Four paths this saga could take

In recent weeks, US President-elect Donald Trump has shown renewed interest in taking control of Greenland, a largely autonomous territory of Denmark in the Arctic and the world’s largest island.

He first indicated his intention to buy Greenland in 2019, during his first term as president, but this week he went further and refused to rule out economic or military force taking control of Greenland.

Danish and European officials have responded negatively, saying Greenland is not for sale and its territorial integrity must be preserved.

So how could this unusual situation play out, with two NATO allies facing off over a huge territory that is 80% covered by ice but has considerable untapped mineral wealth?

And how could the independence aspirations of the 56,000 inhabitants of Greenland, under Danish control for 300 years, affect the final result?

Here we look at four possible scenarios for Greenland’s future.

There is some speculation that Trump’s move is simply grandstanding, a move to get Denmark to improve Greenland’s security amid the threat of both Russia and China seeking influence in the region.

last month, Denmark announced new $1.5bn (£1.2bn) military package for the Arctic. It had been prepared ahead of Trump’s comments, but the Danish Defense Minister described the announcement a few hours later as an “irony of fate.”

“The important thing about what Trump said was that Denmark has to fulfill its obligations in the Arctic or it will have to let the United States do it,” says Elisabet Svane, chief political correspondent for the newspaper Politiken.

Marc Jacobsen, associate professor at the Royal Danish Defense College, believes this is a case of Trump “positioning himself before taking office,” while Greenland uses the occasion to gain more international authority, as an important step toward independence.

So even if Trump were to lose further interest in Greenland now, which Professor Jacobsen believes is the most likely scenario, he has certainly put a spotlight on the issue.

But Greenland independence has been on the agenda for many years and some say the debate could even go in the opposite direction.

“I have noticed that in recent days the Prime Minister of Greenland is calmer in his comments: yes, we want independence, but in the long term,” says Svane.

There is a general consensus in Greenland that independence will come eventually, and also that if Greenland votes for it, Denmark will accept and ratify it.

However, Greenland is also unlikely to vote for independence unless its people are given assurances that they can keep the subsidies they currently receive from Denmark to pay for things like healthcare and the social welfare system.

“Greenland’s prime minister may be up in arms now, but in the event that he calls a referendum, he will need some kind of compelling narrative about how to save Greenland’s economy and welfare system,” said Ulrik Gad, senior researcher at the said to the BBC the Danish Institute of International Studies.

A possible next step is a free association, something similar to what the United States currently has with the Pacific states: the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau.

Denmark has previously opposed this status for both Greenland and the Faroe Islands, but according to Dr. Gad, the current Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, is not categorically against it.

“The Danish understanding of Greenland’s historical experience is much better than 20 years ago,” he says, and Denmark accepts colonial responsibility.

The recent discussions “could persuade (Frederiksen) to say: it is better to keep Denmark in the Arctic, to keep some kind of connection with Greenland, even if it is looser,” he adds.

But even if Greenland manages to get rid of Denmark, it has become clear in recent years that it cannot get rid of the United States. The Americans never really left after taking control of the island in World War II, and consider it vital to their security.

An agreement in 1951 affirmed Denmark’s basic sovereignty over the island but, in practice, gave the United States everything it wanted.

Dr. Gad said Greenland officials had been in contact with the last two US administrations about Washington’s role.

“Now they know that America will never leave,” he said.

There has been speculation that Trump’s economic rhetoric is potentially the biggest threat to Denmark: the United States dramatically increases tariffs on Danish, or even EU, goods, forcing Denmark to make concessions of some kind on Greenland.

Professor Jacobsen says Danish governments have been preparing for that, and not just for the Arctic territory.

Trump has been threatening universal 10% tariffs on all US imports that could, among other things, significantly disrupt European growth, and some Danish and other European companies are now considering setting up manufacturing bases in the United States.

Possible options for raising tariffs include invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) of 1977, Benjamin Cote of international law firm Pillsbury told the website MarketWatch.

One of the main Danish industries potentially affected by this is pharmaceuticals. The United States receives products such as hearing aids and most of its insulin from Denmark, as well as the diabetes drug Ozempic, made by the Danish company Novo Nordisk.

Analysts say the price increase that would result from these measures would not be well received by the American public.

The “nuclear option” seems far-fetched, but since Trump does not rule out military action, it must be considered.

Basically, it wouldn’t be difficult for the United States to take control, given that they already have bases and many troops in Greenland.

“The United States is already in de facto control,” says Professor Jacobsen, adding that Trump’s comments seemed ill-informed and he did not understand the meaning of them.

That said, any use of military force by Washington would create an international incident.

“If they invade Greenland, they invade NATO,” says Svane. “So that’s where it ends. Article 5 would have to be activated. And if a NATO country invades NATO then there will be no NATO.”

Dr. Gad says Trump sounds like Chinese President Xi Jinping talking about Taiwan or Russia’s Vladimir Putin talking about Ukraine.

“You’re saying it’s legitimate for us to take this piece of land,” he says. “If we take it really seriously, this bodes badly for the entire Western alliance.”