France is calling a on EU members to invoke the "anti-coercion instrument" if Trump imposes tariffs.
This means the US will be dealt penalties.
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Greenland Update
(343 Posts)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'd certainly not been aware that anyone had tried to buy Greenland in the past - so it's useful to know that.
The medical rape of those poor Inuit girls back in the 1970s era was certainly new info. to me recently. I can understand the Danish logic of "We have a welfare state and they'll be claiming from it for those 3rd or more children - as well as the basic two per woman". But yep....they were wrong to do that to them - making their choices for them/putting them through and very sexist (ie being girls only they were medically raping).
So yep...the Danes haven't always been kind to the Inuits and my own positive experiences of that same era of Danes being kind and helpful to me and finding their country more modern than my own was certainly not what they were on the receiving end of.
Basically though - it seems the Inuits are too small a community to manage on their own and the Danes seem to have stopped their bad treatment things they were doing to them and it amounts to "Lesser of two evils" for it to be the Danes in charge of Greenland.
I did read something somewhere that when the Americans decided they wanted to take over an Inuit town as an extra base for themselves they literally chucked the Inuits out in the cold - and told them to live in tents (in that climate!!!) whilst the Danes were building them a new town to live in instead! Awful treatment and it wouldnt surprise me if the Americans did some more literally chucking the Inuits out in the cold if they got to take over their country.
I didn't read that before posting!
In my third sentence, for " the US and Russia" read "China and Russia".
JenniferEccles
I certainly don’t condone Trump’s bully-boy tactics, but if he were to make a good offer to Denmark which was accepted, would it necessarily be such a bad thing?
As we’ve found, Denmark hasn’t exactly been squeaky clean in its dealings.
Neither has the Trump administration. I wouldn't trust them any further than I could kick them. They want to be bigger and more scary than the US and Russia, and they are not averse to taking any land that makes that happen. Owning Greenland would give them a very good base for annexing more territory. Canada is in between the US and Greenland. Scandinavia, Iceland, the Uk and Ireland are the next close. From there European countries could be picked off one by one. Meanwhile, Venezuela is a foothold in South America and offers the same opportunity for a military base from which to expand US influence and then ownership.
Paranoia? Perhaps, but what that regime has done so far would have been a paranoid fantasy just a year ago. Think back to the start of last January.
Oreo, I think the difference is, in the past, when usa suggested buying Greenland, they backed down when it was made clear it wasn't for sale. Trump has no such inhibitions.
I certainly don’t condone Trump’s bully-boy tactics, but if he were to make a good offer to Denmark which was accepted, would it necessarily be such a bad thing?
As we’ve found, Denmark hasn’t exactly been squeaky clean in its dealings.
I’d prefer it if the Uk wasn’t sitting on the naughty step to suit any world leader’s aspirations.
Aveline
Nevertheless, US already can put security in place in Greenland. No need to try to coerce it to be American.
Yes. This assumption that because a state has designs on another state, and has done so historically, therefore they have the right to obtain, or control it is an argument we see being used by Putin and Netanyahu plus others.
An argument you notice by over powerful leaders, and not one that should be encouraged.
Nevertheless, US already can put security in place in Greenland. No need to try to coerce it to be American.
I don’t think Denmark has been a kind ‘overlord’ to Greenland,
but of course it still belongs to them.
Apparently since the 1800s several previous US presidents have attempted to buy Greenland from Denmark.
In 1946 Truman offered $100,000 which was turned down.
Trump’s interest in the country then is nothing new.
Several articles about the history online.
Maybe we all need to ask ourselves, would we prefer Putin or the Chinese to acquire it instead?
Then in the early 1970s in an attempt to keep the Inuit population “at a manageable level” the Danes ruled that 14 year old girls were to be fitted with the contraceptive coil.
Thank you Oreo. I'll have a look
Yes, prospecting for sure, it may work or may not.It might not even be what DT and the US really want, it could be a way of making other NATO countries do more and pay more.
Offers to buy other countries that are not for sale are prospective, in themselves they carry no weight. It’s like saying you would like to buy the Crown Jewels, you cannot buy what is not for sale.
I’m interested in history so looked it up Grandmabatty😃
From the 1800’’s to 1955 there have been talks and efforts for the US to secure Greenland as it’s such a strategic island.
Those purchases were made a very long time ago. Absolutely no modern day comparison.
Oreo, I'm interested that you say US has been trying to buy Greenland for a while. How do you know that?
Cossy
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.You cannot buy something, however much you want it and are prepared to pay, even if you’re Trump
Just like Canada, Greenland isn’t for sale and this has been made clear multiple times.
Trump simply doesn’t understand that not everyone has “their price” and not everyone “gotta live a deal”
He can impose tariffs, they’ll just be imposed on them, he attacks he’s loses NATO!
You can buy land, the US bought Alaska from the Russians and then there was the Louisiana purchase from the French amongst many other land purchases around the world.
The US has been trying to buy Greenland for a long time, it isn’t just Trump trying to do this.
It will come down to either Denmark and Greenland wanting the money or another deal that more or less allows the US to do what they want with Greenland or Trump wanting less US personnel there and much more from NATO personnel.
I'm thinking of sending an entry to Private Eye's 'Lookalikes' section. One is a picture of Trump annexing Greenland. The other is a picture of Putin invading Ukraine.
David, the timing of Mr Trump's sudden anxiety about the safety of this place seems suspicious. Could it be in any way related to files regarding activities on Mr Epstein's island, I wonder?
Mr Trump is threatening tariffs on goods from countries that oppose him annexing Greenland.
So, his citizens, potentially, pay more for goods to " punish" nations that have upset him - how statesmanlike, and how respectful of his electorate.
It's as if a grumpy child is running a country.
Mr Orange Ego (aka Trump) is apparently now out to replace the United Nations - ie with an American-led organisation instead.
There's no end to that man's ego and demands...
Denmark will also benefit from the mineral wealth.
Whether Greenland becomes anti-western is for the Greenlanders to decide, not for an overmighty fool, who thinks he knows the price of everything, but in fact knows the value of nothing.
Whitewavemark2
Greenlanders, whilst not liking being partially ruled by Denmark, are content for the status quo for the foreseeable future, until they can become economically independent, and the rare minerals will give them that independence.
It is not for another mighty power to grab Greenland and it’s mineral wealth for their own.
They are content being subsidized by Denmark but once minerals are being exploited that will change, it is not in the interest of the US or anyone else in the West is for China or Russia to dominate Greenland.
An independant Greenland "could" be anti western, in the same way that Cuba is but that is a very distant threat. But in Trumps mind its real
Allira
CariadAgain
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.Military personnel sign up for a specified period of time.
It's not like a job where you can give a week's or month's notice.
I am now wondering what sort of troops the US would sign to occupy Greenland if it came to it. Guess it would be single men on pretty short-term contracts there so to say?
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