On Jan. 6, Congressmen Blake Moore of Utah and Steven Hoyer of Maryland released a joint press statement as a part of being on the bipartisan Congressional Friends of Greenland Caucus. 

They rebuked the Trump administration for trying to buy Greenland once more in his second term, citing Denmark as a crucial ally to the deterrence of foreign adversaries such as China and Russia and their ambitions in the Arctic. “Sabre-rattling about annexing Greenland is needlessly dangerous. The Kingdom of Denmark is a NATO ally, [a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization dedicated to countering Russian aggression, and one of America’s closest partners. An attack on Greenland – a crucial part of that alliance – would tragically be an attack on NATO,” Moore and Hoyer said.

Although the idea of buying Greenland distinctly evokes Trump as of late, historically speaking this is neither America’s first attempt, nor most likely the last, attempt to acquire Greenland for themselves. However, the student body may be largely unaware of this fact, having only heard the recent news that Trump wants to buy Greenland. “Well, I know Trump wants it…and Denmark doesn’t like it,” freshman Eron Borden said.

Yet it is important to recognize patterns in history, not just to learn from the past mistakes or predict the future. It just so happens that this particular story of Greenland and America has heavy and evident parallels, starting with a man named William Seward.

William Seward was the Secretary of State under both Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln and is best known for negotiating the Alaska purchase, which was known as Seward’s Folly as, back then, Alaska was known as a winter wasteland, a place where there was nothing important. The American public, hearing that Seward also wanted to purchase another frigid desert called Greenland, was outraged and adamantly opposed to the purchase.

As one will see, throughout the long history of Greenland and America, the attempts to purchase Greenland and the reasons that it would be a valuable asset do not go away, rather, they compound and stack until someone would inevitably think of acquiring Greenland for America as a gain that would significantly outweigh the harms. In the early stages of this history, the reason revolved mainly around a simple concept without much need for explanation: It had resources such as coal and good fishing spots.

This was the same reason for the next attempt to buy Greenland, this time under the President William Taft, who proposed a land swap, offering the American held Philippines for Greenland. Denmark rejected the offer and counteroffered, selling the Virgin Islands to America for $25 million, which Taft accepted.

Fast forwarding to World War 2, Denmark was invaded by Nazi Germany, causing the Danish ambassador to the U.S. stationed there at the time of the invasion, Henrik Kaufman, to sign the Agreement Related to the Defense of Greenland. A brief synopsis of the agreement is that the United States could do anything they wanted militarily, including using Danish facilities and supplies, to repel German attempts to invade the island or control its ports through submarine warfare.

This is where the next three reasons Greenland was valuable comes to light: the ability to build weather stations there, a potential trade route to the USSR, and combatting U-Boat power in the Atlantic. The first reason is pretty simple: Since the allied powers tended to be west of Germany, they would be able to track the western winds and predict the weather for military operations in advance. 

The third reason, combatting U-Boat supremacy in the Atlantic was important as Greenland offered a place for harbors and air strips that allowed the Allies to extend their range of their air protection against German U-Boats. The second reason was the Northern Sea Route goes right between Greenland and Britain, which was a key trade route to supply Soviet efforts through lend-lease agreements that could be easily stopped if Germany could build a harbor in Greenland. “If ships can get through the Arctic Circle, then [America] will be able to monitor movement or get to the Eastern Hemisphere very quickly,” social studies teacher Anne Steppling said.

Yet, as Germany fell, America entered the Cold War with the USSR, causing an urgent need to secure Greenland from Soviet control and lead to the signing of the Defense of Greenland Agreement of 1951 where, again, Denmark refused to sell Greenland but reiterated the agreement from 1941. The Soviets created International Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) and their propaganda later on caused the American government to start Operation Golden Dome and Operation Chrome Dome out of fear.

These two operations were similar in that they both included stationing bombers in Greenland on American airstrips, but the two differed in the extremity of the operation. Operation Chrome Dome, the one more relevant to the story, was an operation where bombers would fly laps around North America with active nuclear bombs on board so at a moments notice they could break out of their flight path to bomb the USSR. This operation inevitably ended when multiple nuclear bombs were lost in crashes, especially over Greenland.

The last chapter of this long story concerns China as their ambitions include monopolizing the rare earth metals refining industry, and part of this is obtaining the numerous and plentiful deposits of resources in the Arctic. The U.S. is not keen on this happening and, furthermore, they are worried that the melting ice in the Arctic will create a new battleground where their foreign adversaries may be able to take advantage of melting ice and create new threats. “[America is] worried that the Arctic might be a new battle ground for war or compete for natural resources,” social studies teacher Mathew Winter said.

Greenland will stay one of the most important locations to America geopolitically, economically and politically as long as it stays where it is, with emphasis on the flow of resources from and around Greenland. The attention from America’s adversaries extends to Greenland and the Arctic, while America sees encroachment on its water or the Arctic as threats to its national security and maritime security. As long as America stays a global superpower, others will try to encroach on it and it will always be on the defensive and for as long as America exists, it will try to rule the waves.