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US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced plans on Wednesday to meet with Danish officials next week to discuss the Trump administration’s intention to “acquire” Greenland.
US President Donald Trump doubled down on the idea this week, and the White House has refused to rule out using military force to seize the Arctic island, which is a self-governing territory of Denmark.
Rubio told reporters that “acquiring” Greenland has “always been the president’s intent from the very beginning,” adding that “he’s not the first US president that has examined or looked at how we could acquire Greenland.”
Denmark and Greenland sought the meeting after Trump and his advisers reiterated in recent days their desire to control the island, heightening fears after the unprecedented US military operation to capture Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro.
Tensions with NATO members escalated after the White House said Tuesday that the “US military is always an option.” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen warned earlier this week that a US takeover would amount to the end of NATO.
Rubio was on Capitol Hill for a briefing with the entire US Senate and House, where questions from lawmakers centred not only on the capture of Maduro — but also on Trump’s recent comments about Greenland.
Rubio did not directly answer a question about whether the Trump administration is willing to risk the NATO alliance by potentially moving ahead with a military option regarding Greenland.
‘Purchase’ rather than occupy?
“I’m not here to talk about Denmark or military intervention, I’ll be meeting with them next week, we’ll have those conversations with them then, but I don’t have anything further to add to that,” Rubio said, telling reporters that every president retained the option to address national security threats to the United States through military means.
Trump has argued that the United States needs to control the world’s largest island to ensure its own security in the face of rising threats from China and Russia in the Arctic.
Rubio told a select group of lawmakers that it was the administration’s intention to eventually purchase Greenland, as opposed to using military force.
The remarks, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, were made in a classified briefing Monday evening on Capitol Hill, according to a person with knowledge of his comments who was granted anonymity due to the private nature of the discussion.
The leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom joined PM Frederiksen in a statement Tuesday reaffirming that the mineral-rich island, which guards the Arctic and North Atlantic approaches to North America, “belongs to its people.”
Video editor • Emma De Ruiter
Additional sources • AP