By Georgi Kantchev
Updated Jan. 8, 2025 12:35 pm ET
Donald Trump Jr., a son of the U.S. president-elect, landed in Greenland earlier this week, on a trip billed as private. PHOTO: EMIL STACH/ASSOCIATED PRESSPresident-elect Donald Trump has set his sights on a vast, ice-covered and sparsely populated island with a strategic location on the edge of the Arctic—and a whole lot of mineral riches.
At more than three times the size of Texas, Greenland’s ample deposits in rare earths, oil and gas, as well as its commanding position astride crucial trade and military arteries, have made it a focal point for major rival powers including the U.S., China and Russia.
Greenland’s rising profile reflects the larger global scramble for the Arctic as climate change opens maritime routes and reorders geopolitics at the top of the world. Russia reopened dozens of Soviet military bases in the Arctic as tensions with the West worsened over the invasion of Ukraine. China has pursued expanding shipping routes through the region’s melting ice and exploiting Greenland’s natural resources, including minerals used in everything from phones to electric cars and military equipment.
“We need it for national security,” Trump said Tuesday, refusing to rule out using military force to seize control of Greenland, as well as of the Panama Canal.
The president-elect’s latest comments sparked outrage among some officials and lawmakers in Europe, in particular Denmark, Greenland’s former colonial ruler that still governs foreign and security policy on the island and is a close U.S. ally.
Donald Trump declined to rule out using military or economic coercion to gain control of Greenland and the Panama Canal. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty
On Wednesday, outgoing Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the idea about Greenland wasn’t a good one. “But maybe more importantly, it’s obviously one that’s not going to happen. So we probably shouldn’t waste a lot of time talking about it,” Blinken said during a visit to Paris.
Control over Greenland and the broader Arctic is valuable for projecting power, monitoring activities of rivals and securing shipping routes, analysts and officials say.
Trump’s national-security team has held preliminary talks about how to begin negotiations with Greenland and Denmark once he takes office, The Wall Street Journal has reported.
The U.S. already has a presence on the island with what is its northernmost base, the Pituffik Space Base, formerly known as Thule Air Base. It includes a radar station that is part of the U.S.’s ballistic missile early-warning system.
Greenland is also part of what is known as the GIUK gap, a crucial naval chokepoint between Greenland, Iceland and the U.K. that was closely watched during the Cold War. In recent years, Russia has increased its submarine patrols and exercises in the area.
Greenlanders and Danes say the island isn’t for sale. A self-ruling part of the Kingdom of Denmark, Greenland, with a population of around 56,000, decides on most domestic matters.
“Greenland belongs to the people of Greenland,” Múte Egede, the island’s prime minister, wrote in a social-media post Tuesday. “Our future and fight for independence is our business.”
But world powers have been circling for some time.
Beijing has boosted its economic presence in the area, including investment in mining operations in Greenland. The Pentagon worked successfully in 2018 to block China from financing three airports on the island.
The U.S. has a presence on Greenland with the Pituffik Space Base. PHOTO: RITZAU SCANPIX/REUTERSChina is particularly interested because of Greenland’s position relative to all Arctic shipping routes, including Beijing’s “Polar Silk Road” that would make use of the shorter distance to ship goods via the Arctic, avoiding maritime chokepoints at the Suez Canal and the Malacca Strait.
With Trump’s threats to supercharge tariffs on China, Greenland’s vast deposits of rare-earth elements are also becoming increasingly important. The island holds 1.5 million tons of reserves of these materials, according to estimates by the U.S. Geological Survey, not far off the 1.8 million tons in the U.S. China, though, dominates global rare-earth reserves with 44 million tons of deposits and analysts say that it could wield its access to those as a weapon in a trade war.
“When you consider how close the largest untapped deposits of graphite and rare earths are to the eastern U.S., it’s obvious Greenland could be a raw-materials resource” for America, said Stefan Bernstein, chief executive of GreenRoc Strategic Materials, which has operations in the territory.
The British company is seeking the capital it needs to produce graphite—a component of electric-vehicle batteries—and recently submitted an application in Greenland for what is called an exploitation license.
Countries are increasingly interested in securing access to other sources of graphite in the wake of strengthened Chinese export restrictions on the mineral.
Greenland’s resources have been talked about for years, but the opportunities in its nascent mining industry haven’t materialized because it has been difficult to convince investors to risk capital to get projects off the ground, Bernstein said.
Still, KoBold Metals, which is backed by Bill Gates’s Breakthrough Energy Ventures and venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, in recent years undertook early-stage exploration in the territory for critical minerals. The company uses artificial intelligence to scope out deposits others might have missed.
Greenland’s vast deposits of rare-earth elements are becoming increasingly important. PHOTO: HANNIBAL HANSCHKE/REUTERSDanish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told Danish television that although Greenland wasn’t up for grabs, she welcomed an increased U.S. role in the region given moves by other powers such as Russia. Other Danish officials were less diplomatic.
“This level of disrespect from the coming U.S. president towards very, very loyal allies and friends is record setting,” Rasmus Jarlov, a member of the Danish Parliament, wrote on X.
Ahead of Trump’s comments Tuesday, his son Donald Trump Jr. landed in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, in a Trump-branded plane on a trip billed as private.
Despite repeated rebuttals from Danish authorities, the president-elect has remained fixated on the idea of taking control of Greenland, a concept he initially floated in 2019.
Robert O’Brien, Trump’s national-security adviser between 2019 and 2021, said at the end of December that the president-elect was “100% right” that Greenland is critical to the defense of the U.S. “We love the Danes but a couple of additional drones, dogsled teams & inspection ships are not enough to defend Greenland against the Russians & Chinese Communists,” he wrote on X. “If our great ally Denmark can’t commit to defending the Island, the U.S. will have to step in.”
On Wednesday, Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said that with Russia arming itself in the Arctic, and China taking increased interest in the area, it was legitimate for the U.S. and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to have security concerns.
“In conjunction with the fact that we are seeing a melting in the Arctic, so that new shipping routes are opening up, we are, unfortunately, also seeing increasing great-power rivalry,” Rasmussen told reporters.
Others in the European Union have come to Greenland’s defense.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had discussed the issue with European colleagues and “a certain lack of understanding became clear with regard to current statements from the U.S.” He said “the principle of the inviolability of borders applies to every country.”
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said the autonomous Danish territory is part of the EU. “It is out of the question that the European Union would let other countries, whoever they are, and starting with Russia, attack its sovereign borders,” he said on French radio on Wednesday.
Greenland’s government has recently stepped up its push for independence. PHOTO: OLIVIER MORIN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGESIt isn’t clear how taking control of Greenland would be achieved. Some of Trump’s advisers acknowledge a sale is unlikely, but an expansion of U.S. presence on the island, through investments and a larger military footprint, is a possibility, the Journal has reported.
Greenlanders themselves are left guessing.
“I believe that the rhetoric we hear from Trump is likely also about not being willing to show what cards he holds—he wants to keep his listeners on their toes,” said Aki-Matilda Høegh-Dam, Greenlandic representative in the Danish Parliament.
Either way, she said, “Trump’s statement underscores the growing geopolitical importance of Greenland.”
Besides rare earths, there are around 17.5 billion untapped barrels of oil and 148.2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas off Greenland, according to estimates by the U.S. Geological Survey.
The notion of the U.S. acquiring Greenland dates back to the 1860s under the administration of President Andrew Johnson, who was interested in expanding American territory, but that attempt ultimately failed.
Following World War II, the U.S. developed a strong interest in Greenland because of its strategic importance in the emerging Cold War. In 1946, under President Harry Truman’s administration, the U.S. made a formal offer to purchase Greenland from Denmark for $100 million in gold. Denmark declined. Trump hasn’t so far floated a concrete figure for any purchase.
For many Greenlanders, though, the focus isn’t on superpower rivalry but on their own sovereignty.
A movement to gain independence from Denmark, with whom they have a long history of strained relations, has gained traction in recent years and the government of the island has recently stepped up its push for independence. Still, Greenland, whose main export is fish, relies heavily on Denmark for annual financial support to the tune of nearly $600 million.
“We want to become an independent state, and we will not accept being colonized by any country again,” Høegh-Dam said.