US president’s increasingly bellicose demands for control of the island may force the EU to draw a line in the snow
Greenland: new shipping routes, hidden minerals – and a frontline between the US and Russia?
The crisis over Greenland may deliver the moment when Europe must stand up to Donald Trump, as officials have said a US attempt to annex the territory could shatter the Nato transatlantic alliance.
European leaders have entertained Trump’s demands for nearly a year as he has pushed Nato countries to increase their defence spending to 5% of GDP, and threatened to pull US support from Ukraine as part of a peace process that appears to favour Russia. They have also given a muted response to US adventurism abroad including the capture and rendition of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro.
The obsequiousness has often played out in public. Various European leaders have vied for the role of “Trump whisperer” and Nato’s secretary general, Mark Rutte, infamously referred to him as “daddy” at a summit last June.
