January 2026. Donald Trump reiterates with insistence his desire to acquire Greenland, invoking a “national security priority” in response to what he describes as the Chinese threat in the Arctic. The proposal, which had already sparked controversy during his first term in 2019, returns now with greater rhetorical intensity and in a transformed geopolitical context. But does this ambition really correspond to defensive imperatives, or does it conceal strategic objectives of another nature?
A cartographic analysis allows to disentangle the different factors that converge in this renewed American interest. The world’s largest island, covering 2.16 million km² —although 81% remains ice-bound—, hosts barely 56,000 inhabitants in coastal settlements with no land connection between them. Despite this apparent marginality, the motivations of the Trump Administration are not exhausted by a desire to contain China; they intertwine with the global competition for critical minerals, the opportunities opened by climate change, and the reconfiguration of Arctic trade routes. Understanding the complexity of this geographic space requires going beyond official rhetoric.
The security argument: a limited Chinese footprint
The White House justifies its interest in Greenland by the need to counter what it portrays as a growing Chinese influence in the Arctic. It is true that the Chinese government, which in 2018 self-declared itself a “Near-Arctic State,” has increased its capabilities in the region through the construction of icebreakers and the promotion of a “Polar Silk Road”. However, China possesses only three icebreakers compared with Russia’s fleet of more than forty, and the physical Chinese presence on Greenland’s own soil is considerably more modest than the White House narrative suggests.
“China’s successive attempts to invest in Greenland have been systematically blocked by the Danish government or have failed for economic reasons”
China’s attempts at economic penetration in the island have met recurrent obstacles. In 2018, when China Communications Construction Company sought to finance the expansion of Nuuk and Ilulissat’s airports, the Danish executive intervened directly to take over the project, thus preventing Chinese control over infrastructure deemed critical. A similar pattern appeared in 2016, when the Hong Kong-based General Nice attempted to acquire a Danish naval base at Grønnedal. At that time, the Danish government blocked the operation citing national security concerns.
Other extractive projects with Chinese participation have had varied outcomes, but none have come to fruition. The license to develop the Isua iron ore mine, acquired by General Nice in 2015, was revoked by the Greenlandic Government in 2021 after years of inactivity and defaults. The Citronen zinc project in the fjord, where NFC (China Nonferrous Metal Industry) had signed a memorandum of understanding in 2014, lost momentum and its promoters ultimately turned to American investors. As for the Kuannersuit rare earth deposit in the south of the island, the 2021 reinstatement of the uranium extraction ban, which accompanies the rare earths, has de facto halted the project, despite Shenghe Resources as a shareholder. The parent company, Energy Transition Minerals, currently claims $11.5 billion in compensation through international arbitration.
This history of frustrated attempts significantly tempers the narrative of an “omnipresent China” that would threaten U.S. security. The urgency invoked by the Trump Administration contrasts, moreover, with the entrenched position that the United States already holds on the island. The Pituffik air base, formerly known as Thule, is the United States’ northernmost military installation and has operated uninterruptedly since the Cold War. Its early-warning radar is part of the North American missile defense system. Furthermore, the United States has agreements with the Danish government that would permit expanding this presence if deemed necessary.
Hover over the map to zoom. It shows points of geostrategic interest in Greenland: from mines to military bases. | Map: Thomas Cattin, Cassini Spain
A Climate Opportunity
The interest in Greenland cannot be detached from the transformations that climate change is driving in the Arctic. The accelerated retreat of the Greenland ice sheet opens prospects that were unthinkable a few decades ago. Between 1979 and 2024, the extent of the summer sea ice has shrunk to roughly half of the values recorded in the eighties, freeing up coastal areas and facilitating access to territories previously unreachable.
This evolution has direct consequences for natural resources. Extensive tracts of Greenland, currently covered by glaciers, host mineral deposits whose exploitation was technically and economically unviable. As the ice recedes, these reserves become progressively accessible. At the same time, the reduction of sea ice broadens the navigable window of Arctic routes, such as the Canadian Northwest Passage, which can save up to two weeks compared to the Panama route, or the Siberian Northern Sea Route, which cuts the journey between Asia and Europe in half.
“For the United States, controlling Greenland means securing a privileged position over resources and trade routes whose importance will only grow”
In this context, controlling Greenland takes on a forward-looking dimension. It is not only about the current situation, but about anticipating a scenario in which the Arctic becomes a space of commercial transit and resource extraction comparable to other strategic regions of the planet. The United States lacks a significant Arctic coastline beyond Alaska, while Russia accounts for more than half of the Arctic shoreline and Canada another quarter. The Arctic routes still operate with limited navigation windows, but climate models project summers essentially ice-free before mid-century. Greenland, with its more than 44,000 kilometers of coastline, would provide the United States with a privileged gateway into this new space of global competition.
The mineral imperative: the real race
If the securitarian argument deserves nuance and the climate factor operates in the medium term, there is an immediate motive that better explains the persistence of U.S. interest: access to critical minerals. Greenland hosts 25 of the 34 minerals that the European Union has classified as critical for the energy transition and technological shift, including rare earths, graphite, cobalt, and copper. Its reserves of rare earth elements, estimated at 1.5 million metric tons, are comparable to those in the United States and higher than those in Canada. Deposits such as Kvanefjeld concentrate neodymium, dysprosium, and terbium, essential for the manufacture of high-power magnets.
This geological wealth gains strategic relevance when the current market structure is examined. China controls roughly 90% of global rare-earth refining capacity, essential for making wind turbines, electric vehicles, guided-missile systems, and virtually any advanced electronic device. The Chinese government has leveraged this dominant position as an instrument of foreign policy, imposing export quotas that condition Western supply chains. In 2010, during a maritime dispute with Japan, it temporarily restricted rare-earth exports, triggering a price spike that highlighted the vulnerability of dependent economies.
“Washington is weakened by dependence on Chinese imports for essential components of its defense and technology industries, representing a structural fragility”
The United States has experienced this vulnerability firsthand. Dependence on Chinese imports for core components of its defense and technology sectors represents a structural fragility that successive administrations have sought to address. Efforts to develop domestic extraction capabilities (the Mountain Pass mine in California, Vulcan Elements projects, or ReElement Technologies’ recycling facilities) are steps in that direction, but they remain insufficient to alter the short-term equation.
The integration of Greenland into the U.S. economic space would offer a more direct solution. Greenland’s reserves, if exploited at scale, would provide the United States with a domestic supply, reducing exposure to Chinese restrictions and strengthening its strategic autonomy in key sectors. This logic fits a broader trend in recent foreign policy, observable also in mining agreements signed with Ukraine following the Russian invasion, aimed at securing access to critical raw materials through bilateral partnerships.
However, the distance between reserves and their practical exploitation remains substantial. Greenland lacks road connections between settlements, possesses limited port infrastructure, and currently operates only one mine across its territory, dedicated to the extraction of anorthosite for thermal insulation. Political risk, following the revocation of licenses such as Kuannersuit, has eroded investor confidence. Analysts estimate a horizon of ten to fifteen years and investments of billions of dollars before any rare-earth project reaches production. And even then, the ore would have to be sent to China for processing, given the Chinese monopoly on refining capabilities.
European Dilemmas in Arctic Rivalry
The persistence of the Trump Administration’s focus on Greenland reveals a wide gap between official discourse and the underlying motivations. The rhetoric of Chinese threat serves a legitimizing function, providing a comprehensible narrative for public opinion. But the real Chinese presence in Greenland, as seen, is limited; what truly concerns the U.S. Government is the dominance of China over the value chains of critical minerals, not its physical footprint on the island.
“The Greenland debate illustrates how competition for natural resources is reshaping the geostrategic priorities of the great powers”
The climate transition acts as a catalyst, transforming a peripheral territory into a space of growing strategic relevance. And the critical minerals constitute the core material of interest. Without them, the Western energy transition would be conditioned by decisions taken by the Chinese government.
For the Danish executive and the Greenlandic Government, this convergence of pressures raises important dilemmas. Greenland’s economy depends about 50% on Danish subsidies (around $600 million annually) and fishing exports account for nearly a quarter of its GDP. The relationship with the United States is a central element of Danish security architecture, but proposed territorial acquisitions clash with Greenland’s right to self-determination and with the Danish government’s sensitivity to external interference in its sovereignty. The debate over Greenland’s future status is expected to intensify in the coming years.
For the European Union, the case poses an additional dilemma. Denmark is a member state; Greenland, though outside the Union’s framework since 1985, maintains association agreements with European institutions. Persistent American pressure on this territory would compel the European Council to define a collective position, exposing differences among governments that are more Atlantic-oriented and those favoring greater strategic autonomy. If member states prove unable to articulate a united response to pressures on one sovereign space, the very viability of a project aiming to become a geopolitical actor would be questioned.
What the Greenland case clearly illustrates is the centrality that natural resources, and particularly critical minerals, have assumed in contemporary geopolitical competition. The energy transition, far from depoliticizing access to raw materials, is generating new forms of dependence and rivalry. In this context, territories once considered marginal acquire unexpected relevance. Greenland is today one of those spaces where the competition for critical resources is territorialized, and where the outcome will depend as much on the decisions of the great powers as on the ability of local actors to defend their own priorities.
