Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on Monday that the United States had taken over Greenland This would mean the end of the NATO military alliance. Her comments came in response to President Donald Trump’s renewed calls for the United States to take control of the mineral-rich strategic island following a weekend military operation in Venezuela.
U.S. military conducts late-night arrest operation in Caracas leader nicolas maduro Earlier on Saturday, he and his wife shocked the world and heightened concerns in Denmark and Greenland. Greenland is a semi-autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark and therefore part of NATO.
Frederiksen and his Greenlandic counterpart Jens Frederik Nielsen slammed the president’s comments and warned they would have catastrophic consequences. Many European leaders expressed solidarity with them.
“If the United States chooses to launch a military attack on another NATO country, then everything stops,” Frederiksen told Danish broadcaster TV2 on Monday. “That is, including our NATO and the security it has provided since the end of World War II.”
20-day timetable deepens fears
Trump repeatedly called for U.S. jurisdiction over Greenland during the presidential transition and in the early months of his second term and did not rule out using military force to control the island. His comments on Sunday, including telling reporters “let’s talk about Greenland in 20 days,” further heightened concerns that the United States plans to intervene in Greenland in the near future.
Frederiksen also said that when Trump says he wants Greenland, it “should be taken seriously.” “We will not accept a situation where we and Greenland are threatened in this way,” she added.
Nielsen told a news conference on Monday that Greenland cannot be compared to Venezuela. He urged voters to remain calm and united.
“We don’t think the country could be taken over overnight, which is why we insist on good cooperation,” he said.
“It is not the case that the United States can easily conquer Greenland,” Nielsen added.
TV2 political reporter Ask Rostrup wrote on the station’s live blog on Monday that Mette would have categorically rejected the idea of a US takeover of Greenland. But now, Rostrup writes, the rhetoric has escalated to such an extent that she has to acknowledge the possibility.
Trump slams Denmark’s security efforts in Greenland
Trump on Sunday also mocked Denmark’s efforts to improve Greenland’s national security posture, saying the Danes had added “another dog sled” to the Arctic region’s arsenal.
“This is very strategic right now,” Trump told reporters Sunday as he flew back to Washington from his home in Florida. “Greenland is full of Russian and Chinese ships.”
He added: “From a national security perspective, we need Greenland, but Denmark can’t do that.”
But Ulrik Pram Gad, a global security expert at the Danish Institute for International Studies, wrote in a report last year that “Russian and Chinese ships do exist in the Arctic, but they are too far from Greenland to be seen with or without binoculars.”
U.S. space base in northwest Greenland
Greenlanders and Danes were further angered by a social media post this weekend after former Trump administration official and current podcaster Katie Miller was raided. The post shows an illustrated map of Greenland in the colors of the Stars and Stripes, along with the caption: “Coming Soon.”
“Yes, we want the territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Denmark to be fully respected,” Jesper Møller Sørensen, Denmark’s chief envoy to Washington, said in a post responding to Miller, the wife of Trump’s influential deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller.
The U.S. Department of Defense operates the remote Pitufik Space Base in northwestern Greenland. It was built under a 1951 defense agreement between Denmark and the United States. It supports U.S. and NATO missile warning, missile defense and space surveillance operations.
Back home in Denmark, the partnership between the United States and Denmark is long-term. The Danes have purchased American F-35 fighter jets, and just last year the Danish parliament approved a bill allowing the United States to establish military bases on Danish soil.
Critics said the vote ceded Danish sovereignty to the United States. The legislation expands a previous military agreement with the Biden administration in 2023, which gave U.S. troops broad access to Danish air bases in the Scandinavian country.
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Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland, and Dazio reported from Berlin.