The Decibel - What Greenland thinks about Trump’s threats of annexation

Episode Date: January 15, 2026

For weeks, U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to annex Greenland, an autonomous region of Denmark. That led to a meeting on Wednesday between a delegation of Danish and Greenland foreign ministers and U.S. Vice-President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The two sides did not seem to come to any kind of conclusion.The Globe’s Europe correspondent, Paul Waldie, is in Greenland to get a sense of how people are feeling on the ground. He was in Denmark earlier this week. He joins the show to tell us what he’s learned, what the potential implications are for NATO, and what concerns this raises for Canada.Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

After weeks of increasing threats against Greenland by U.S. President Donald Trump, the Danish and Greenlandic foreign ministers met with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday morning. The Danish foreign minister said they're working on finding a common way forward. Our perspectives continue to differ, I must say. The president has made his view clear, and we have a different position. But the two sides didn't seem to come to any. kind of conclusion.

We therefore still have a fundamental disagreement, but we also agree to disagree. And therefore we will, however, continue to talk. We have decided to form a high-level working group to explore if we can find a common way forward. Denmark, which Greenland is a part of, also announced an increased military presence in and around the island with support from other NATO countries. Meanwhile, people in Greenland are feeling uneasy about the new Trump threats, including Avaruk-Olsson, who's the mayor of Greenland's capital, Nuk. I started to think if there would be an invasion, they would come in the night or when

it's getting dark without the lights on. And suddenly I was having those kind of thoughts that I wasn't prepared to be thinking about. Paul Walde, the Globe's Europe correspondent, is in Greenland to get a sense of how people are feeling there. He was also in Copenhagen earlier this week to get Denmark's view. Today, he's here to tell us what he's learned. I'm Cheryl Sutherland, and this is the decibel from the Globe and Mail. Hi, Paul, nice to see you, and thanks so much for joining us from Nook Greenland.

Glad to be here. So, Paul, we're speaking to you Wednesday morning around 10.30 Eastern Time, which is midday for you in Nook, Greenland. And Paul, you were in Greenland a year ago. Can you tell me how is it different now? You know, it's completely different. I was here almost exactly a year ago when Donald Trump's son, Donald Jr., came to Greenland.

And then, of course, U.S. Vice President Vance came a few weeks later. And at that time, you know, all of this was still kind of considered a bit of a joke and a little bit, you know, not really serious that Trump was going to buy Greenland or take over Greenland somehow. But this year, the mood has changed dramatically. I mean, and the politicians I've spoken to so far, the mayor of Nook I spoke with, they're taking this a lot more seriously. I think Trump's actions in Venezuela have really rattled people here.

They see that the military option is a real option, and Trump, of course, keeps talking about it. So there's a lot more concern. And I would argue even fear here than there was a year ago. That's really interesting, yeah, because like you said, you were there last year. and I guess, you know, of course, the threats were happening at that time as well. But, and maybe people were feeling like it was more of a joke than it is today. What have you been hearing? Have you been talking to people in Greenland? Like, what have they been telling you?

I've spoken to quite a few people so far. You know, basically they're saying they just, they don't know what to do. It's on their minds constantly. It's in the back of their minds all the time. I mentioned speaking with the mayor. And she said she's been talking to people who are actually considering selling their property and moving either to Denmark or even to Norwood. People have already started to talk about if we don't want to live in our own country anymore, where do we want to go?

Some people have already said that they could imagine themselves in Iceland, Norway, or even the Faroe Islands. Some also elder people are already talking about selling everything and go to Denmark as soon as possible. Older people are very concerned. They put out a notice to teachers and what does. tell children. There's talk that government's going to start putting out contingency plans, telling people how to prepare or stock up on food for five days. So yeah, it's very different here. And people just think about it all the time. Is that everything that people are talking about? Is this like, you know, all over the news? Yeah, what are you hearing? What stands out for you?

You know, it is all over the news. But you have to keep in mind that people here, they're pretty reserved. So it's not something they're going to talk about when you first meet them. But it doesn't take long to to get to the bottom of how they're feeling here. And there's actually going to be a demonstration organized next week. That's rare here. People here don't express themselves sort of emotionally like that. So the fact that they're even doing a demonstration kind of is reflective of the mood here. But really, people are just, they're just tied up about this.

And they don't know what to do. I mean, they don't know, is there going to be an invasion? What's going to happen? Can they count on Denmark? The Danish government has announced they want to increase their military presence here. and that's probably caused some people even more concerned. So I think there's real worry. There's concern, too, about the impact this is having on the economy,

whether it's going to be held off, whether tourists are going to come back in the summer. So it's hitting people on all fronts here. And I believe the mayor spoke about the demonstrations as well, right? Yeah, she said, you know, last year there was quite a large demonstration when Vance was supposed to come here. And, of course, he kind of curtailed his trip. And that was several thousand people.

And she said she, in her lifetime, never said, seen anything like that because it is rare for people in Greenland to take to the streets on any issue at all. So the very fact that the same person organized it last year is trying to organize another one this year, I think, you know, does show just how seriously people are taking this. I think it's fair to say that Greenland isn't a place that many people have been to. Can you paint us a picture, Paul? Like, what is Greenland like? Yeah, it's a very, very different kind of place. The geography is actually stunning. You know, looking at my window now, I can see snow-covered mountains. there's fjords, there's beautiful coastline, but it's very, very difficult to get around.

You're talking about 57,000 people spread across the world's largest island. And there are no roads linking any of these communities. The only roads are really within Nuk or within the communities themselves. The only way to get anywhere here is by airplane or by boat. And, you know, one example of that is the mayor. She's the mayor of NUC, but she's also the mayor of the municipal region of Nuk. Now, that encompasses an area the size of France. And she was saying to get to one village from Nook, she has to go fly to Iceland and then fly to the village itself.

It's like a two-day journey. So I think it gives you the sense of the size of this place and, you know, the very different geography you find here and the fact that it is a very tiny population spread across such a vast area. Wow, that's really interesting that the mayor, just to travel to part of her jurisdiction, she has to go to a whole other country. Yeah, yeah. Her municipality is, as she's told me, is the side of France. It's 500,000 square kilometers or something. It's just massive. Wow.

I'm guessing that people, they just must stay in, like, their small communities. They're not traveling around then. Yeah, I mean, getting around Greenland is pretty much by airplane, but it's very difficult because the weather can change dramatically. And, of course, you can be stranded anywhere quite easily. Boating is possible in winter. And certainly fishing is the mainstay of the economy here, and the boats still go out. But in winter, you're not going to go very far in a boat.

So people are pretty much isolated wherever they live. What is life like for everyday Greenlanders? I think it's probably typical of the far north in Canada, although, again, fishing is kind of what keeps the economy going here and only fishing. I mean, there's lots of talk about mineral wealth, but there's only one small operating mine, and that's a gold mine. So there's very little else to do here, but in terms of economics, but fishing, you know, the island is very much reliant on Denmark. Half of the budget comes from a block grant from Denmark. And Denmark does run police services, medical, health care, all these kinds of things. So very dependent economically on Denmark, but a very, very different culture, obviously, than Denmark.

And an awful lot of tension between Greenlanders and Denmark over the course of colonization and the sort of history that Denmark has left here has caused an awful lot of tension, which is why you see this kind of move towards independence, which probably a long way off. There's a real sense here from people that they would like to be free of Denmark and the U.S. and everybody. Yeah, yeah. Let's get into kind of the relationship between Denmark and Greenland, because Greenland is a territory of Denmark. Can you really quickly explain that relationship to me? Well, it's centuries-old relationship. I mean, this was a colony of Denmark for a while. I think around the 1950s, Denmark started to give Greenland a lot more autonomy over different things. And then, of course, that eventually led to a pathway to independence.

there is a process for independence here. It's difficult for Greenland because, of course, they are so economically dependent on Denmark. But, you know, culturally, it's very, very different. I mean, this is a society here that speaks Greenlandic, a different language. Yes, they speak Danish, often resentfully because they're taught that in school. For the longest time, that was the only language they were allowed to speak in school. The Greenlandic language was pretty much frowned upon. It's come back.

That's changed a little bit. But it has still bred an awful lot of resentment. There were an awful lot of horrible stories here from the colonel. There was forced contraception of some young girls. There was residential school issues similar to what we've had in Canada. There's been a lot of sort of rapid modernization that took people out of their villages and threw them into public housing projects and took them away from the traditional way of life. So that has bred an awful lot of resentment and an awful lot of anger towards and hostility towards Denmark. But the flip side is the economic dependence and the fact that there's 50,000 people who live here in Greenland and there's 15,000 Greenlanders who live in Denmark because that's the only place that can find work. So it's a very difficult relationship. So you mentioned that there's this strong independence movement in Greenland. Do the threats from Trump, do these change the calculation for this movement?

Yeah, they really do because what you'll find is that now the vast majority people, certainly in Nook, don't want to join the U.S. and sort of reject Trump's offer. But there are a handful of people who wouldn't mind a close association with the U.S. if it got them away from Denmark. I mean, so this kind of feeds into their narrative about we need to be more independent. We need to break free from Denmark. And therefore, the U.S. might be a really good option to have some kind of economic association. So, you know, the independence movement here is difficult and tricky because while people kind of might want it emotionally and the polls show there is a majority for it, I think everybody knows in their heart is very, very difficult.

I mean, you have an economy here that is completely dependent on fishing. nothing else really happens here beyond that. So the fact that half their budget comes from a block grant from the Danish government and all these other services means it's really, really extremely difficult to see how Green Lake could go it alone. But the whole Trump thing has forced this debate and forced this discussion to be a lot more pronounced. Something I found interesting from your reporting from your last trip was that you spoke to people who were pro-American because like you said, they're anti-Demark. Have you encountered these same sentiments? Or has that changed in this trip? You know what?

There is still, there's one guy here, a guy named Yorgan, who is very much a Trump supporter. And he's kind of been leading the charge for Trump in Greenland and in the U.S. He's gone and made a lot of trips to the U.S. to talk about Greenland there. He's very keen that Greenland should be independent, but have a very, very close association with the U.S. I think last year when he was very active here before the Donald Trump Jr. visit, he had a small contingent of people who kind of supported. his way of thinking. I do think that's kind of fallen by the wayside now that talk of military invasion

has really turned people off. And I think whoever was kind of favorable towards Trump a year ago is kind of falling off a little bit now. So I think the support's probably shrunk on that level. But there are some and Jorgon is still out there. He now lives in Copenhagen pretty much full time, but he's planning on running for office. And he's certainly very, very vocal for Trump's point of view here. But I think you'd find less support for the Trump view or the Trump. proposal now than you would have a year ago. We'll be right back. So for the last two weeks, Trump has dialed up his threats toward Greenland.

And on Wednesday, he posted on social media saying, quote, The United States needs Greenland for the purpose of national security. It is vital for the Golden Dome that we are building. NATO should be leading the way for us to get it. If we don't, and this part is in caps. If we don't, Russia or China will, and that is not going to happen. He then goes on to say, anything less than that is unacceptable. So, Paul, how have the Danish and Greenlandic government officials responded to these threats?

Well, I mean, I think it's interesting that he kind of keeps changing his rationale for taking over Greenland. Initially, it kind of was more along the lines of economic. We need the minerals. You know, that's the national security issue that we need the rare earths or we need the other kind of minerals that Greenland may or may not have. Now he's sort of talking about this dome, this golden dome he wants to build, this kind of defense apparatus, which is a whole new thing. I mean, that hasn't been mentioned before. So I think the people and the officials in Denmark and in Greenland, both really just

trying to keep up with his changing mind because the economic rationale for taking over Greenland is kind of pointless because, yes, there may or may not be vast mineral wealth here, but it was always been open for any company to come and exploit them and none have because it's so expensive. So American mining companies could have come here over the last decades and dug up all the minerals they want, but they haven't because it's just not economically viable. Neither of the Russians and neither of the Chinese. And in terms of national security on the other side, the Denmark and the U.S. have a longstanding defense agreement, which allows the U.S. to station as many troops as they want in

Greenland. So nobody's really understanding this sort of national security rationale, but Trump has now upped it by saying this Golden Doan thing that he wants to build. So I really don't think people here can keep track of why he wants to take Greenland and, you know, the goalposts keep changing. changing. On the minerals and how it's not economically viable, it's very expensive to get these minerals out of the ground right now. But is there a sense of perhaps that Trump is playing the long game, like maybe he sees this as an opportunity in the future? He may be, and that's certainly a possibility. I mean, there are deposits here. There's an Australian company tried to launch a rare earth's mining project here. I ran into a bunch of environmental concerns because of the uranium. There is some suggestion that

what Trump is thinking about or what some of his tech supporters are thinking about is that if Greenland has these big deposits of rare earth, and they might, even if they're not necessarily economically viable to pull out of the ground, the refining could be done here. And refining rare earth is a very dirty, not very environmentally friendly business. So there's some suggestion that maybe what Trump wants to do is take Greenland, set it up as the rare earth kind of processing facility, disregard any kind of environmental concerns. That might be a reason for taking over Greenland. It's a bit of a stretch, but that's really the only mineral argument people can find because otherwise, if this was, if these were viable resources, they would have been

exploited a long time ago. What's interesting is that the U.S. does already have access to Greenland, right? Like, don't they already have a military presence there? Yeah, very small. And that's the other thing that people remark on. You know, after what happened during the Second World War was Denmark kind of asked the U.S. to look after Greenland to protect it. And so that led to a lot of military bases, a lot of U.S. military bases across Greenland, several, in fact, and several thousand troops stationed here, over the course of the past, you know, 70 odd years or so, the U.S. presence has dwindled. I think there's like 100 troops left and only one listening post kind of base left. So if the U.S. was really concerned about security issues, Russia's and Chinese, why did they

pull everything out of here? That's what a lot of people here don't understand. If there was this national security concern, why did the U.S. leave? So there aren't Russian ships. There aren't Chinese ships. you know, and Denmark argues that whatever national security issues Trump wants to address can be done through NATO, right? Let, get NATO, Sweden, Denmark, other NATO countries to do some Arctic patrol in Canada as well. So that's what they're kind of using to counter this, but Trump seems bound and determined to actually own Greenland, and that's what people here can't get their heads around. Yeah, I'm also curious about that. Like, what difference would it make if Greenland was some kind of territory of the U.S.? Like, what would it change?

Well, the only thing is the only argument that some of the, made to me today was that kind of made sense was, again, you could do all the awful ugly refining of rare earths in Greenland and not do it anywhere else. And therefore, if you own Greenland, you don't have to worry about environmental concerns from Denmark or anybody else. You just set it up and do it, right? And you don't really care about the population or anything. And that might be the only advantage to own in Greenland is you could basically do whatever you want with it. Paul, you were also in Copenhagen just before your trip to Greenland. Are you hearing different things from Danish people as opposed to Greenlanders?

Well, that was interesting too because, of course, again, given the history between Greenland and Denmark, it's an interesting side of the equation on the Danish side because, you know, the people I talked to there say until Trump kind of raised this whole issue, most Danes really didn't think much about Greenland. They were kind of indifferent towards it. And Greenlanders living in Denmark. And as I mentioned, there's about 15,000 of them. There's a lot of stereotypes surrounding Danish attitudes towards them. And I think there's a sense that, you know, they're not really taking seriously. They're second-class citizens, and Danes really didn't care about Greenland. So now, suddenly they care, but there are people who say they really only care because their pride has been heard. They really don't care that much about Greenland and its future. They care more about the fact that their national pride is at stake here. So it's a very difficult relationship, and a lot of people in Denmark don't really understand this realm they have, which includes places like Denmark and the Faroe Islands. They're not really sure why they have them and what they're for and why they should be subsidizing them. Why does Denmark want to hold on to Greenland? I think that it gives them a presence

in the Arctic. It gives them a say in the Arctic that they wouldn't have otherwise. I think it's historic. I mean, they've had it for X century, so why not? There may be some fishing advantages to it and that kind of thing, but I'm not really sure people in Denmark know why they want to tell you the truth, because it's not like they get all their oil and gas from Greenland or anything from Greenland at all for that matter. In fact, it's a very one-way relationship. So I think that's a question. A lot of Danes are asking themselves, why do we need Greenland? Why are we hanging on to it so much? I'm assuming that this whole thing with Trump is definitely making people think a little bit harder about the relationship and also about maybe the importance of Greenland to Denmark. So anyway,

Trump is definitely making this top of mind, I'm sure. He is. And, you know, again, it was interesting when you go into central Copenhagen into the main square, the Tivoli Gardens and all that, you'll see a bunch of Ukrainian flags flying, but you won't see a Greenland flag flying. There's huge support for Ukraine. And of course, Denmark has been steadfast in its support for Ukraine. And while polls show that Danes are, you know, want Greenland to decide it for itself and they reject Trump, you don't see any Greenland flags flying in downtown Copenhagen in solidarity with Greenland. Wow.

Let's talk about NATO for a second. Because if the U.S. does use some kind of force against Greenland, this does have implications for NATO. what would those implications be? You know, it's just mind-boggling, and people here just can't get their heads around a NATO member actually invading another NATO country. I mean, the politician I talked to Yarlov in Copenhagen said, really, it would be the end of NATO. It would be the end of the alliance. There's no way the Danes or anybody else could trust the Americans, and that would pretty much be the end of NATO as we know it. So it's really impossible to comprehend.

There are some suggestion that from politicians in Sweden and France, that maybe they should send some troops here. I'm not sure that will get much traction in those countries. But, you know, nobody knows what to do. This is a completely new situation. And on the other side, the Trump supporters here say they don't really care about NATO and that Europe should take care of itself in its own defense and that, you know, NATO really is the U.S. anyway and the U.S. can do what it wants.

So, yeah, it's a real turning point and fork in the road for the alliance, that's for sure. So that's true if the U.S. annexes Greenland. But what if they buy it? Because there's been talk about perhaps the U.S. buying Greenland, too. Oh, yeah. There's been talk about, you know, sending checks, million-dollar checks to everybody living in Greenland to kind of bribe their way into it. And, you know, and Trump looks at this as a real estate play, right? You know, you just try and buy something and keep upping the price until the seller takes your offer. But, you know, there's sovereignty at stake here. And there's emotion at stake here. And it's just very difficult. You know, some things aren't for sale. And I think, you know, Mark Carney, when he was talking to Trump one time in one of his visits last year, said, you know, imagine somebody making an offer to buy the White House. It would be unheard of. You're just not going to sell it. Some things just aren't for sale. And I think that's where you're at with Greenland, that Denmark and Greenlanders themselves just don't want to sell their country. That's just kind of the way it is. And I don't know how Trump squares that or gets around that other than through military force. Yeah, I mean, Canadians will be very familiar with that line. You know, some things are not for sale. Of course, that brings us back to the Carney.

meeting with Trump. Is there any way Greenland or Denmark can push back? It's pretty difficult. You know, it's very difficult because, of course, you know, Trump likes to use the tariff weapons and all these other things. I'm not sure there's anything Greenland and Denmark can do other than try and fend him off. I mean, they kind of thought, I think they were living in a little bit of a false, you know, narrative for the past year where they thought this all kind of went away and now it's come roaring back in an even more serious fashion. So I think they're hoping that maybe they'll just stall it or put it off or, you know, just wait it out. You know, they got three years to go in Trump's term. I mean, I think that's the best they can hope for is just delay and maybe get some

people in some senators and Congress, maybe midterm elections change the mood, changes Trump's focus. I think that's all they can hope for is delay and sort of maybe a change in the political dynamics in the U.S. But other than that, they really don't have any cards to play. Considering what happened in Venezuela, if Greenland were to be annexed or taken over somehow, what concerns does that raise for Canada? Well, I mean, I think you'd be a huge concern to Canada. I think even the talk of military invasion, given what happened in Venezuela, is a concern for Canada. Because, of course, many people here, and when I talk to people here, they say, well, you're next. You're the country that's going to be annexed next.

And, of course, we all know. People are saying that. Yeah, people say that here for sure. They totally understand the relationship with Canada and the fact that Canada has the, the same difficult relationship with Trump. And that Trump has talked, you know, we all know, annexing Canada and making it the 51st state, you know, military action against Canada is probably a whole different issue than Greenland, which is a confined.

Yes, it's a massive island, but it's more confined than sort of Canada, which would be massive in terms of a military operation. But I think it speaks to Trump's ambitions and his global ambitions and his ambitions in the Western Hemisphere, whether it's Latin America or Canada or Greenland. He views that as his territory where he believes he can do whatever. he wants. Paul, something you brought up earlier in our conversation that I kind of want to end on is this idea around Denmark kind of taking Greenland for granted. I'm just curious because there are parallels

here with, you know, Canada's relationship to the North, right? Are there lessons for how Canada deals with the North in what's going on here in Greenland? Yeah, you know, that is really important. I think that there is a lot of lessons to be learned. You know, the tensions between Greenland and Denmark over colonization, over the way development has been handled, over the way resources are distributed and people are made to feel part of their country. I think there's a lot of lessons to be learned there. You know, Greenlanders, many of them anyway, don't feel part of Denmark. They don't really understand why they're part of this realm. And I think Canada probably has a lot of lessons to learn in that too, and making the Inuit and other indigenous people feel part of

their country and that everyone is in the same. We don't have the same issue in terms of realm in that, but we certainly have the same issues in terms of how people in Canada view the North and treat the North and involve the North and exploit the resources up there as well. So, yeah, I think Canada has a lot to learn from the way Denmark and Greenland interact. Paul, great to have you on. Thank you so much for making the time. Thank you. That was Paul Waldy, the Globe's Europe correspondent.

That's it for today. I'm Cheryl Sutherland. Our producers are Madeline White, Mikhail Stein, and Ali Graham. Our editor is David Crosby. Adrian Chung is our senior producer and Angela Pichenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening.