Is President Dolad Trump’s obsession with the idea of making Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, the 51st state of the United States linked with his grandiose scheme of developing the “Golden Dome”, a $175 Billion, multi-layered missile defense system?
Trump or any of his officials does not address this question publicly; they all explain the Greenland policy in strategic terms of America’s overall “national security” vis-à-vis China and Russia.
“It’s so strategic,” Trump told reporters onboard Air Force One on January 4. “Right now, Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships all over the place. We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security.”
However, two senior Nordic diplomats with access to NATO intelligence briefings told the Financial Times on January 11 that there was no evidence of Russian or Chinese ships or submarines operating around Greenland in recent years, directly contradicting Trump’s justification for U.S. control of the Arctic territory.
“I have seen the intelligence. There are no ships, no submarines,” one told the paper.
Another diplomat from another Nordic country said, “This idea that the waters around Greenland are crawling with Russian and Chinese ships or submarines is just not true. They are in the Arctic, yes, but on the Russian side.”
Besides, Norway’s Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide has also told Norwegian broadcaster NRK that there was “very little” Russian or Chinese activity near Greenland, despite ongoing Russian submarine movements closer to Norway itself.
This is not to suggest that Greenland, or control of it, will not pose a security threat to the U.S. Positioned between the U.S. and Russia, Greenland has long been viewed as an area of high strategic importance for Americans, or, for that matter, for Arctic security.
It is also known for an abundance of untapped raw materials, from oil and gas reserves to critical mineral deposits. The island contains vast mineral deposits, including rare-earth metals, uranium, lithium, and cobalt. Rare earth metals, which are crucial for manufacturing everything from smartphones to electric vehicles, are supplied mostly by China now, an over-reliance that America would like to overcome.
As EurAsian Times explained earlier, Greenland is becoming increasingly vital to American security. All told, Greenland is part of the North American continent and is now an important component in the North American security framework.
It may be noted that when Germany occupied Denmark during World War II, the latter made Greenland a protectorate of the United States in 1941. This led to naval patrols by the US, the establishment of bases, and the construction of other military facilities, such as the “Greenland Patrol,” an Arctic fleet.
After the Second World War ended, Denmark reassumed control of Greenland, but the U.S. was allowed to maintain its military presence there.
Denmark joined NATO in 1949, and in 1951, the United States started building the Thule Air Base “in secrecy.” It was considered an important base for defending against possible Soviet attacks on North America during the Cold War and a potential refueling point for U.S. aircraft.
There is no longer any secrecy about the base, which remains an important strategic asset for the U.S. military and its allies. The Thule base has been renamed “Pituffik,” and it is now a part of the US Space Force.
It is also noteworthy that, following World War II, US forces established a secret polar base known as Camp Century. U.S. government officials described it as a “remote research community,” but in reality, it stationed nuclear weapons capable of reaching the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
As part of the covert “Project Iceworm,” the U.S. housed missiles under the ice to hide them from Moscow. However, engineers quickly realized that storing nuclear weapons under shifting ice sheets was risky. The project was terminated in 1966, and the base was buried under ice.
Greenland is important for the security of the American part of the Arctic, i.e., Alaska, the U.S.’s largest state. The shared boundary with Russia across the Bering Strait and Sea entails proximity to Russian strategic forces in the Russian Far East.
Thus, the more tense relations between Russia and the US become, the greater the need for the Air Force to control and respond to Russian airborne activity across the Bering Strait.
All this has assumed greater significance as Russia increasingly views the entire Arctic coastline – stretching from Norway in Western Europe to the shores of the Aleutian Islands in the Far East – as a continuous strategic domain within reach of its ballistic missiles.
Besides, with the ever-increasing melting of ice north of the Bering Strait and expectations of increased civilian and military traffic in the area, Russia has also increased military exercises in the region.
Secondly, Americans also seem concerned about the growing challenges posed by China in the Arctic. Though not an Arctic state and thousands of miles away, in 2018, China termed itself a “near-Arctic state” in the first iteration of an Arctic policy paper.
China is investing in various natural resource projects across Arctic states and engaging in developing the NSR ( the Northern Sea Route, the shipping lane from the Kara Sea to the Pacific Ocean, specifically running along the Russian Arctic coast from the Kara Strait between the Barents Sea and the Kara Sea, along Siberia, to the Bering Strait) that could cut transit times between Asia and Europe by as much as 40%, bypassing traditional routes through the Panama and Suez Canals.
In fact, China has been systematically increasing its investments in Greenland. In 2016, a Chinese company emerged as one of the few buyers of an old naval station in Greenland.
To prevent the Chinese from buying it, then-Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen allegedly worked to reopen the former military station. In 2018, Lokke Rasmussen rushed to Greenland to offer investment to help upgrade airports after a state-owned Chinese company was preapproved for construction.
China’s goal with these investments has been to gain a foothold in the Arctic, and Beijing sees Greenland as a potential gateway for influence in the region—especially if Greenland at some point achieves independence from Denmark.
It is against this background that the U.S. interest in Greenland is about keeping China from gaining influence. After all, when Trump proposed in 2019 (during his first term) to buy Greenland, his officials also cited the China factor in the decision.
However, this time, if Trump is even threatening a military takeover of Greenland when it cannot be bought with money, then it is due to his Administration’s fierce “space race” with China and Russia.
Space is arguably emerging as the most important war-fighting domain. As seen in the Ukraine war and skirmishes between India and Pakistan last year, control of the highest altitudes in space could result in control of the battle domains on earth.
Nations are now developing counter-space weapons (ASATs) and enhancing space capabilities for surveillance and control, blurring lines between peaceful use and conflict. Nations are investing in space-based assets for intelligence, communication, and navigation.
The U.S., Russia, China, and India are now testing Anti-Satellite (ASAT) weapons (kinetic and non-kinetic). The U.S. has already established ( none other than by Trump during his first term) a dedicated Space Force, focused on space operations and defense. China and Russia are planning the same.
Seen thus, if Russia launches missiles at the U.S., they would likely fly over Greenland. That could make the territory a useful staging ground for a greater US presence and a strategic location to place US missile interceptors, as part of the ‘Golden Dome’ missile defense system – a priority for the Trump administration, argues Dr Marion Messmer, Director, International Security Programme at London’s Chatham House.
Apparently, Golden Dome is a multibillion-dollar initiative, rolled out in May last year, and often compared to Israel’s “Iron Dome” system, is a visionary plan designed to shield the U.S. from all missile attacks.
According to Dr. Pippa Malmgren, who was an economic advisor to President George W. Bush, and has been a manufacturer of award-winning drones and autonomous robotics, space offers unlimited energy, unlimited resources, and unlimited internet connectivity — and the High North is crucial.
This is because satellites that orbit from pole to pole must pass each pole with every orbit, which means that they fly over a given point in “the High North” far more often than a given point toward the Equator.
She argues that places like Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, have been ideal locations for ground stations that keep in touch with constellations of satellites, whether commercial or military, belonging to NATO countries.
But they are increasingly becoming vulnerable because they depend on high-speed subsea internet cables that have been targeted by adversaries in recent times.
“Given this security situation, the US doesn’t want to rely solely on Svalbard. So it maintains another space base, Pituffik, on the northwest coast of Greenland. As the second most important space base after Svalbard, it is of immense strategic importance, not least because, being closer to the US, it is much more easily defended.
“Given that Denmark already allows the US to maintain Pituffik and other bases, one might ask why the White House wants sovereignty over the territory. The answer is that the White House does not trust Europe to be a reliable partner“, Malmgren points out, explaining the linkage between Greenland and Golden Dome.
The U.S. has to take care of itself, so runs the argument.
Viewed thus, far from being idle musings, Trump’s views on Greenland reflect his determination to strengthen America’s Arctic foothold, an idea on which there seems to be more bipartisan support than any of his other ideas.
- Author and veteran journalist Prakash Nanda is Chairman of the Editorial Board of the EurAsian Times and has been commenting on politics, foreign policy, and strategic affairs for nearly three decades. He is a former National Fellow of the Indian Council for Historical Research and a recipient of the Seoul Peace Prize Scholarship.
- CONTACT: prakash.nanda (at) hotmail.com
