Over the past several weeks, President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly demanded that Denmark sell Greenland to the United States. In the abstract, purchasing Greenland would be extremely beneficial to America. Greenland has immense natural resources and is one of only eight countries that have territory within the Arctic Circle, which in turn has inherent economic and strategic value.
Territorial expansion via financial acquisition is nothing new for the United States. The Louisiana Purchase of 1803, the Gadsen Purchase of 1854 and the Alaska Purchase of 1867 all yielded benefits vastly greater than the purchase price. If the United State bought Greenland, the resulting economic and strategic advantage would be similar to those acquisitions.
There is a significant problem with this scenario — Greenland is not for sale, and it is not Denmark’s to sell.
For over a thousand years, Greenland has been an occupied territory, first of Norway, then of the political union of Denmark-Norway, and of Denmark since 1814. Recently, however, the people of Greenland have asserted their autonomy, including the right of political self-determination. In a 1979 referendum, more than 70% of Greenlanders voted in favor of greater independence, which resulted in establishment of the Parliament of Greenland. In 2009, the Danish Parliament ratified the Greenland Self-Government Act, which states:
“The people of Greenland (are) a people pursuant to international law with the right of self-determination.”
Accordingly, Denmark recognizes Greenland’s right to self-determination, and Denmark has no more authority to sell Greenland to the United States without the consent of Greenlanders than does the United States to sell Puerto Rico to Mexico without the consent of Puerto Ricans. This is consistent with the principles of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence; the Founding Fathers asserted that the right of political self-determination enumerated in those documents originated in natural law, granted to all mankind by the Creator. This applies to Greenlanders in 2025 just as it did to American colonists in 1776.
Beyond demanding that Denmark sell Greenland, Trump recently refused to rule out the U.S. military forcibly annexing Greenland. Trump’s apologists like to say he should be taken seriously, but not literally. That is a luxury belief in which smaller nations such as Denmark and Greenland cannot afford to indulge. When the president-elect of the United States threatens an ally with military force, it must take his intent seriously and literally.
This is not a real estate transaction or hostile corporate takeover. Greenland is not a former factory site that can be bought and redeveloped into an office building, or farmland that can be turned into a housing subdivision. Greenland is an autonomous territory with ambitions of independence that has no intention of being the subject of a forced and unnecessary political merger. America’s emergent interests in Greenland — natural resource extraction, new shipping lanes, expansion of our existing military presence at Pituffik Space Base — can all be realized within the context of the existing cooperative and mutually respectful relationship we have with Denmark and Greenland.
Demanding that Denmark agree to sell Greenland is not an appropriate or effective way to treat an ally and partner nation. Denmark was a founding member of NATO in 1949 and was one of the first NATO member states to join the American-led invasions in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003. Reasonable people can disagree with the decision to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, but there is no dispute regarding the premise of Danish participation in these two operations — they were there solely at the request of the United States. Today — as they have for the past several decades — Danish sailors and ships participate in the U.S. Navy-led Combined Maritime Coalition operations in the Persian Gulf, Arabian Sea and Red Sea, ensuring freedom of navigation and commerce. They do so solely because we asked them to.
The modern world is growing more interconnected and dangerous, not less so. The most effective strategy for America is to engage with our allies in partnerships based on common interests, not demand that they sell us autonomous territories. Denmark has treated America with dignity, respect and loyalty. We should respond in kind.