Why Denmark's success could cost it Greenland |
Remember when the President of the United States casually enquired about purchasing Greenland in 2019? The world scoffed. Denmark, a nation whose greatest geopolitical aspiration usually involves a decent bridge or tunnel, emitted a collective gasp of ‘Oh no, he didn’t’. It was all very quickly dismissed with a chuckle as just another example of Donald Trump’s fantasy of embiggening America.
But fast forward seven years, and the laughter is stuck in Copenhagen’s throat. This is because the Arctic, far from being a frozen curiosity, is rapidly becoming the next great theatre of global power. Trump, with his signature sledgehammer, may well have been years ahead of the curve in a way that few, at the moment, quite appreciate.
Greenland suddenly becomes not just real estate but the fulcrum of a new global trade artery
A declared interest: I’m a Dane and a proud one at that (our bridges really are magnificent). By rights, I should be decrying Trump’s offer to buy up a part of our beloved lingdom with all the affronted fury of my Viking ancestors. But I also happen to work in an industry the Vikings would have recognised for all its land-claiming, world-defining, realpolitik-ing dominance: oil. And it’s this that makes me uniquely positioned to witness Denmark’s recurring geopolitical irony: we’ve simply been a victim of our own success. In developing the world’s best bio- and electro-fuels, we’ve changed the tradewinds and are losing........