk’s doorstep. “This was always like a safe little bubble,” says Binzer-Johnsen, who is a project manager for a charity. “That’s what we are used to from growing up here.”
She adds: “Everything has changed so fast. People are very scared, and emotions are heightened. I’ve felt really bad about what is going on. I’ve had sleepless nights.
“I have so many questions, wondering what we are going to do. If I want to protect my family, is this the time to act?
“I constantly feel ready to flee and leave, just for a period. But at the same time, we can’t just stop living. Everything we’ve invested in is here: our dreams and our life.”
Such considerations are now weighing on the minds of many Greenlanders, regardless of the territory’s status as a Nato member and having served as an American ally for more than 80 years.
The fate of the world’s largest island has been thrust back into the spotlight this month following Trump’s capture of Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelan president.
Buoyed by his coup in Latin America, Trump has now set his sights on Greenland, the sparsely populated autonomous Danish territory.
“We need Greenland from a national security situation,” Mr Trump said last week, adding that he may have to choose between preserving Nato or expanding America’s influence in the western hemisphere.
“It’s so strategic. Right now, Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships all over the place.”
The threats have sent alarm bells ringing in Copenhagen and Brussels, prompting stunned European leaders to issue a joint statement saying they will “not stop defending” Greenland.
However, it should not come as a surprise.
The US president has long been fascinated by Greenland, which has been part of the Danish kingdom for hundreds of years, like the Faroe Islands.
Trump first proposed buying the island during his first term in 2019, comparing it to “a large real estate deal”.
Seven years later, he has returned to the issue, alternating between threats of military force and offers to make Greenlanders rich.
All in all, last week’s events suggest the US president may be determined to make Greenlanders an offer they can’t refuse.
However, in Nuuk, the mood is one of anger and defiance.
“He can go f--- himself,” is the verdict from a local pensioner.
So why has the world’s most powerful man decided that, come hell or high water, he must own the world’s largest island?
“The Arctic is the crossroads of the world,” says Dwayne Menezes, founder of the Polar Research and Policy Initiative in London.
“Greenland is strategically located along the shortest air and sea routes between three continents: North America, Europe and Asia.”
The country’s position means it would offer the shortest route for ballistic missiles targeting North America, and it is key to surveillance in the Arctic.
“It also is a vast resource frontier, all of which is becoming increasingly strategically important for the US, but also increasingly accessible because of climate change,” Menezes adds.
The US has cooperated with Greenland and Denmark on national security since the Second World War.
Americans operate the island’s only military base. Some 150 US soldiers staff the Pituffik Space Base on the north-west coast, down from 6,000 during the Cold War.
This is part of a defence agreement that has been in place between the US and Denmark since 1951.
“The US has had such critical infrastructure in Greenland since the Second World War, through the Cold War, and more recently, even now, it plays a very, very important role for the Space Force,” Menezes says.
Experts and locals are also sceptical of US claims that the island’s waters are full of ships from hostile states that pose a threat.
“If there are so many Chinese and Russian ships here, then how can it be that only Donald Trump has seen them?” says Frans Heilmann, the boss of fishing company Sigguk.
Heilmann adds: “All of Greenland is full of fishing trawlers. I have not heard of a single trawler that has spotted either a Russian or Chinese vessel near our coasts.
“I am not sure he [Trump] has much of a conscience. He says Greenland’s strategic position means he needs us for national security.
“But he already has that. That argument is worthless. He’s just after the minerals. He’s a trophy hunter.”
The suspicion that Trump’s interest in Greenland is its vast deposits of rare earths is widespread.
“It’s not really any more about wanting to get Greenland because of security reasons, but coming up with security reasons to get Greenland,” says Menezes.*
The island is rich in resources ranging from uranium that can be used to power nuclear plants to obscure minerals critical for modern-day electronics.*
apple.news/ADUBx4ZdcRbmK5xmG_p4znw
I've not seen news re the Native American Indians! Quite prepared to believe he's done that though. Do you have a link to that info?
(Thinks if only our darn newspapers didn't waste so much of their space printing stuff about sports people/influencers/royal families/etc and printed some news instead).
Google it, Cariad There are a lot of links. They deny it, but a lot of accounts seem to confirm that it has happened.
ronib
I don’t understand why Greenland is not more proactive in mining its natural resources. Why does it need someone like Donald Trump to come along and push for mineral exploration and extraction? Why not Greenlanders themselves?
One very good reason is that Greenland on its own cannot afford to mine and market minerals. And the Greenlanders have the good sense to realise that if they let others (USA or China mine them they are putting themselves at risk of a take-over bid like the one Trump has been proposing (threatening) for a year now.
Now Denmark and other Nato members are increasing the military presence in Greenland, something that was made clear at the recent meeting between the Danish Foreign Secretary and the Greenlandic when they met their American counterpart earlier this week.
It is a step in the right direction that the matter is now being discussed by politicians and diplomats on both sides, instead of just being aired on media and social media.
Even more heartening was to hear the categorical opinions of American senators visiting Denmark at present. You may not have had this reported in the UK yet, but they stated very clearly that their President cannot take over Greenland either by putting forth a monetary offer or by force.
Trump has, of course, said he needs Greenland and is going to have it - well, we all expected that didn't we?
Let us all just hope there even for him is a difference between what he wants and what he can have.
Thanks AuntieE, good news that Politicians are attempting to intervene.
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Wouldn't a mutiny be good!
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
Allira
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
I was asking if military people could quit if they disliked acts advocated by the department of war? May they quit at any time, I've no idea however I assume so.
Norah
Allira
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
I was asking if military people could quit if they disliked acts advocated by the department of war? May they quit at any time, I've no idea however I assume so.
No, I believe that, like the UK, they sign on for a number of years.
You can't just give a week's notice.
Trump has announced plans to impose extra tariffs on UK, Denmark and other European countries over Greenland.
Allira
Norah
Allira
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
I was asking if military people could quit if they disliked acts advocated by the department of war? May they quit at any time, I've no idea however I assume so.
No, I believe that, like the UK, they sign on for a number of years.
You can't just give a week's notice.
Young acquaintances at RAF Lakenheath frequently quit, I suppose there are many factors allowing one to up sticks. One being moving home.
Bully boy tactics to raise the tariffs.
Norah
Allira
Norah
Allira
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
I was asking if military people could quit if they disliked acts advocated by the department of war? May they quit at any time, I've no idea however I assume so.
No, I believe that, like the UK, they sign on for a number of years.
You can't just give a week's notice.Young acquaintances at RAF Lakenheath frequently quit, I suppose there are many factors allowing one to up sticks. One being moving home.
I suppose there are many factors allowing one to up sticks. One being moving home.
Sorry, I don't understand.
Allira
Norah
Maremia
I also get the impression, but have no evidence yet, that the USA military is also against 'taking' Greenland.
Could not the military quit their military job?
Why should they?
Morals?
The thought that amuses me that if Trump chucks a load of Americans into squatting in Greenland against the will of the Greenlanders themselves being = has he clicked just how fast the Greenlanders could decide to send the lot of them to Coventry (refuse to socialise with them, refuse to sell them anything, refuse absolutely everything to do with them). Just make their life an absolute misery - as it's a tactic that works with a lot of people. Even the most battle-hardened member of the US troops would probably feel more than a little disheartened when he'd had a dozen Greenlanders walking or driving past him in the street - apparently totally oblivious that there was anyone else anywhere near them.
I think the service personnel will have everything they need already on the base there, US bases in this country do.
They may or not mind if Greenlanders don’t speak to them.
This whole taking Greenland in this way is bizarre, I think if it goes ahead the US will pay Denmark a fortune.
Norah Service personnel sign a contract for so many years.
If they have to move to another army/naval/ airforce base that’s one thing but they can’t just clear off.
The Congress and the Senate are both against this daft notion. This might just be Trump's Waterloo. I do hope so.
In the middle of this horror story, one thing intrigues me, the " threat" of tariffs.
So, American consumers are going to pay the price on imports from countries Mr Trump is feels angry with: such statesmanlike behaviour.
O
Surprised that nobody seems interested in the plan Trump has to raise tariffs for the UK and others over the Greenland row.
CariadAgain
I've not seen news re the Native American Indians! Quite prepared to believe he's done that though. Do you have a link to that info?
(Thinks if only our darn newspapers didn't waste so much of their space printing stuff about sports people/influencers/royal families/etc and printed some news instead).
Try The Guardian - they barely mention the Royals and the Sports section is separate from the rest.
CariadAgain
I don’t think the lack of integration would worry the us military.
The population of Greenland is 56,000 people.
They’ll be lucky if the see any people.
Oreo
I think the service personnel will have everything they need already on the base there, US bases in this country do.
They may or not mind if Greenlanders don’t speak to them.
This whole taking Greenland in this way is bizarre, I think if it goes ahead the US will pay Denmark a fortune.
Denmark will never sell for sure
European leaders including the UK.have responded strongly to threats from the US.
Trump says he will buy Greenland.
Good to see Europe standing together to defend their fellow NATO countries.
Threats of tariffs has not had the effect Trump wants.
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