"Greenland is the largest island in the world, but it has fewer than fifty-seven thousand residents, who are mostly scattered..."

"... among settlements and towns along its western coast. Although it belongs to the Kingdom of Denmark, it lies to the west of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, and is part of North America. The latest articulation of the U.S.’s National Security Strategy, published in November, frames Trump’s imperial ambitions as an extension of the Monroe Doctrine, the assertion by President James Monroe, in 1823, that any attempt by European powers to further colonize the Americas would be treated as 'dangerous to our peace and safety.' Under Trump’s leadership, the N.S.S. says, “we will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere.'"

Writes Ben Taub, in "Inside the Ludicrous, Deadly Serious Plan to Take Over Greenland/'We want Greenland,' Trump said. Four men sprang into action to make fantasy a reality" (The New Yorker).

Adding tags to this post, I hesitated over whether to use "geography" or "geology" or both. The part about Denmark "owning" or "colonizing" Greenland is obviously geography and not geology, so "geography" is a good tag for this post. But I want to underscore that Greenland is part of the North American continent. To get rid of the politics and human culture and speak of it geologically, Grok pointed me to the Wikipedia article "Laurentia":

"Working with the fantastic Governor of Louisiana, Jeff Landry, we are going to send a great hospital boat to Greenland to take care of the many people who are sick, and not being taken care of there."

"It’s on the way!!!"

Wrote Trump, quoted in "Greenland does not need US hospital boat to be sent by Trump, says Denmark/Prime minister and defence minister rebuff US president’s claim that Arctic islanders are 'not being taken care of'" (The Guardian).

"President Trump Gaggles with Press on Air Force One En Route Palm Beach, FL, Jan. 31, 2026."

I'm going to pick through the transcript and will update in about an hour. Meantime, you can pick over the text and pull out your favorite highlights

ADDED: From the YouTube transcript:

Taste the delicious penguin bait.

Embrace the penguin. pic.twitter.com/kKlzwd3Rx7

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) January 23, 2026

"Based upon a very productive meeting that I have had with the Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte, we have formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland..."

"... and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region. This solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the United States of America, and all NATO Nations. Based upon this understanding, I will not be imposing the Tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st. Additional discussions are being held concerning The Golden Dome as it pertains to Greenland. Further information will be made available as discussions progress. Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and various others, as needed, will be responsible for the negotiations — They will report directly to me. Thank you for your attention to this matter!"

Writes President Trump, at Truth Social.

ADDED: I just want to note that I have seen that Trump kept calling Greenland "Iceland," and I'm not buying the theory that he was merely calling it an ice land and not mixing it up with the country named Iceland.

Trump is now confusing Greenland and Iceland: "They're not there for us on Iceland, that I can tell you. Our stock market took the first dip yesterday because of Iceland. So Iceland has already cost us a lot of money." pic.twitter.com/Iu9CI6M2ku

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 21, 2026

I thought of another excuse that could be attempted. Trump likes to rename things, notably the Gulf of Mexico, so maybe part of his plan is to rename Greenland, which, after all, was misnamed in the first place. I do not think it's a good idea to use a name that another country is already using, but at least, he's not calling it Trumpland.

With stacks of papers as props, Trump endeavors to prove to the press that the first year of his second term was jam-packed with amazing accomplishments.

I watched the entire thing, and you can too. If you don't already agree that it's been a great year, I don't think he can ever prove it to you, but he has to do this, because, he says, no one else is going to do it for him.

"As you know, this is the anniversary, first anniversary, January 20th. And it's been an amazing period of time. We have a book that I'm not going to read to you, but these are the accomplishments of what we've produced. Page after page after page, individual things. I could stand here and read it for a week and we wouldn't be finished, but we've done more than any other administration has done by far. And terms of military, in terms of ending wars, in terms of completing wars, nobody's really seen very much like it...."

On and on, for 2 hours.

When it gets to the Q&A, he gives short answers. The best example of that is, asked "How far are you willing to go to acquire Greenland?," he said, "You'll find out."

That answer called to mind something Chief Justice Rehnquist said in 2005 when he was asked if he was going to retire: "That's for me to know and for you to find out."  I reacted, blogging, "How near death can he be if he's horsing around like that?" He died less than 2 months later.

Speaking of things that feel like we're in a movie, the President of the United States just posted this on his place called Truth.

Link.

"U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Monday that it would be 'completely wrong' for President Donald Trump to slap tariffs on European nations opposing his plan to take over Greenland...."

"In remarks to reporters, Starmer denounced economic coercion against allies as the wrong approach to resolving disagreements. He described tariffs as harmful to British workers and businesses — even as he praised and sought to preserve the relationship with the United States, which has underpinned Europe’s security and economic interests for more than eight decades...."

From "Europeans see alliance at risk as Trump stokes trade war over Greenland/U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said it was 'completely wrong' for President Donald Trump to threaten tariffs on allies who oppose his push to seize or buy Greenland" (WaPo).

"Trump has insisted that controlling Greenland is necessary for national security reasons — a point disputed by allies and some senior members of Congress who have rebutted the president’s claim that the Arctic territory faces imminent security risks from Russia and China. Trump’s unwillingness, so far, to back down risks driving a deeper wedge in the Western alliance or, some fear, causing an irreparable break."

Is the dispute about what counts as "imminent"... or rather how early we need to act in advance of a security risk becoming imminent? I go back to what Scott Bessent said yesterday: "The national emergency is avoiding a national emergency."

Why doesn't Europe want to give us what we need to provide the defense that they rely on?

ADDED: Trump wrote this letter to the prime minister of Norway: "Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America. Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China, and why do they have a 'right of ownership' anyway? There are no written documents, it’s only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also. I have done more for NATO than any other person since its founding, and now, NATO should do something for the United States. The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland. Thank you! President DJT"

"Is President Trump serious about annexing Greenland?"/"President Trump strongly believes that we cannot outsource our security."

 

BESSENT: It might not be next year. Might not be in 4 years. But down the road this fight for the Arctic is real. We would keep our NATO guarantees. And if there were an attack on Greenland from Russia, from some other area, we would get dragged in. So better now, peace through strength, make it part of the United States.... The Europeans project weakness. The U.S. projects strength....

Trump embraces the title "King." Either he's laughing in the face of the "No Kings" crowd or he's forgotten about them altogether.

That's at Truth Social.

What's the context? I had to look it up. I found "Trump threatens tariffs to force support for US control of Greenland/Trump's threat marked another escalation of his campaign to control the island, which is a territory of US ally Denmark" (USA Today), which reports on a health policy event at the White House yesterday, where Trump "trumpeted how the threat of tariffs forced other developed countries to accept higher drug prices so U.S. prices could come down."

Trump then added that he might use tariffs to get what he wants about Greenland. He said:  "I may put a tariff on countries if they don’t go along with Greenland because we need Greenland for national security."

And then he praised himself more generally, declaring: "I’m the tariff king and the tariff king has done a great job."

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A post shared by USA TODAY (@usatoday)

UPDATE: "Trump Announces 10 Percent Tariff on European Countries in Standoff Over Greenland/The president escalated his drive to take charge of the Danish territory, targeting Denmark and seven other nations aligned with it" (NYT):

Denmark, which oversees Greenland, will be hit with a 10 percent tariff on all goods sent to the United States beginning on Feb. 1, he wrote in a social media post, along with Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, Britain, the Netherlands and Finland. If they don’t relent, he added, the tariff rate will increase to 25 percent on June 1, “until such time as a Deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase of Greenland.”

Yikes. 

"The U.S. has such a free hand in Greenland that it can pretty much do what it wants. I have a very hard time seeing that the U.S. couldn’t get pretty much everything it wanted if it just asked nicely."

Said Mikkel Runge Olesen, a researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies in Copenhagen, quoted in "Trump Administration Live Updates: Rubio Says President Wants to Buy Greenland" (NYT).

Under a little-known Cold War agreement, the United States already enjoys sweeping military access in Greenland... allow[ing] it to “construct, install, maintain, and operate” military bases across Greenland, “house personnel” and “control landings, takeoffs, anchorages, moorings, movements, and operation of ships, aircraft, and waterborne craft.” It was signed in 1951 by the United States and Denmark, which colonized Greenland more than 300 years ago and still controls some of its affairs.... 

So it's essentially already ours? But Rubio told Congress yesterday that Trump wants to buy Greenland.  Olesen told the NYT that "Greenland does not want to be bought by anyone — especially not the United States." Presuming that this Olesen knows what Greenland wants, I'd still regard that as a bargaining position. And they are bargaining with Trump. We'll see what happens.

At the New Year's Eve party at Althouse...

... you can talk about your memories of 2025 and plans for 2026. 

Me, I'll almost surely be asleep, but I can see that it's already 2026 in London. In 5 minutes, it will turn midnight in Ittoqqortoormiit, Greenland. That's good enough for me!

***

And here's today's sunrise, which I did dare to go out to see:

"Greenland is not for sale and will not be for sale, so you can forget about your plans for Greenland to become part of the USA."

"Nothing about us without us, and Greenland’s future is solely up to us. A majority does not want to become Americans, we do not want to be taken over by another country...."

Said Aaja Chemnitz, "a Greenlandic politician serving in the Danish Parliament," quoted in "Trump appoints Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry as special envoy to Greenland/The Danish territory has long been in the president’s sights. Trump said the Republican governor “understands how essential Greenland is to our National Security" (WaPo).

From the text of the article: "Trump has said repeatedly that the United States will 'get' Greenland, casting it as a national security objective for the U.S. His administration also covets Greenland for its untapped rare earth metals, an industry dominated by China globally. In April, The Washington Post reported that the White House was preparing an estimate of what it would cost the federal government to control Greenland as a territory."

"How big is Greenland?" — that question came up in a novel I'm reading. A child asks the question of her father who was telling her a story about the Greenlandic ice sheet melting and flooding the world and had said "Imagine, a slab of ice the size of Greenland!" The father "had no idea," only that Greenland "was notorious for being smaller than it looked on a Mercator projection, but he felt sure it was large, given that its melting would cause global sea levels to rise by something like seven meters."

The WaPo article offers an answer to the question: Greenland is "around three times the size of Texas."

"We cannot change what has happened. But we can take responsibility. Therefore, on behalf of Denmark, I would like to say sorry."

Said Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, quoted in "Denmark Apologizes After Birth Control Scandal in Greenland/For years, Danish doctors inserted intrauterine devices in Greenlandic girls and women without their consent, part of a painful legacy of mistreatment" (NYT).

The practice went on for decades and many patients were never told what had been placed inside them. Some learned only years later when they had health complications. Some women were left infertile for life.... Denmark colonized Greenland more than three centuries ago.... The campaign started in the 1960s and affected thousands of Greenlandic women and girls but was brought to light only a few years ago. Danish doctors, who were running Greenland’s health care system at the time, inserted IUDs in women and girls with the intent of preventing pregnancies and controlling Greenland’s birth rate....

"We feel threatened by them. So it would’ve been a total disaster and a cold slap in the face if the pope had been full-on American."

Said Araceli Torres Hallal, 64, "a Catholic entrepreneur in Mexico City," quoted in "World Catholics See the First American Pope as Hardly American/Catholics around the world were skeptical at first about an American pope. But Pope Leo XIV’s multicultural and multilingual identity has put them at ease" (NYT).

We're also told:

Even calling Pope Leo “American” has bothered those Latin Americans who resent the use of the word to describe someone from the United States, because they see it as a form of imperialism. They think “American” should apply to anyone from the entire continent — that is, from North, Central or South America.

Isn't that 2 "continents" — North America and South America? Central America is not a continent. It's part of North America, though I've heard educated Americans deny it. And I mean to say Americans for United Statesians, because we don't say "United Statesians." There's the Esperanto "Usonians." There's "Yankees." These are never going to happen. We don't have another word for saying who we are. Show a little empathy for our plight. Read the Wikipedia article "Demonyms for the United States." It's been a problem all along.

But the NYT writes "the entire continent — that is, from North, Central or South America," and maybe that means it has adopted the theory that the whole landmass — south and north (and central) — is one continent. I don't think the NYT has adopted that nomenclature. And I wonder if Trump would like it. He looks at a map and insists that it's some kind of manifest destiny that Canada should be part of the U.S. And he came up with Gulf of America. And if you want to say it's one continent because we're all here on one tectonic system, remember who's on our plate: Greenland. The Trumpian dinner is served!

"The predecessor who now inspires Trump in vivid oil paint served only one term, dying shortly after he left office in 1849."

"But in four years Polk nearly doubled the territory of the U.S. On the northern border, Polk’s supporters rallied around the expansionist slogan '54°40’ or Fight,' demanding the U.S. take over the entire Pacific Northwest up to that latitude, then the southern boundary of Russian Alaska, even if it meant going to war with Britain. Instead, in 1846 Polk negotiated a treaty that established the U.S.’s northern border at the 49th parallel. In the Southwest, Polk annexed Texas and fought the Mexican-American War, which ended in Mexico ceding more than 500,000 square miles to the U.S., including all of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming, in exchange for $15 million. It was 'one of the largest land grabs in world history,' said historian Hampton Sides... 'He wanted it all, and he got it all in one term....' In terms of personality, Polk and Trump have little in common, Sides said. Despite his aggressive foreign policy, Polk 'was not this blustering, loud, bully of a person. He was morose, a kind of dark guy.' Polk was also known 'for being quite honest…He wasn’t this erratic, crazy person who was constantly throwing people off guard....'"

From "The Painting That Explains Trump’s Foreign Policy/James K. Polk expanded the U.S. more than any other president. Now his portrait hangs in the Oval Office, a signal that President Trump’s ambition to take over Canada, Greenland and other territory is more than just talk" (Wall Street Journal).

"There's a sense that Denmark doesn't respect Greenland and that there's this long legacy of racism, exploitation, treating Greenlanders as second class citizens."

"And Greenlanders come from a different culture. They're part of this wider Inuit community that lives in the Arctic Circle in Alaska and Canada and parts of Russia. They have their own language, their own traditions, their own history of how they survive in this very hostile environment. And I met a number of people who said that they were mistreated, they were made fun of, that they were called racial slurs. I also heard a lot about the colonial legacy and things that Denmark had done when Greenland was a colony. They destroyed local traditions. They outlawed some of the religious practices that Greenlanders had been doing for centuries. And there was this scandal in the 1960s and 70s where Danish doctors were inserting IUD birth control devices into Greenlandic girls as young as, like, 12 in an attempt to keep the population down. And they did this to thousands of girls without them really understanding what was being done to them. And this was kept secret until just a few years ago. And when this scandal broke and the news spread that all these women in Greenland had been subject to this, it caused a lot of anger towards Denmark, all these things together. That's what brings us to this moment where just about everybody now wants independence."

From "Trump’s Bid for Greenland," yesterday's episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast. Audio and transcript here, at Podscribe.

And here's today's news from Greenland, as reported in the NYT: "In Trump’s Shadow, Greenland Votes for a New Government/President Trump has expressed a desire to 'get' Greenland, but the party that won Tuesday’s election is in no rush to change the status quo":

"Trump has been adamant that the United States should exert control over [Greenland], given both its strategic position in a melting Arctic region..."

"... where China and Russia also have growing interests, as well as the wealth of natural resources that are thought to lie beneath Greenland’s seabeds and frozen wastes.... Trump and his allies do not envision an invasion of Greenland.... Instead, Trump is hoping for Copenhagen’s acquiescence in some sort of deal, framing a U.S. acquisition of the territory as an act of generosity to relieve Denmark of the burden of administering it. There is plenty of historical precedent. U.S. politicians have eyed Greenland for more than a century and a half. William Seward, the U.S. secretary of state who purchased Alaska in 1867, was close to a similar deal for Greenland, but was foiled by political rivals in Congress. With both northern territories folded into the United States, Seward suggested this continental nation 'will flank British America for thousands of miles … and greatly increase her inducements, peacefully and cheerfully, to become a part of the American Union.' That is, he thought buying Greenland would be a precursor to absorbing Canada — a vision Trump hasn’t quite relinquished, either...."

From "The curious momentum behind Trump’s quest for Greenland/In 2019, Trump’s bid for the Arctic territory was laughed off as a joke. Now, it’s gaining traction and provoking jitters in Europe" (free-access link).

"How's everything going? Good? Everybody happy? You're getting a little bit more access to your President than you did the last time. Slightly. Like by about 5,000 percent."

Our tireless President, on Air Force One last night:

 

It's hard to listen through the plane noise, but let me pick out a few things. Responding to a comment that he'd been "so nice" to Governor Newsom ("you know, 'Governor Newscum,'" he said:

I decided to be nice. It was nice that he came to the plane, honestly... and in the end you know we have the same goal. We want to take that catastrophe and make it as good as possible. We disagree on some things I guess he's not so set on water. I like water for putting out fires. I find it to be extremely good. A little old fashioned, but about the best thing that God has ever created for putting out fires....

Asked about the First Lady, who "seems to be taking a more public facing role," he said:

She felt badly about North Carolina. She felt very badly about California. Los Angeles. Got a lot of friends. I have a lot of friends in North Carolina and both, and she has a lot of friends in California, so she wanted to be with me.

 About TikTok:

As you know, I have the right to sell it or close it depending on what I think is best for the country....

Pushed on "a report... that you are putting together a deal with Oracle and outside investors to help them buy TikTok," he said:

"We are ready to talk. Cooperation is about dialogue. Cooperation means that you will work towards solutions.”"

Said Múte Egede, the prime minister of Greenland, quoted in "Greenland leaders ready to talk with Trump after prez-elect expressed interest to make territory part of America" (NY Post).

At a press conference Friday in Denmark, which exercises nominal sovereignty over Greenland, Egede said he accepted that Greenland was “a place that the Americans see as part of their world” and that while he has not spoken with Trump, he was open to “discussions about what unites us.”... 

“We have a desire for independence, a desire to be the master of our own house … This is something everyone should respect,” he said. “Greenland is for the Greenlandic people. We do not want to be Danish, we do not want to be American. We want to be Greenlandic.”