It’s not always easy or obvious how to deal with uninvited guests. The original trip threatened an icy amid President Donald Trump’s vow to make Greenland the 51st U.S. state.
Vice President JD Vance says he’s visiting Greenland
Vice President JD Vance announced via social media that he’ll be joining his wife in Greenland to the dismay of Greenland officials.
The itinerary has changed. So too has the personnel. The Avannaata Qimussersua, one of the world’s major dog-sledding events, is out. There will be up to three Vances, not two − one is the vice president of the United States.
It’s not always easy or obvious how to deal with uninvited guests. Just ask Danish and Greenlandic officials. They welcomed a U.S. decision to alter a planned visit this week to the Arctic territory they said was not wanted or needed. It threatened an icy reception amid President Donald Trump’s vow to make Greenland the 51st U.S. state.
“It’s very positive the Americans cancelled,” Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said Wednesday.
Usha Vance, wife of Vice President JD Vance, and one of her sons had been due to visit the Danish territory Thursday to Saturday to see cultural and historical sites. The head of the dogsledding association asked her to wave a flag to open the annual dogsled race across ice and snow, which translates to “The Great Race of the North.”
Upgraded. And then downgraded
But amid what Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen described as “unacceptable pressure” on Greenland and local Greenlandic officials angrily characterized as an entirely unsolicited trip, the visit has both been upgraded and downgraded. Upgraded, because the vice president will be joining his wife, becoming the most senior Trump administration official to set foot on the island. Downgraded, because the American delegation will now only visit the U.S. Space Force Base at Pituffik, in northern Greenland, on Friday, not the dogsled race or other attractions. The Vances will be joined by White House National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
Here’s a recap on Trump’s quest to “get” Greenland, why he wants it, how that’s going and the meaning of an invite.
A primer: What’s behind Trump’s Greenland fascination?
The idea of the U.S. acquiring Greenland first came up in the 19th century when Andrew Johnson was president. The U.S. had recently taken control of Alaska, from Russia. Johnson saw a Greenland acquisition as part of a broader push to expand U.S. influence in the Northern Hemisphere.
Trump first expressed interest in acquiring Greenland, the world’s largest island that isn’t a continent, in 2019, during his first term. That interest has been amplified in the early months of his second one. He has made repeated threats to acquire Greenland either through some form of financial transaction or even by using military force.
“We need Greenland for national security and even international security,” Trump said during an address to Congress in March, adding that the territory was “very, very important for military security.”
The U.S. has maintained a small missile defense base in Greenland since World War II. Trump has asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to come up with a plan for a U.S. missile defense system modeled after Israel’s “Iron Dome” system. Straddling the Arctic circle between the U.S., Russia and Europe, the Pituffik base could become part of Trump’s “Golden Dome” defense system, which he believes will protect the U.S. from long-range missile strikes.
Untapped cobalt, nickel, copper, lithium and zirconium
There also appears to be an economic motivation, that has national security implications, behind Trump’s interest in the territory. Greenland has vast stores of untapped cobalt, nickel, copper, lithium, zirconium and other so-called rare earth minerals used in the production of batteries, cellphones, electric vehicles and other technology and defense systems. The U.S. currently gets most of its rare earths from China. Trump wants to end that.
Controlling Greenland could give the U.S. an expanded claim on undiscovered Arctic oil and natural resources, and enable it to exert more dominance over Arctic shipping lanes used by Russia and China.
“Speaking for President Trump, we want to reinvigorate the security of the people of Greenland because we think it’s important to protecting the security of the entire world,” the U.S. vice president said, when announcing he would be joining the second lady on the visit to Pituffik on Friday. Vance claimed that U.S. and Danish leaders had “ignored Greenland for far too long” and that “we think we can take things in a different direction.”
Danish officials dispute that suggestion. Rasmus Jarlov, a Danish opposition Conservative lawmaker, said that his country has long been open to the U.S. having a bigger military presence in Denmark if it wants it. Ulrik Pram Gad, a researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies in Copenhagen, said Greenland’s authorities are willing to to do business with American companies who want to open mines in Greenland to extract resources.
Is Trump’s Greenland pressure working?
Martin Breum is a Danish journalist and author who specializes in Greenland and Arctic affairs. He said that many people in Greenland welcome the idea of inviting American companies to the territory to invest in mining, tourism or fisheries. He said there is no particular animosity toward the U.S. in government circles.
“We should not fall into the trap that the Greenlanders don’t want anything to do with the U.S. Nothing could be further from the truth,” Breum said in a phone interview from Greenland’s capital Nuuk on Wednesday.
“It’s the idea of a (Trump) political takeover that they really object to,” he said.
Drew Horn is the CEO of Greenmet, an American company that is helping to facilitate business contacts between Greenland’s government and Trump’s White House. Horn played a role in organizing the upcoming U.S. visit.
He said in a phone interview prior to the shift in the U.S. delegation’s itinerary that comments from Danish and Greenlandic officials asserting that the White House was applying political pressure on Greenland were “ludicrous.”
“Mike Waltz is the national security advisor. He’s looking at defense solutions that the Greenlanders have asked for in the past − out at the base there. It’s within his purview and his responsibilities to go meet with the Space Force leadership there as a part of this planning. It’s not a power move. It’s not pressure on the Greenlanders,” said Horn.
“We want to diversity our economy. We want to trade with other companies and not only Denmark,” Kuno Fencker, a member of Greenland’s parliament, said in an interview.
Still, Gad, the researcher, said that it was clear that Trump’s strategy to send a high-powered U.S. delegation to Greenland was backfiring because whatever his intentions might be, it looks to most Greenlanders like “dominance.”
“If it’s an attempt at playing some kind of soft diplomacy, then it’s failed,” said Gad, who worked in Nuuk for Greenland’s government before moving full-time into academic research.
“Every time Trump says, ‘We want to make you rich,’ he then says ‘we will have it one way or the other.'”
About that Greenland invite. Was there one?
Greenland’s government has been fairly explicit: There was no formal or informal official invitation to U.S. officials for them to visit, and they objected especially to any U.S. delegation arriving at time when Greenland is in the middle of negotiations to form a new coalition government following an election there earlier in March.
Yet Trump said there was an invite. So which is it?
Both. Neither. Blame the dogs − or their benefactor.
In fact, the invitation for the second lady to attend the dogsled race was sent by an American named Tom Dans, according to his own admission. Dans runs a company called American Daybreak that seeks to strengthen U.S.-Greenlandic ties. He worked for Trump during his first term, as a commissioner for U.S. Arctic Research.
In a statement published late Tuesday on social media, Dans said that his company was a “sponsor and supporter” of the Avannaata Qimussersua and that in that capacity he invited the second lady and other senior administration officials to come to Greenland “with us to experience this unique and exciting cultural event.” Dans said the visit was always intended to be “purely personal in nature and in the spirit of the friendship between our two nations.”
Still, Denmark’s leadership and Greenland’s outgoing Prime Minister struggled to view the visit in those terms.
“What is the national security adviser doing in Greenland? The only purpose is to demonstrate power over us,” Egede said an interview Sunday with the Greenlandic newspaper Sermitsiaq. “His mere presence in Greenland will no doubt fuel American belief in Trump’s mission − and the pressure will increase.
So why no dogs race? And what now?
What was supposed to be a three-day trip, is now just a single day, perhaps only a few cloistered, frozen hours.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment on why the dogsled race, which takes place in Sisimiut on Saturday, was being dropped from the itinerary, or why the visit has been condensed to just a single day.
Still, in recent weeks there have been protests in Greenland over Trump’s designs on Greenland, including one in Nuuk where demonstrators filed past the U.S. consulate and quietly sang the island’s anthem. Another had been planned for Saturday at the dogs race, when protesters intended to turn their backs at the second lady.
At least one U.S. media report suggested anti-U.S. demonstrations in Nuuk might have scared the Trump administration enough to revise the trip to avoid interactions with angry Greenlanders.
So no dogs, but what appears to be a brief day trip to the U.S. military base.
The vice president said he and his wife will travel to the Pituffik to receive a briefing on Arctic security issues and meet with U.S. service members. There was no mention of whether there son will still be on the trip.
Fencker, the lawmaker, acknowledged the importance for Vance to visit the Pituffik base, but doesn’t think that visit will boost trade and tourism. Fencker said nobody in Greenland knows much about what goes on there.
Pituffik is situated in Greenland’s way remote north, about 750 miles from the North Pole, an area where there are few civilians or Greenlandic officials. It seems unlikely, said Breum, the Danish expert on the Arctic, that the Vances; Waltz, the national security advisor; or Wright, the energy secretary, will encounter any locals.
“Pituffik is completely isolated from civil society,” said Breum.
He noted that on Wednesday morning in Nuuk two U.S. Hercules military aircraft, loaded with bullet proof cars and security officials, left Greenland. They were part of a White House advance security team no longer needed.
“Plus,” Breum said of Pituffik, “on Friday it will be 25 below celsius (-13 Fahrenheit).”
Contributing: Bart Jansen