Starmer is expected to attend a meeting of JEF leaders in Finland during the first quarter of this year, according to a government official, who was not authorized to speak on the record.
The scheduled annual summit has not been specifically arranged in response to Trump’s threats, but the future of Greenland is expected to have increased salience during discussions about High North security. The same official added that while committing a greater British military presence to the region via NATO remains on the table, the Arctic flank could also be reinforced by increased monitoring, rather than sending extra troops.
Anthony Heron, research associate at the Arctic Institute think tank, said JEF’s potential role in Greenland had been “overlooked” and that focusing on NATO or the U.S.-Denmark relationship “misses the value of smaller, regionally focused groupings that can act quickly and politically coherently in the High North.”
He added that JEF is “one of the few frameworks where the U.K. already has influence and the trust of key Nordic and Baltic partners, yet it is still treated as a secondary tool rather than a core part of U.K. security policy.”
In an interview during a JEF exercise last year, U.K. Defence Secretary John Healey talked up the grouping as a tool to resist aggression against Arctic countries — at that point with reference to Russia.
“We’re the nations that can best assess the risks, best respond to the threats, and best get NATO connected to take this more seriously,” he said.
An MOD spokesperson said: “The U.K. is committed to working with NATO and Joint Expeditionary Force allies to strengthen NATO’s Arctic deterrence and defence. The JEF plays a vital role in boosting our collective security in the Baltics and the High North, with allies routinely training and operating together.”
This story has been updated with a response from a Ministry of Defence spokesperson.