President-elect Donald Trump has sparked diplomatic controversy by suggesting the U.S. wants to amass Greenland for causes of “nationwide safety” and refusing to definitively rule out utilizing army pressure to take action. Greenland, a self-governing Danish territory, “isn’t on the market,” mentioned Denmark’s prime minister, Mette Frederiksen.
Trump’s curiosity in Greenland isn’t new. He first expressed curiosity within the territory in 2019, nevertheless it by no means developed into any motion.
Whether or not or not Trump has precise plans this time round to advance any try in Washington to personal Greenland is much from clear. However given the incoming president’s repeated statements and invocation of nationwide safety, it’s value contemplating what strategic worth Greenland may even have from the angle of the U.S.’s geopolitical priorities.
As a scholar of geopolitical conflicts involving pure assets and the Arctic, I imagine Greenland’s worth from a global political perspective will be considered when it comes to 4 basic areas: minerals, army presence, Arctic geopolitics and the territory’s potential independence.
A matter of minerals
Greenland’s most precious pure assets lie with its huge mineral wealth, which holds actual potential to advance its economic system. Recognized deposits embrace valuable metals comparable to gold and platinum, a variety of base metals – zinc, iron, copper, nickel, cobalt and uranium – and uncommon earth parts, together with neodymium, dysprosium and praseodymium. A detailed 2023 abstract printed by the Geologic Survey of Denmark and Greenland suggests new deposits can be discovered with the continued retreat of the Greenland Ice Sheet.
Greenland’s uncommon earth assets are notably vital. These parts are important not solely to battery, photo voltaic and wind expertise but additionally to army functions. If totally developed, the Kvanefjeld – or Kuannersuit in Greenlandic – uranium and uncommon earth deposit would place Greenland among the many high producers worldwide.
Throughout the 2010s, Greenland’s leaders inspired curiosity from exterior mining companies, together with main Chinese language firms, earlier than lastly granting a lease to the Australian firm Power Transition Minerals (previously Greenland Minerals Ltd).
When China’s Shenghe Assets took a serious share in Power Transition Minerals, it raised pink flags for Denmark, the European Union and the U.S., which felt China was looking for to increase its international dominance of the uncommon earth market whereas decreasing Europe’s personal potential provide.
The difficulty was put to relaxation in 2021 when Greenland’s parliament banned all uranium mining, killing additional improvement of Kvanefjeld in the interim. That very same yr noticed the federal government additionally prohibit any additional oil and gasoline exercise. Predictably, a majority of mining firms have subsequently steered clear of Greenland attributable to perceived concern of any funding being jeopardized by future political choices.
Fears of China overseas
China’s curiosity in Greenland stretches again at the least a decade.
In 2015, Greenland Minister of Finance and Inside Vittus Qujaukitsoq visited China to debate potential funding in mining, hydropower, port and different infrastructure initiatives. One agency, China Communications Development Firm, bid to construct two airports, one within the capital, Nuuk, the opposite in Ilulissat.
One other Chinese language agency, Common Good Group, supplied to buy an deserted Danish naval base in northeastern Greenland, whereas the Chinese language Academy of Sciences requested to construct a everlasting analysis middle and a satellite tv for pc floor station close to Nuuk.
None of this sat properly with the primary Trump administration, which put strain on Denmark to persuade Greenland’s authorities {that a} vital, official Chinese language presence on the island was undesirable. The Danes and Greenlanders complied, rebuffing Chinese language makes an attempt to spend money on Greenland-based initiatives.
The Trump administration, particularly, considered China’s curiosity in Greenland as having hidden business and army motives, issues that continued underneath the Biden administration in its latest lobbying of one other Australian mining agency to not promote any of its Greenland belongings to Chinese language firms.
Lengthy-standing US curiosity
The U.S. has had a long-standing safety curiosity in Greenland courting from 1946, when it supplied Denmark US$100 million in gold bullion for it. The Danes politely however firmly declined, with their overseas minister saying he didn’t really feel “we owe them the entire island.”
Within the early Nineteen Fifties, the usbuilt Thule Air Drive Base 750 miles (about 1,200 kilometers) north of the Arctic Circle. Initially a missile early warning and radio communications website, it was transferred to the newly shaped U.S. Area Drive in 2020 and renamed Pituffik Area Base in 2023.
The northernmost army facility of the U.S., Pituffik has up to date radar and monitoring capabilities to offer missile warning, protection and area surveillance, and satellite tv for pc command missions. Whereas it additionally helps scientific analysis targeted on the Arctic, the bottom is meant to extend army capabilities within the Arctic area for each the U.S. and its allies.
The bottom has the power to trace delivery in addition to air and satellite tv for pc positions, giving it each actual and symbolic significance to American strategic pursuits within the Arctic. Consequently, a lot of the U.S. overseas coverage institution, not simply these in Trump’s orbit, view any notable Chinese language presence in Greenland, whether or not momentary or everlasting, with concern.
Geopolitics of the Arctic
Greenland is geographically located between the Northern Sea Route and the Northwest Passage, two Arctic delivery routes whose significance is rising as sea ice shrinks. By round 2050, a Transpolar Sea Route is prone to open by the central Arctic Ocean, passing Greenland’s jap shores. Moreover, the island is the idea of Denmark’s sovereignty declare to the North Pole – rivaled by claims by Russia and Canada.
Whereas worldwide regulation acknowledges no nationwide sovereignty in worldwide waters, that has accomplished little to finish the diplomatic tug-of-war over the pole. The matter is much from trivial: Sovereignty would give a rustic entry to probably vital oil, gasoline and uncommon earth assets, in addition to superior scientific and army entry to the longer term Transpolar Sea Route.
But, this dispute over possession of the North Pole is just one a part of the geopolitical battle for offshore territory within the area. Russia’s rising militarization of its huge coastal space has been countered by NATO army workouts in northern Scandinavia, whereas China’s personal strikes into the Arctic, aided by Moscow, has seen the launch of a number of analysis stations supported by icebreakers and agreements for analysis and business initiatives.
China’s authorities has additionally asserted it has rights within the area, for navigation, fishing, overflight, funding in oil and gasoline initiatives, and extra.
Greenland for Greenlanders?
All of those components assist decipher the realities concerned within the U.S.-Denmark-Greenland relationship. Regardless of Trump’s phrases, I imagine this can be very unlikely he would truly use U.S. army pressure to take Greenland, and it’s an open query whether or not he would use coercive financial insurance policies within the type of tariffs towards Denmark to provide him leverage in negotiating a purchase order of Greenland.
But whereas Trump and different overseas coverage outsiders view Greenland by an exterior strategic and financial lens, the island is house to just about 60,000 folks – 90% of them indigenous Inuit – lots of whom deal with the designs of overseas nations on their territory with skepticism.
Certainly, in 2008, Greenland voted to pursue nationhood. The island receives an annual subsidy of 500 million euros ($513 million) from Denmark, and to additional financial independence, it has sought overseas funding.
Curiosity from China has accompanied Greenland’s strikes towards independence, backed by Beijing’s technique to be an Arctic participant. The pondering in Beijing could also be that an unbiased Greenland can be much less shackled to NATO and the European Union, and as such, extra open to funding from additional afield.
Paradoxically, Trump’s latest feedback have the potential of reaching one thing very completely different than their intention by encouraging Greenland’s prime minister, Mute Egede, to suggest a referendum in 2025 on full independence.
“It’s now time for our nation to take the subsequent step,” he mentioned. “We should work to take away … the shackles of colonialism.”
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