Why does Donald Trump actually want Greenland?

Telegraph

28-03-2025

Donald Trump wants the United States to buy Greenland for its strategically vital resources, to bolster US security and give China a bloody nose.
But he also wants to strike his largest ever real estate deal because Greenland is 'massive', he 'loves maps' and because he is very, very stubborn.
Who owns Greenland?
World's largest island
To impress his billionaire allies
Space base and missile defence
Russia and China's arctic alliance
Treasure trove of rare minerals
Can Trump even buy Greenland?
What is Greenland's response?
Who owns Greenland?
Mr Trump's desire to swell the US with a territory roughly the size of Texas and Alaska combined is nothing new.
He tried to bounce Denmark into selling Greenland, which is geographically in North America, during his first presidency – but was rebuffed.
Mr Trump cancelled a 2019 state visit and branded Mette Frederiksen, Denmark's prime minister, 'nasty' after she said the idea was 'absurd'.
Like all hard-nosed negotiators, Mr Trump doesn't take no for an answer and took the chance of naming his ambassador to Denmark to revive the demand this weekend.
As his son Donald Trump Junior arrived for a visit to Greenland, Mr Trump declared: 'I am hearing that the people of Greenland are 'MAGA'.'
He added: 'Greenland is an incredible place, and the people will benefit tremendously if, and when, it becomes part of our nation. We will protect it, and cherish it, from a very vicious outside world. MAKE GREENLAND GREAT AGAIN!'.
Greenland is beautiful!!! 🇬🇱 pic.twitter.com/PKoeeCafPz
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) January 7, 2025
World's largest island
Greenland is a very large, strategically important landmass.
'You take a look at a map. I'm a real estate developer,' Mr Trump said in an interview for The Divider, a book by The New York Times' Peter Baker and The New Yorker's Susan Glasser.
'I love maps. And I always said: 'Look at the size of this. It's massive. That should be part of the United States',' he added.
However, Greenland is actually much smaller than it appears on maps because of the Mercator projection, which makes it look a similar size to Africa.
The projection is used to create flat maps but makes landmasses larger the further away from the Equator they are.
To impress his billionaire allies
Mr Trump reportedly insists that the idea of making America's largest land buy since the Alaska Purchase in 1867 is all his own.
But according to The Divider, Mr Trump got the idea from Ronald Lauder, a billionaire heir to the Estée Lauder cosmetics fortune.
Mr Lauder, 80, a longtime friend of Mr Trump and a New York-born political activist, reportedly offered himself as a back channel negotiator with the Danish government.
Some Left-leaning commentators have branded Mr Trump's coveting of Greenland as a neo-colonist urge to emulate nationalist autocrats like Vladimir Putin.
The United States has history when it comes to buying land. Its last land purchase was 1917's acquisition of the US Virgin Islands … from Denmark.
Before then it bought Alaska from the Russian Empire (which was widely seen as an expensive mistake until gold and oil were discovered there), Louisiana from France, as well as territory from Mexico and the Philippines, now independent, from Spain.
Space base and missile defence
The US offered Denmark $100 million (£79 million) for Greenland after the Second World War.
Washington instead secured a defence treaty centred on a US military base on Greenland.
Pituffik Space Base, formerly Thule Air Base, has been strategically vital ever since the first years of the Cold War.
It is the US military's most northerly outpost and is a vital location for missile defence and space surveillance, housing America's solid state phased array radar system, known colloquially as the ballistic missile early warning system radar network.
Buying Greenland would ensure continued access to the base, although there is no suggestion that it is at risk.
Mr Trump, nevertheless, is adamant he wants Greenland for national security reasons.
'For purposes of national security and freedom throughout the world, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity,' the president said on social media.
Aside from the base, Greenland is on strategic sea lanes like the Northwest Passage and the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap, and is beneath Arctic flight paths. It is on the shortest route from North America to Europe.
Russia and China's Arctic alliance
Moscow and Beijing have been working hand in glove to bolster their influence in the Arctic, which is a key region for transportation and resources.
Climate change could mean new waterways and new territories for settlement being opened, raising the likelihood of a race for the Arctic amid competing superpowers.
Chinese leaders see the region as a new crossroads of the world, a new source of raw materials and new avenues for manifesting its growing power, the US defence department has said.
In 2019, Republican politicians warned China was trying to build airports on Greenland and even buy an old American naval base there.
Beijing's activities are being facilitated by Russia, which continues to invest heavily in both military and economic terms in the Arctic despite its illegal war in Ukraine.
US officials have also been concerned by joint Russian-Chinese military drills in the area, which seem aimed at Washington and its Nato allies.
Buying Greenland would be a show of strength from the US at a time when its rivals are encroaching into the region.
Treasure trove of rare minerals
Greenland is a potential treasure trove of natural resources, including rare earth minerals.
These minerals are vital for high-end military, green energy and industrial technologies but their production and supply is dominated by China.
Beijing last month imposed export controls on the minerals in response to US controls on advanced semiconductors.
Some 37 of the 50 minerals seen as 'critical' by the US could be found in moderate or high quantities in Greenland, based on a 2023 survey.
Lessening US dependence on Chinese supplies would be a geopolitical boost but some experts point out that buying Greenland would mean subsidising an area with the lowest per capita disposable income of any Arctic region except Russia.
Greenland's ice-sheet boasts 7 per cent of the world's fresh water and its undeveloped oil and gas resources are thought to be the third largest in the Arctic.
Can Trump even buy Greenland?
There is no guarantee that the almost 57,000 Greenlanders will be willing to become part of the US.
In 2009, the island assumed self-rule from Denmark under an agreement that gives it the right to one day declare independence.
By becoming part of the US, Greenland would gain independence from one country while coming under the control of another.
It would also be an expensive acquisition.
In 2019, the Washington Post estimated that Greenland could cost up to $1.7 trillion – on the assumption that the island was up for sale.
What is Greenland's response?
Múte Egede, Greenland's prime minister, has rebuffed all advances to date. 'We are not for sale and we will not be for sale,' he said in response to Mr Trump's comments, adding: 'We must not lose our long struggle for freedom.'