US aggression of Greenland

[gleem]

It is possible that Trump is looking for a war so as to expand his powers locally as well as to potentially cancel future USA elections.

Cancelling elections has been brought up periodically, but it is stipulated in the Constitution that elections will take place. They have never been halted. So, how would he try to cancel them except by a military force?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Cancelling elections has been brought up periodically, but it is stipulated in the Constitution that elections will take place. They have never been halted. So, how would he try to cancel them except by a military force?

The point is not exactly the danger of elections to wartime but the transfer of power. There is a weak spot for the country when the two presidents are making the transition.

 

[fresh_42]

"It’s a pleasure – and a duty – to be with you at this turning point for Canada and for the world.
Today, I’ll talk about the rupture in the world order, the end of a nice story, and the beginning of a brutal reality where geopolitics among the great powers is not subject to any constraints.
But I also submit to you that other countries, particularly middle powers like Canada, are not powerless. They have the capacity to build a new order that embodies our values, like respect for human rights, sustainable development, solidarity, sovereignty, and territorial integrity of states.
The power of the less powerful begins with honesty.
Every day we are reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry. That the rules-based order is fading. That the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must.
This aphorism of Thucydides is presented as inevitable – the natural logic of international relations reasserting itself. And faced with this logic, there is a strong tendency for countries to go along to get along. To accommodate. To avoid trouble. To hope that compliance will buy safety.
It won’t.
So, what are our options?
In 1978, the Czech dissident Václav Havel wrote an essay called The Power of the Powerless. In it, he asked a simple question: how did the communist system sustain itself?
His answer began with a greengrocer. Every morning, this shopkeeper places a sign in his window: “Workers of the world, unite!” He does not believe it. No one believes it. But he places the sign anyway – to avoid trouble, to signal compliance, to get along. And because every shopkeeper on every street does the same, the system persists.
Not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false.
Havel called this “living within a lie.” The system’s power comes not from its truth but from everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true. And its fragility comes from the same source: when even one person stops performing — when the greengrocer removes his sign — the illusion begins to crack.
It is time for companies and countries to take their signs down.
For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, praised its principles, and benefited from its predictability. We could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.
We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient. That trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful, and American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods: open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security, and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
So, we placed the sign in the window. We participated in the rituals. And largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
This bargain no longer works.
Let me be direct: we are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.
Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy, and geopolitics laid bare the risks of extreme global integration.
More recently, great powers began using economic integration as weapons. Tariffs as leverage. Financial infrastructure as coercion. Supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.
You cannot “live within the lie” of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination.
The multilateral institutions on which middle powers relied— the WTO, the UN, the COP – the architecture of collective problem solving – are greatly diminished.
As a result, many countries are drawing the same conclusions. They must develop greater strategic autonomy: in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance, and supply chains.
This impulse is understandable. A country that cannot feed itself, fuel itself, or defend itself has few options. When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself.
But let us be clear-eyed about where this leads. A world of fortresses will be poorer, more fragile, and less sustainable.
And there is another truth: if great powers abandon even the pretence of rules and values for the unhindered pursuit of their power and interests, the gains from “transactionalism” become harder to replicate. Hegemons cannot continually monetize their relationships.
Allies will diversify to hedge against uncertainty. Buy insurance. Increase options. This rebuilds sovereignty – sovereignty that was once grounded in rules, but will be increasingly anchored in the ability to withstand pressure.
As I said, such classic risk management comes at a price, but that cost of strategic autonomy, of sovereignty, can also be shared. Collective investments in resilience are cheaper than everyone building their own fortress. Shared standards reduce fragmentation. Complementarities are positive sum.
The question for middle powers, like Canada, is not whether to adapt to this new reality. We must. The question is whether we adapt by simply building higher walls – or whether we can do something more ambitious.
Canada was amongst the first to hear the wake-up call, leading us to fundamentally shift our strategic posture.
Canadians know that our old, comfortable assumption that our geography and alliance memberships automatically conferred prosperity and security is no longer valid.
Our new approach rests on what Alexander Stubb has termed “values-based realism” – or, to put it another way, we aim to be principled and pragmatic.
Principled in our commitment to fundamental values: sovereignty and territorial integrity, the prohibition of the use of force except when consistent with the UN Charter, respect for human rights.
Pragmatic in recognising that progress is often incremental, that interests diverge, that not every partner shares our values. We are engaging broadly, strategically, with open eyes. We actively take on the world as it is, not wait for a world we wish to be.
Canada is calibrating our relationships so their depth reflects our values. We are prioritising broad engagement to maximise our influence, given the fluidity of the world order, the risks that this poses, and the stakes for what comes next.
We are no longer relying on just the strength of our values, but also on the value of our strength.
We are building that strength at home.
Since my government took office, we have cut taxes on incomes, capital gains and business investment, we have removed all federal barriers to interprovincial trade, and we are fast-tracking a trillion dollars of investment in energy, AI, critical minerals, new trade corridors, and beyond.
We are doubling our defence spending by 2030 and are doing so in ways that builds our domestic industries.
We are rapidly diversifying abroad. We have agreed a comprehensive strategic partnership with the European Union, including joining SAFE, Europe’s defence procurement arrangements.
We have signed twelve other trade and security deals on four continents in the last six months.
In the past few days, we have concluded new strategic partnerships with China and Qatar.
We are negotiating free trade pacts with India, ASEAN, Thailand, Philippines, Mercosur.
To help solve global problems, we are pursuing variable geometry— different coalitions for different issues, based on values and interests.
On Ukraine, we are a core member of the Coalition of the Willing and one of the largest per-capita contributors to its defence and security.
On Arctic sovereignty, we stand firmly with Greenland and Denmark and fully support their unique right to determine Greenland’s future. Our commitment to Article 5 is unwavering.
We are working with our NATO allies (including the Nordic Baltic to further secure the alliance’s northern and western flanks, including through Canada’s unprecedented investments in over-the-horizon radar, submarines, aircraft, and boots on the ground. Canada strongly opposes tariffs over Greenland and calls for focused talks to achieve shared objectives of security and prosperity for the Arctic.
On plurilateral trade, we are championing efforts to build a bridge between the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the European Union, creating a new trading block of 1.5 billion people.
On critical minerals, we are forming buyer’s clubs anchored in the G7 so that the world can diversify away from concentrated supply.
On AI, we are cooperating with like-minded democracies to ensure we will not ultimately be forced to choose between hegemons and hyperscalers.
This is not naive multilateralism. Nor is it relying on diminished institutions. It is building the coalitions that work, issue by issue, with partners who share enough common ground to act together. In some cases, this will be the vast majority of nations.
And it is creating a dense web of connections across trade, investment, culture on which we can draw for future challenges and opportunities.
Middle powers must act together because if you are not at the table, you are on the menu.
Great powers can afford to go it alone. They have the market size, the military capacity, the leverage to dictate terms. Middle powers do not. But when we only negotiate bilaterally with a hegemon, we negotiate from weakness. We accept what is offered. We compete with each other to be the most accommodating.
This is not sovereignty. It is the performance of sovereignty while accepting subordination.
In a world of great power rivalry, the countries in between have a choice: to compete with each other for favour or to combine to create a third path with impact.
We should not allow the rise of hard power to blind us to the fact that the power of legitimacy, integrity, and rules will remain strong — if we choose to wield it together.
Which brings me back to Havel.
What would it mean for middle powers to “live in truth”?
It means naming reality. Stop invoking the “rules-based international order” as though it still functions as advertised. Call the system what it is: a period of intensifying great power rivalry, where the most powerful pursue their interests using economic integration as a weapon of coercion.
It means acting consistently. Apply the same standards to allies and rivals. When middle powers criticise economic intimidation from one direction but stay silent when it comes from another, we are keeping the sign in the window.
It means building what we claim to believe in. Rather than waiting for the old order to be restored, create institutions and agreements that function as described.
And it means reducing the leverage that enables coercion. Building a strong domestic economy should always be every government’s priority. Diversification internationally is not just economic prudence; it is the material foundation for honest foreign policy. Countries earn the right to principled stands by reducing their vulnerability to retaliation.
Canada has what the world wants. We are an energy superpower. We hold vast reserves of critical minerals. We have the most educated population in the world. Our pension funds are amongst the world’s largest and most sophisticated investors. We have capital, talent, and a government with the immense fiscal capacity to act decisively.
And we have the values to which many others aspire.
Canada is a pluralistic society that works. Our public square is loud, diverse, and free. Canadians remain committed to sustainability.
We are a stable, reliable partner—in a world that is anything but—a partner that builds and values relationships for the long term.
Canada has something else: a recognition of what is happening and a determination to act accordingly.
We understand that this rupture calls for more than adaptation. It calls for honesty about the world as it is.
We are taking the sign out of the window.
The old order is not coming back. We should not mourn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy.
But from the fracture, we can build something better, stronger, and more just.
This is the task of the middle powers, who have the most to lose from a world of fortresses and the most to gain from a world of genuine cooperation.
The powerful have their power. But we have something too – the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality, to build our strength at home, and to act together.
That is Canada’s path. We choose it openly and confidently.
And it is a path wide open to any country willing to take it with us."

 

[EricDMMiller]

And he is already threatening Canada because of that speech.

He said that we live at the whim of the US.

Trump Threatens Canada After Carney Draws Standing Ovation at Davos

Donald Trump used his speech at Davos to warn Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney after the latter warned about a “rupture” in the world order.

newrepublic.com

“Canada gets a lot of freebies from us, by the way. They should be grateful also, but they’re not,” Trump continued. “I watched your prime minister yesterday, he wasn’t so grateful. They should be grateful to us.… Canada lives because of the United States. Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements.”

I guess he'll kill us the next time he doesn't like something we say.

 

[fresh_42]

I guess he'll kill us the next time he doesn't like something we say.

Would all haven't happened if someone had filed a complaint at the ICC.

 

[Grinkle]

Would all haven't happened if someone had filed a complaint at the ICC.

As far as I able to properly understand the guidelines ICC publishes (maybe I'm wrong of course), anyone can file a complaint with the ICC. There is not the same scrutiny on 'standing' as there is in a normal court. I expect if this approach really had any legs, some legal advocacy organization in the world would have done this already.

 

[fresh_42]

As far as I able to properly understand the guidelines ICC publishes (maybe I'm wrong of course), anyone can file a complaint with the ICC. There is not the same scrutiny on 'standing' as there is in a normal court. I expect if this approach really had any legs, some legal advocacy organization in the world would have done this already.

The problem isn't that anybody can; the problem is the evidence. I think you need cases, e.g., orphans created by ICE. And the US doesn't recognize the ICC, so I assume that this is the major reason why nobody has done it or even thought about it so far. However, if you really want to hit him, that's the way to do it: no Davos, no Aberdeenshire, no Royalties in London.

Edit: I also think that Americans hesitate to appeal to the ICC. They apparently cannot even address the problem themselves, and notoriously refuse to look at anyone else in the world. Furthermore, unlike Palestinians, Latinos don't have a lobby, it seems.

 

[Grinkle]

if we can agree on getting up there as one big happy NATO-family

Edit:
==
The snip above from @sbrothy can be found here -

Civil Rights Post in thread 'Collection of worrying incidents'

Jan 22, 2026

This makes me want to puke

ICE detains five-year-old Minnesota boy arriving home, say school officials

Superintendent says Liam Ramos and his father were taken into custody while in their driveway and sent to Texas

www.theguardian.com

• Greg Bernhardt

• 

Post #334

I moved subsequent discussion to this thread as its this thread's topic.
==


As soon as indigenous people's territory becomes economically desirable it becomes colonized. To me, that the US is the aggressor here is less the issue than that the world seems more concerned with Denmark and fate of NATO than Greenland's Inuit owners. I choose word 'owner' because I think the idea of Denmark owning Greenland should be absolutely preposterous to people who support the idea of liberal democracy. I shed no tears for Denmark or NATO in this situation.

 

[fresh_42]

As soon as indigenous people's territory becomes economically desirable it becomes colonized. To me, that the US is the aggressor here is less the issue than that the world seems more concerned with Denmark and fate of NATO than Greenland's Inuit owners. I choose word 'owner' because I think the idea of Denmark owning Greenland should be absolutely preposterous to people who support the idea of liberal democracy. I shed no tears for Denmark or NATO in this situation.

Denmark is the guarantor that the indigenous people can live in prosperity and preserve their culture. The US would do the opposite. If you really cared about the people, you would have to support the status quo.

 

[Grinkle]

guarantor that the indigenous people can live in prosperity and preserve their culture

This is classic patronizing colonial justification for maintaining an empire. Maybe its also true in this case, I don't know.

If you really cared about the people, you would have to support the status quo.

I don't follow - what is not-caring about the perspective that the indigenous Inuit's should be globally recognized as owning Greenland?

The US would do the opposite.

I agree with this.

 

[fresh_42]

I don't follow - what is not-caring about the perspective that the indigenous Inuit's should be globally recognized as owning Greenland?

The difference is the money Denmark puts into Greenland yearly in order to guarantee the Danish standards (health care, food, hard store materials, access to Danish universities, EU protection laws on culture and nature etc.). This would instantly break away if the Inuit possessed Greenland. Sure, the Americans have only an eye on the resources they can exploit. However, serving the people would mean giving them what they would lose, and that is expensive!

Btw., shouldn't all this be in the other thread?

 

[EricDMMiller]

The US still has a law in place that authorizes the President to "use all means necessary" to prevent any member of the Armed Forces of the United States, elected or appointed official of the United States Government and any prior elected or appointed official, and other person employed by or working on behalf of the United States Government "who is being detained or imprisoned by, on behalf of, or at the request of the International Criminal Court."

The purpose of the legislation, and the way it has been framed since it was originally considered in 2001, would be a kinetic attack against the Hague.

 

[gleem]

It is possible that Trump is looking for a war so as to expand his powers locally as well as to potentially cancel future USA elections.

As I stated earlier, the Constitution requires an election every four years. The president's term of office will end on January 20, 2029. There is no provision for him to continue as president, relieving him of all power and authority. Any order to interfere with an election would be blatantly unconstitutional, relieving any authority from obeying that order.

We had an election during the civil war, the worst time one could expect to have one, with about 30% of the country having succeeded.

A possibility would be some sort of MAGA effort trying to prevent voting, but again, the president loses authority on 1/20/2028. The states could call up national guard to counter them. Maybe some states would try not hold elections, but as in the Civil War, those that hold elections will elect a president.

The best bet for the continuation of the MAGA movement IMO is to find a new standard-bearer. At this point, it is not clear whether Trump will be able to physically or mentally remain president.

 

[Grinkle]

Btw., shouldn't all this be in the other thread?

Ack! I'll move the posts,thanks!

The difference is the money Denmark puts into Greenland

This discussion has me coming around to the conclusion that I am making the perfect the enemy of the good. In a perfect world the Greenland Inuits would not need a patron to defend them or to help develop their natural resources. As far as patrons go, I agree with you that the Dane's current governance of Greenland is not bad, especially if judged by historical standards.

I am still uncomfortable with the idea that the Danes (as compared to the Greenland Inuits) are real stakeholders in this, but I do agree that if selecting from available choices and eliminating fantasy choices the status quo is the best option.

 

[Grinkle]

Americans hesitate to appeal to the ICC

I mean this seriously - if you try to find a randomly selected college educated American who knows what ICC stands for, if you give them the clue that the last C stands for 'Court', I think you'd still have to ask dozens of people. If you don't give them the clue, many more dozens, I think.

If Americans had an awareness of the ICC, there would be hesitation, I think - not arguing that.

 

[fresh_42]

Denmark is not what we classically call a colonist. Greenland is more or less autonomous. I think they aren't even in the EU, but the Danes are, and as such, bound by EU law. As far as I know, they currently don't even exploit their resources (seldom earths) except for fishing. This means, in return, that nature is currently relatively safe there. This would immediately change. And the environmental sins of the USA already fill a book, and its current president even worsens the situation daily. Simply compare CA legislation with federal legislation, and there are many more deficits, but this would be a different topic.

I haven't looked up the numbers, but I assume Denmark is paying way more than they receive.

 

[EricDMMiller]

I think Denmark sends about €600M in direct cash and provides court and prison services worth about another €250M every year.

I don't think they really get anything meaningful back at all.

 

[fresh_42]

The other way around is more important. From Wikipedia:

Greenland, an autonomous territory belonging to Denmark, was the first territory to leave the European Union following a referendum in 1985. Greenlanders had voted to secede in a 1982 plebiscite. Greenland retains the status of an "associated overseas country" within the EU, enjoying the benefits of a customs union, but according to the Union's Customs Code, it is not part of the Union's customs territory.

You also need to add free access to the Danish universities, the Danish health system, and likely more.

 

[jack action]

We had an election during the civil war, the worst time one could expect to have one, with about 30% of the country having succeeded.

Yes, but the norm in an election during wartime is the status quo. In 1864, Lincoln was re-elected, in 1916 Wilson was re-elected, and in 1944, Roosevelt was also re-elected.

 

[Patxitxi]

Trump says eight European countries face 10% tariff for opposing US control of Greenland​

https://www.theguardian.com/world/l...rk-us-donald-trump-europe-latest-news-updates

Now that deflated pretty fast and it's one of the few times we have seen the orange monster take a step back.

 

[Patxitxi]

... and the article mentions that the 10% tariff from February is to increase to 25% in June if they don't change their minds.

I find it hard to grasp the number of ways in which this violates accepted norms, including not only ethical considerations but also international law and binding agreements relating to trade, United Nations, NATO and so on.

Norms? Ethics? Law? Agreements? This brute?
Didn't you have a bully like this in school?
My contention is this is very easy to grasp, just think of "it" as a bigger, meaner, and even more stupid bully in the international playing field.
Easier to grasp now?

 

[Jonathan Scott]

Norms? Ethics? Law? Agreements? This brute?
Didn't you have a bully like this in school?
My contention is this is very easy to grasp, just think of "it" as a bigger, meaner, and even more stupid bully in the international playing field.
Easier to grasp now?

Even school bullies (of which I have painful experience) didn't have unlimited power - for example, they wouldn't act in situations where their actions could be witnessed by those in charge or by someone who could report them and be believed. But Trump doesn't seem to care who sees what he does.

 

[Patxitxi]

Even school bullies (of which I have painful experience) didn't have unlimited power - for example, they wouldn't act in situations where their actions could be witnessed by those in charge or by someone who could report them and be believed. But Trump doesn't seem to care who sees what he does.

Well I agree (andvI have also very painful memories from school) but even he doesn't have unlimited power.
We all have to do what we can (small as it may seem) to start denying him. For example "Iceland" ;-) is not been invaded anymore.
One thing is clear: no bully steps back on his own initiative.

 

[Grinkle]

I have come to believe that one thing Trump is very good at is sniffing out a bluff. If he is dealing with someone who he believes will actually follow through on what they say, and he doesn't want that follow-through to happen, he looks for an off-ramp. Some pundits have said 'Trump respects strength', I'd say 'acknowledges' rather than 'respects', myself.

Regarding Greenland, I think he believed Macron would have gotten the EU to void the trade agreement and that is why he backed off.

 

[placebo]

Cancelling elections has been brought up periodically, but it is stipulated in the Constitution that elections will take place. They have never been halted. So, how would he try to cancel them except by a military force?

Heather Cox Richardson noted that authoritarians generally like holding elections to give themselves an air of legitimacy. They just rig the elections. That's what Trump and some Republicans have been trying to do with redistricting.

I think the more likely danger to the midterms is the Trump and his minions falsely claiming widespread fraud, seizing voting machines, and then declaring they found that Republicans actually won the elections.

 

[MindlessPieces]

Cancelling elections has been brought up periodically, but it is stipulated in the Constitution that elections will take place. They have never been halted. So, how would he try to cancel them except by a military force?

I have to say that Trump's strength is that he doesn't leave any stone unturned. All legitimate. legal approaches, all illegal unconstitutional approaches, all unethical and morally dubious approaches are at his disposal. Remember the 2020 election and the illegal fake electors scheme and the Capital riot. Remember his campaign to personally phone up the election authorities in the key swing states and tell them to find him the votes, and his pressure campaign to remove the Attourney General and replace him with someone who was willing to say that they had evidence of widespread voter fraud.
And the publicity campaign that his hired lawyers undertook to spread the lies of fraud during the election.
Trump will try every dirty trick regardless if they are legal or not, regardless if they are Constitutional or not. He's trying to get rid of birth right citizenship even though it is a constitutional right.

Trump is like an armchair critic, with very little understanding of how things actually work. He just believes every outlandish thing that he hopes will work at keeping him president. I bet he believes if their is a war he can cancel the election. Plus I reckon, almost half of USA would be very happy if there was no election, they would be very happy if Trump tried to stay in office by force. Some are probably preparing to help him now, stock piling guns, conspiring Sedition., Believing that Trump will pardon them of any crimes, just like the Jan 6 ers. Trump himself has total immunity from the law.

 

[MindlessPieces]

Now that deflated pretty fast and it's one of the few times we have seen the orange monster take a step back.

Mr TACO, almost always backs out of his hyperbole blustering threats. He loves all the media attention that he gets, He loves trying to panic people and countries, especially allies.
He is like a mob boss, he rules by fear and intimidation.

 

[Patxitxi]

Mr TACO, almost always backs out of his hyperbole blustering threats. He loves all the media attention that he gets, He loves trying to panic people and countries, especially allies.
He is like a mob boss, he rules by fear and intimidation.

Not "like". He just is.

 

[Borg]

 

[fresh_42]

Greenland Olympian sends clear message to Donald Trump after 'buy' threats​

...
Greenlandic biathlete Ukaleq Slettemark has pledged to "show people who we are and where we are on the map" in response to United States President Donald Trump's ongoing efforts to acquire the territory.
...

Source: https://www.themirror.com/sport/other-sport/greenland-olympian-sends-clear-message-1679926