Danish prime minister says a US takeover of Greenland would mark the end of NATO : NPR

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said Monday that a U.S. takeover of Greenland would amount to the end of the NATO military alliance. His comments came in response to US President Donald Trump’s renewed call for the strategic, mineral-rich Arctic island to come under US control following the weekend’s military operation in Venezuela.

The overnight operation by US forces in Caracas to capture leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife early Saturday left the world stunned and is causing concern in Denmark and Greenland, which is a semi-autonomous territory of the Danish kingdom and therefore part of NATO.

Frederiksen and his Greenlandic counterpart, Jens Frederik Nielsen, criticized the president’s comments and warned of catastrophic consequences. Many European leaders expressed their solidarity with them.

“If the United States decides to attack another NATO country militarily, then everything will stop,” Frederiksen told Danish broadcaster TV2 on Monday. “That is, including our NATO and therefore the security that has been provided since the end of World War II.”

The 20-day schedule deepens fears

Trump repeatedly called for U.S. jurisdiction over Greenland during his presidential transition and the first months of his second term, and has not ruled out military force to take control of the island. His comments on Sunday, including telling reporters “let’s talk about Greenland in 20 days,” further deepened fears that the United States was planning an intervention in Greenland in the near future.

Frederiksen also said Trump “should be taken seriously” when he says he wants Greenland. “We will not accept a situation where we and Greenland are threatened in this way,” he added.

Nielsen, in a press conference on Monday, said Greenland cannot be compared to Venezuela. He asked his constituents to remain calm and unified.

“We are not in a situation in which we think there can be a takeover of the country overnight and that is why we insist that we want good cooperation,” he said.

Nielsen added: “The situation is not such that the United States can simply conquer Greenland.”

TV2 political journalist Ask Rostrup wrote on the station’s live blog on Monday that previously Mette would have flatly rejected the idea of ​​an American takeover of Greenland. But now, Rostrup wrote, the rhetoric has intensified so much that he has to acknowledge the possibility.

Trump criticizes Denmark’s security efforts in Greenland

On Sunday, Trump also mocked Denmark’s efforts to improve Greenland’s national security posture, saying the Danes have added “one more dog sled” to the Arctic territory’s arsenal.

“It’s very strategic right now,” Trump told reporters Sunday as he flew back to Washington from his home in Florida. “Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships everywhere.”

He added: “We need Greenland from a national security point of view, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it.”

But Ulrik Pram Gad, a global security expert at the Danish Institute of International Studies, wrote in a report last year that “there are indeed Russian and Chinese ships in the Arctic, but these ships are too far away to see from Greenland with or without binoculars.”

US space base in northwest Greenland

Greenlanders and Danes were further classified this weekend by a social media post following the raid by a former Trump administration official turned podcaster, Katie Miller. The publication shows an illustrated map of Greenland in the colors of the stars and stripes accompanied by the legend: “SOON.”

“And yes, we expect full respect for the territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Denmark,” Ambassador Jesper Møller Sørensen, Denmark’s top envoy to Washington, said in a post responding to Miller, who is married to Trump’s influential deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller.

The United States Department of Defense operates the remote Pituffik Space Base in northwest Greenland. It was built following a 1951 defense agreement between Denmark and the United States. Supports missile warning, missile defense and space surveillance operations for the United States and NATO.

On mainland Denmark, the partnership between the United States and Denmark has been long-standing. The Danes buy American F-35 fighter jets and just last year the Danish parliament passed a bill to allow American military bases on Danish soil.

Critics say the vote ceded Danish sovereignty to the United States. The legislation expands a previous military agreement, signed in 2023 with the Biden administration, where US troops had broad access to Danish air bases in the Scandinavian country.