Danish Officials Now Betting on U.S. Cooperation Over Greenland

On Wednesday, after a closed-door meeting with American officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance, Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen held a press conference. His remarks sounded cautiously optimistic.

Denmark will join a high-level working group to discuss Greenland's future after talks at the White House with senior Trump administration officials.
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told a press conference Wednesday that the closed-door meeting, attended by Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, was a "frank but also constructive" discussion and an opportunity to "challenge the narrative presented by the American president."

The narrative presented by the American president, as we've been reporting, is that Greenland should become an American possession. Needless to say, Denmark and Greenland aren't keen on the idea.

President Donald Trump has showed no sign of cooling his Arctic ambitions, vowing to take control of Greenland “one way or the other,” citing concerns it could be vulnerable to Russia or China. The White House has refused to rule out military action to seize Greenland from Denmark, alarming allies and rattling the NATO alliance.

While it seems unlikely that the United States would attempt to take Greenland by force, the big island does in fact occupy a vital strategic position in the North Atlantic; it's something worth trying to make a deal over.

'Going to Be a Big Problem for Him': Trump Smacks Down Greenland PM Who Says He ‘Chooses Denmark’

The Danish Foreign Minister seems to think some kind of rapprochement is possible, but both he and Greenland's minister stop short of Greenland's status changing vis-a-vis being a semi-autonomous possession of Denmark.

Rasmussen said a high-level working group would be formed and meet within weeks "to explore if we can find a common way forward" on security while respecting Denmark's red lines, referring to demands for U.S. ownership of the vast, semi-autonomous territory as “totally unacceptable.”
“Whether that is doable, I don't know, but I hope it could take down the temperature,” he added.
Greenland’s minister of foreign affairs, Vivian Motzfeldt, said strengthening cooperation “doesn’t mean we want to be owned by the United States,” adding: “We have shown where our limits are.”

President Trump has been insistent on taking Greenland as an American possession, but it's unclear whether or not this is some "Art of the Deal" move on the president's part. An agreement to increase the American military presence on the island, along with some kind of deal over oil/gas extraction and mining, seems much more likely. It would benefit the United States and Greenland as well, while providing some extra security in the area. And the location is likely to become more important in the coming years, as Chinese interest in the Arctic and their cooperation with Russia are both increasing; Russia, remember, owns almost half of the Arctic Ocean's shoreline, and Greenland sits astride the largest oceanic access point to the Arctic.

As for Greenland, its stance is clear:

Ahead of the meeting, Greenland Prime Minister Jens-FrederikNielsen made his stance clear.
“Greenland does not want to be owned by the USA. Greenland does not want to be governed by the USA. Greenland will not be part of the USA. We choose the Greenland we know today, which is part of the Kingdom of Denmark,” he said in a news conference Tuesday with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen in Copenhagen.
“Now we are faced with a geopolitical crisis, and if we have to choose between the USA and Denmark here and now, we choose Denmark.”

As of this writing, no further meetings have yet been scheduled. Stay tuned.

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