Authors: Jacob Gronholt-Pederson and Stine Jacobson
COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – When U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio meets his Danish and Greenlandic counterparts next week, Denmark will defend a territory that has been steadily moving away from and toward independence since 1979.
President Donald Trump has threatened to seize Greenland, sparking a wave of solidarity from Europe and Denmark. But the crisis has exposed a disturbing reality – Denmark is rallying for support to protect a territory its people want to be independent, while its largest opposition party now wants to bypass Copenhagen and negotiate directly with Washington.
“Denmark could exhaust its foreign policy capital defending Greenland only to watch it leave,” said Mikkel Wedby Rasmussen, a professor of political science at the University of Copenhagen.
strategic relevance
Denmark cannot abandon Greenland without losing its geopolitical significance in the Arctic region, which is strategically located between Europe and North America and is a key location for U.S. ballistic missile defense systems.
However, if Greenlanders choose independence or strike their own deal with Washington, its efforts could end up being fruitless.
The stakes go beyond Denmark’s national interests. European allies rallied behind Denmark not only out of solidarity but also because abandoning Greenland would set a dangerous precedent that could upend the post-1945 world order by encouraging other powers to assert territorial claims on smaller countries.
The Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs declined to comment, but referred to a joint speech on December 22 by Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens Frederik Nielsen.
“National borders and national sovereignty are rooted in international law,” the two leaders said. “They are fundamental principles. You cannot annex another country… Greenland belongs to Greenlanders.”
This week, Frederiksen said: “If the United States chooses to attack another NATO country, everything stops, including NATO and the security that the alliance has provided since World War II.”
“Greenland Card”
For now, the Trump administration says all options are on the table, including buying the territory or seizing it by force.
Rasmussen, the Copenhagen professor, said any discussion about whether it was worth keeping Greenland had been drowned out by anger over Trump’s threats.
“This is not part of the political debate in Denmark. I fear we have fallen into a patriotic excess,” he said.
During the Cold War, Greenland’s strategic location gave Denmark enormous influence in Washington and allowed it to keep defense spending lower than expected by NATO allies.
This is known as the “Greenland Card,” according to a 2017 report by the University of Copenhagen’s Center for Military Studies.
But Greenland’s desire for self-determination has been brewing since the former colony gained greater autonomy and its own parliament in 1979. A 2009 agreement explicitly recognized the right of Greenlanders to become independent if they chose.
Greenland’s political parties all say they want independence but are divided over how and when to achieve it.
Trump’s pressure has accelerated a timetable that had already been set in motion, forcing Copenhagen to spend political capital and financial resources on a relationship with an increasingly uncertain endpoint.
“How much should we fight for someone who doesn’t really care about us?” Joachim B. Olsen, a political commentator and former Danish lawmaker, told Reuters.
financial burden
Copenhagen provides a block grant of approximately 4.3 billion Danish kroner ($610 million) to Greenland’s economy every year. Greenland’s economy is almost stagnant, with GDP growth in 2025 of only 0.2%.
The central bank estimates that there is an annual financing gap of approximately DKK 800 million to ensure the current sustainability of public finances. Denmark also covers the police, justice system and defence—bringing total annual spending to nearly $1 billion.
Separately, Copenhagen last year announced a 42 billion Danish kroner (approximately $6.54 billion) Arctic defense plan in response to U.S. criticism that Denmark was not doing enough to protect Greenland.
Some refuse to frame the relationship in transactional terms, pointing to Denmark’s legal and moral obligations under international law and centuries of shared history.
“We’re talking about family ties and a long history of relations between Denmark and Greenland,” said Mark Jacobson, associate professor at the Royal Danish Defense College. “So it’s not just about defense and economics, it’s about feelings, it’s about culture.”
difficult balancing act
Prime Minister Frederiksen faces a difficult balance, said Serafima Andreeva, a researcher at the Fridtjof Nansen Institute in Oslo.
At present, Denmark has no choice but to firmly maintain its diplomatic credibility, but doing so will jeopardize relations with the United States because “the Russian threat is accelerating and being on the bad side of the United States does no one in the West good.”
Frederiksen also faces elections this year, although Greenland is not a major subject.
“I don’t understand why we have to hold on to Greenland as a community when they are so desperate to leave it,” Danish science writer and broadcaster Lone Frank told Reuters. “Greenland doesn’t inspire any sense of belonging in me, to be honest.”
(Reporting by Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen and Stine Jacobsen in Copenhagen; Additional reporting by Soren Sirich Jeppesen and Tom Little; Editing by Alex Richardson)
