Donald Trump’s antics over the past week have put paid to the refrain, often heard in Europe, that the president should be taken “seriously but not literally”. It turns out that Trump literally wants Greenland. He doubled down on his aggressive rhetoric in a raging 45-minute call with the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, a few days ago, threatening crippling tariffs unless she agreed to sell the autonomous territory to the US. In response to Denmark’s sharp increase in military spending for the Arctic, including ships and drones, he derided Copenhagen’s “dog-sled” defences for Greenland, the world’s largest non-continental island, which pale in comparison with the strength of the US military base there.
The threat to take over the territory of a European country by force is something that Europeans now know all too well. Russia has repeatedly threatened east European countries, making good on those threats by invading Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine since 2014. Yet many Europeans are gobsmacked that such a threat is now coming from its greatest ally.
That said, the reaction has been muted. The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, and the European Council president, António Costa, have said nothing, while the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, while speaking out initially, have joined in the collective silence. What’s going on?
Crippling tarrifs you say, a quick Google says Greenland export $36M to the US in 2022, which is basically nothing. And don’t forget the people who pay the tarrifs are the American people not the country the tarrifs apply to. Just because someone says I want to buy that, it doesn’t mean it’s for sale. The only way the US will get Greenland is by invasion and occupation. So the EU response of ignoring the giant toddler is probably the correct move.
The tariffs would be on Denmark or even possibly Europe as a whole.
Trump might think he can strongarm Europe with tariffs, but we’re much too big of an economy for that to work.
Probably tariffs on the entire EU. I don’t think tariffs on Denmark would work, as it’s trivial to route Danish exports to the US through another EU country.
Correct. He can’t put a tariff specifically on Denmark at all. The only way to target Denmark specifically is by putting a tariff on goods that are exclusively made in Denmark. That would be a bad idea, since the main export to USA is medicine. The Americans are already moaning about the price of medicine, so it’ll interesting to see their reaction if Trump raises the price further for no good reason.
This. And by replying we would acknowledge that the subject has any matter. We say more with this silence.
Yes. Don’t feed the troll. A lot more people need to learn this.
This troll it’s fed enough, when is diabetes going to do its job?