Increasing international tensions, global warming and the changing world economy have put Greenland at the heart of the debate over global trade and security.
US President Donald Trump has made it known he wants his country to control the mineral-rich island that guards the Arctic and North Atlantic approaches to North America.
Greenland is a self-governing territory of Denmark, a longtime US ally and Nato member that has rejected Trump’s threats. Greenland’s own government also opposes US designs on the island, saying the people will decide their own future.
Trump has said he can take the territory “the easy way or the hard way”. As the threat of a US takeover becomes clearer, vice president JD Vance and secretary of state Marco Rubio will host the foreign ministers of Denmark and Greenland for a crucial summit at the White House.
Greenland’s prime minister showed no signs of yielding in the build up to the summit, saying on Tuesday that the island would not be owned or governed by Washington.
Here’s why Greenland is strategically important to Arctic security:
Greenland’s Arctic location is key
Greenland sits off the northeastern coast of Canada, with more than two-thirds of its territory lying within the Arctic Circle. That has made it crucial to the defence of North America since World War II, when the US occupied Greenland to ensure it didn’t fall into the hands of Nazi Germany and to protect crucial North Atlantic shipping lanes.
Following the Cold War, the Arctic was largely an area of international cooperation. But climate change is thinning the Arctic ice, promising to create a northwest passage for international trade and reigniting competition with Russia, China and other countries over access to the region’s mineral resources.
The Trump administration charges Denmark with not doing enough to shore up security in the region – something European allies are desperately looking to improve as the US weighs taking the territory by force.
Rare earth minerals
Greenland is also a rich source of the so-called rare earth minerals that are a key component of mobile phones, computers, batteries and other hi-tech gadgets that are expected to power the world’s economy in the coming decades.
That has attracted the interest of the US and other Western powers as they try to ease China’s dominance of the market for these critical minerals.
Development of Greenland’s mineral resources is challenging because of the island’s harsh climate, while strict environmental controls have proved an additional hurdle for potential investors.
US military presence in Greenland
The US Department of Defence operates the remote Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, which was built after the U.S. and Denmark signed the Defence of Greenland Treaty in 1951.
It supports missile warning, missile defence and space surveillance operations for the US and NATO.
Greenland also guards part of what is known as the GIUK (Greenland, Iceland, United Kingdom) Gap, where NATO monitors Russian naval movements in the North Atlantic.
Danish armed forces in Greenland
Denmark is moving to strengthen its military presence around Greenland and in the wider North Atlantic.
Last year, the government announced a roughly 14.6 billion-kroner ($2.3 billion) agreement with parties including the governments of Greenland and the Faroe Islands, another self-governing territory of Denmark, to “improve capabilities for surveillance and maintaining sovereignty in the region.”
The plan includes three new Arctic naval vessels, two additional long-range surveillance drones and satellite capacity.
Denmark’s Joint Arctic Command is headquartered in Greenland’s capital, Nuuk, and tasked with the “surveillance, assertion of sovereignty and military defence of Greenland and the Faroe Islands,” according to its website. It has smaller satellite stations across the island.
The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite Danish naval unit that conducts long-range reconnaissance and enforces Danish sovereignty in the Arctic wilderness, is also stationed in Greenland.
Security threats to the Arctic
In 2018, China declared itself a “near-Arctic state” in an effort to gain more influence in the region. China has also announced plans to build a “Polar Silk Road” as part of its global Belt and Road Initiative, which has created economic links with countries around the world.
Then-US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo rejected China’s move, saying: “Do we want the Arctic Ocean to transform into a new South China Sea, fraught with militarisation and competing territorial claims?”
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Russia is worried about NATO’s activities in the Arctic and will respond by strengthening its military capability in the polar region. European leaders’ concerns were heightened following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
