"We don't want to be Danes, and we don't want to be Americans. We want to be Greenlanders." — Mutter B. Egerd, Prime Minister of Greenland.
On January 4, 2026, Donald Trump uttered the words that shook the North Atlantic: "We need Greenland. It's absolutely necessary."
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen's response was equally unequivocal: "Greenland is not for sale. If the United States forcibly takes it over, it will mean the end of NATO."
An island, two great powers, and a century-long struggle over sovereignty: Who truly owns Greenland? But this story is far older and more profound than geopolitics.
I. The World's Biggest "Lie"
Between 60 and 83 degrees north latitude lies a landmass larger than France, Germany, and Spain combined. Its name is "Greenland."
This is one of the oldest lies on Earth.
In 982 AD, a Viking exiled to Iceland for murder spotted a small patch of green tundra deep in the fjords. He gave this land, 80% of which was covered in ice, an enticing name, hoping to attract more colonists. His name was Erik Tovaldsson, but history remembers him as Erik the Red.
This naming ranks among history’s most persuasive deceptions.
The Greenland ice sheet holds 2.85 million cubic kilometers of ice, storing 7% of Earth's freshwater. What if it melts entirely? Sea levels would rise 7.2 meters. Cities like New York, Shanghai, Mumbai, and London would be swallowed by the sea. This is no ordinary land. It is the second heart of the Earth, second only to Antarctica.
And this heart is melting.
II. The First Batch of Owners
AClose to 2500 BC, not long after the last Ice Age, hunters from what is now northern Canada crossed the frozen strait. Greenland, remote and wild, became their home. They chased musk oxen and caribou, building camps with animal bones and stones. Today, archaeologists call them the "Sakac Culture."They lived here for nearly two thousand years. Then, they disappeared.
There were no traces of war, no evidence of plague. Only the climate—long, cold cycles that drove prey to migrate and sea ice that sealed everything off.
Ice cores are archives of time. Scientists have drilled ice cores from the Greenland ice sheet, recording climate changes over the past 100,000 years. Each layer of snow represents a year's history. Every air bubble preserves the air of that era.
The Sakak people knew nothing of this. All they knew was that winters were getting longer and longer, and prey was becoming increasingly scarce. Eventually, they either left or died.
But Greenland did not remain vacant for long.
Around 1200 AD, another group of people set off from Alaska and migrated eastward along the Arctic Ocean coast. They brought with them more advanced technologies: collective hunting methods to kill bowhead whales, kayaks made of seal skin, and an animal that had coexisted with humans for nearly 10,000 years—the Greenland Husky.
Genetic studies have shown that these sled dogs have a direct genetic link to an ancient breed from Siberia 9,500 years ago. Unlike ordinary dogs, they don't bark; they howl like wolves. This isn't a sign of domestication, but a memory of the wilderness.
This group of people who migrated from Alaska created the "Thule culture," and they are the direct ancestors of today's Greenlandic Inuit. The Inuit call themselves "Kalaallit"—"Greenlanders." They call this land "Kalaallit Nunaat"—"Land of the Greenlanders."
The Inuit have lived in Greenland for eight hundred years—a testament to endurance. No European can match that.
III. Five Hundred Years of the Vikings
In 985 AD, Eric the Red set sail from Iceland with 25 ships and more than 500 colonists. Only 14 ships reached their destination, but that was enough.
The Vikings established two settlements in Greenland, which at their peak numbered between 3,000 and 5,000 people. They built churches, raised cattle and sheep, and exported walrus ivory and narwhal tusks to Europe—in medieval Europe, narwhal tusks were sold as the legendary "unicorn horn" for prices comparable to gold.
Eric's son, Leif Ericsen, continued sailing westward from Greenland, becoming the first European to set foot on the North American continent—nearly five hundred years before Columbus.
Then, they disappeared.
On September 16, 1408, a wedding was held at Hvalsey Church. This is the last written record left by the Greenlandic Vikings. After that, no more news came from Greenland back to Europe.
When the British explorer John Davies reached Greenland in 1585, only the Inuit remained. The ruins of Viking settlements lay silent, buried by weeds. What happened to 3,000 people and 5 centuries of history? Silence. What happened?
First, there was the climate. The Little Ice Age, which began in the 14th century, shortened Greenland's summers and lengthened its winters. Pasture could not grow, and livestock began to die. Worse still, sea ice blocked sea routes to Europe, and trading ships could no longer reach the island.
Next came economic collapse. The walrus ivory trade, critical to Viking prosperity, did not fail due to walrus extinction. Instead, it succumbed to a flood of African ivory onto European markets. Greenlandic Vikings fell to a continent they'd never seen, much less imagined. There was also competition. The Thule people were migrating south from the north, possessing technologies the Vikings lacked: kayaks capable of hunting seals on sea ice, and the ability to build igloos in the harshest winters. The Vikings maintained a European way of life—cattle herding, farming, and building churches. They hadn't learned the Inuit survival techniques.
Ultimately, they paid the price for this pride.
Greenland teaches a harsh lesson. This land belongs to no one. It only gives shelter—fleetingly—to those who learn to live with it.IV. The Shadow of Colonialism
In 1721, Danish-Norwegian missionary Hans Egerd arrived in Greenland in search of the "Lost Vikings." What he found were only Inuit people and Viking ruins scattered across the tundra.
Egerd did not give up. Now that the Vikings had disappeared, he turned his missionary focus to the Inuit. This marked the beginning of Denmark's three-hundred-year colonial rule over Greenland.
Colonialism is never just politics. It is the erosion of language, the rupture of culture, and the tearing apart of identity. Sometimes, it is even the possession of the body.
"The Little Dane Experiment"
In May 1951, 22 Greenland Inuit children were sent to Denmark. They were between 5 and 9 years old, and only 6 of them were true orphans—the parents of the rest were told it was an "educational opportunity."
The children were forbidden from speaking Greenlandic in Denmark and were required to communicate only in Danish. More than a year later, they were sent back to Greenland—not to their families, but to a Danish-speaking orphanage in Nuuk. Many never saw their parents again.
Survivor Helen Thyssen recalled, "When I returned to Greenland, I ran to my mother, excitedly talking. But she couldn't understand me. I was speaking Danish. I had forgotten my mother tongue. I didn't find out until I was 46 that I was part of an experiment."
Of the 22 children, half developed mental illness or drug addiction in adulthood, and half died prematurely in middle age. By the time the Danish government issued a written apology in 2020 and an in-person apology in 2022, only six were still alive.
Frozen uterus
Between 1966 and 1975, Danish authorities implemented a large-scale birth control program in Greenland. More than 4,500 Greenlandic women—estimated to be half of all women of childbearing age at the time—were implanted with intrauterine devices (IUDs). Many were not informed that it was an option. Some of the girls who underwent the procedure were only 12 years old.
Greenland’s birth rate has halved in the last decade.
Survivor Naya Liebers said, "Our bodies have been frozen for decades. The uterus is our most sacred organ, and reproduction is our fundamental right. No government has the right to decide whether we can become mothers."
This history explains many things. It explains why Greenland has one of the highest suicide rates in the world—80 to 100 per 100,000 people, and seven times higher than in Denmark among young men.
It also explains why Greenlanders' anger was so profound when the US president claimed he wanted to "buy" Greenland. They had been used as experimental subjects, and their bodies had been treated as the property of colonists.
They will not be "bought" again.
V. The Secret Beneath the Ice
In 1941, Nazi Germany occupied Denmark. Henrik Kaufmann, the Danish ambassador to the United States, made a bold decision: he signed a defense agreement with the United States "in the name of the King of Denmark," allowing the US military to establish a military base in Greenland.
The puppet government in Copenhagen charged him with treason. After the war, the Danish parliament ratified the agreement, and Kaufman went from being a "traitor" to a hero. Meanwhile, the United States gained a firm foothold in Greenland.
The Thule base and the expelled Inuit
In 1951, the United States established Thule Air Base at the northernmost tip of Greenland—located directly beneath the shortest flight path between Washington and Moscow.
But the construction of the base came at a price. In May 1953, 27 Inuit families—about 116 to 130 people—living in the Pitufik region were told they had to relocate. They had only four days to pack their belongings and were moved to a desolate location more than 100 kilometers away.
The relocation date was carefully calculated: to be completed before June 5, 1953. This was because the new Danish constitution, which came into effect on June 5, contained provisions on compensation for land expropriation. Relocating before that date meant no compensation would be required.
Survivor Balika Jensen recalled, "We looked back and saw our houses overturned in the wind. Everyone was crying, especially the elderly."
Ice Worm Project
In 1959, the U.S. Army began a secret project deep within the ice sheet. Externally, it was called "Campus Century"—a scientific research station. Internally, it was known as "Project Ice Worm."
Camp Century's 21 tunnels stretch nearly 3 kilometers deep into the ice sheet. It has its own hospital, church, cinema, and even a nuclear reactor—the world's first mobile nuclear power plant.
But this was just a cover. The real plan was to build a massive missile launch network under the ice sheet—2,500 kilometers of tunnels, 600 nuclear missiles, covering an area equivalent to three Denmarks.
This plan was never disclosed to the Danish government.
Project Iceworm ultimately failed—not because it was discovered, but because of physics. The Greenland ice sheet was not static; it was slowly shifting. The tunnel walls began to deform, and the ceiling began to sink.
In 1967, Camp Century was abandoned. The Americans took the nuclear reactor, but left everything else behind: 200,000 liters of diesel fuel, 24 million liters of untreated wastewater, and an unknown amount of radioactive coolant. They believed that ice and snow would bury these things forever.
They were wrong.
In 2016, scientists warned that due to global warming, waste from Century Camp could be exposed on the surface by the end of this century. The ice cap is revealing humanity's secrets.
In April 2023, Thule Air Force Base was renamed "Pitufik Space Base." Pitufik means "place to tether dogs" in Greenlandic. The United States returned the name and recognized the cultural heritage. However, control under the radar dome remains entirely with the United States.
The separation of nominal sovereignty and actual control—this is a microcosm of the current situation in Greenland.
VI. Red Stone and Black Stone
Nasak in southern Greenland is Greenland's only large-scale sheep-grazing area. In summer, the fjords look almost like the Norwegian or Scottish Highlands—green grass, flowing water, and quiet flocks of sheep.
But behind this idyllic landscape lies a war for the fate of Greenland.
Behind the ranch lies the Kuannersuit Plateau, home to one of the world's largest rare earth deposits—as well as uranium. Rare earth elements are key raw materials for smartphones, electric vehicles, wind turbines, and missile guidance systems. Currently, China controls 90% of the world's rare earth processing capacity.
In 2007, an Australian company obtained a mining license for the Kuannersuit deposit. One of its shareholders was China’s Shenghe Resources, the world’s largest rare earth processing company.
The residents of Nasak began to worry: "They told us there would be jobs, there would be prosperity. But what they didn't tell us was that there's uranium in that mountain. Uranium will pollute our water sources. Our sheep drink that water. Our children drink that water."
In April 2021, Greenland held parliamentary elections. This election, later dubbed the "mining election," revolved around a single issue: whether uranium mining should be permitted.
The Inuit community, opposed to uranium mining, won the election. The new government quickly passed Law No. 20, banning the mining of deposits with uranium content exceeding 100 ppm. This law effectively sealed the fate of the Kuannersuit project.
But the story didn't end there. The Australian mining company then initiated international arbitration, seeking $11.5 billion in damages from the governments of Greenland and Denmark—almost four times Greenland's GDP. In October 2025, the arbitration tribunal ruled in favor of the Greenlandic government.
This reveals a harsh reality: while the 2009 Greenland Autonomy Act granted Greenlanders ownership of mineral resources, transnational capital can make this ownership extremely expensive through international arbitration. You can say "no," but can you afford to pay the compensation?
Sovereignty, in this era, comes with a price tag.
Tanbreez: Another buyer
In the same geological formation, there is another deposit: Tanbreez. Its main ore is anisodactylite—a beautiful red crystal rich in rare earth elements but with extremely low uranium content. It complies with Greenland's environmental regulations.
In 2024, Tanbreez was acquired by New York-based Critical Metals. The Export-Import Bank of the United States subsequently announced its intention to provide $120 million in financing for the project.
U.S. officials stated, "The Tanbreez project is crucial to establishing a Western rare earth supply chain. We cannot allow critical minerals to continue to be monopolized by rival countries."
The United States is gradually "buying up" the most strategically valuable parts of Greenland through capital means—without formal territorial annexation.
The Greenlanders rejected one buyer, only to find another knocking at their door.
A Nassak resident said, "They say Tanbreez is 'clean.' Maybe. But I don't know if they'll care about us after the Americans have dug up what they want. Whether they're Chinese or Americans, they're only looking at the mountain, not us."
VII. Protector or plunderer?
On January 7, 2025, Donald Trump Jr.'s private jet landed at Nuuk Airport. This was not an official visit, but its symbolism was more striking than any diplomatic note.
A few weeks ago, in his victory speech, Donald Trump said, "We need to have Greenland. It's absolutely necessary for national security. I don't rule out using economic means, or even military means."
In December 2025, the Danish Defence Intelligence Agency released its annual report. The report included an unprecedented paragraph: the United States was listed as a "potential security threat"—alongside Russia and China.
This is something that has never happened before in NATO's history: a member state's intelligence agency openly listing the alliance's leaders as threats.
When protectors turn into predators, the very definition of an alliance begins to crumble.
On March 15, 2025, Nuuk witnessed the largest protest in Greenland's history. Protesters held signs that read: "We are not for sale," "No means no," and "Stop threatening us."
Greenlandic Prime Minister Mutt B. Egerd addressed Parliament: "Greenland belongs to the Greenlandic people. We don't want to be Danes or Americans. We want to be Greenlanders—Kalaallit. Our country is not a commodity to be bought and sold. We are not anyone's backyard."
Trump responded at the White House: "You know what Denmark has in Greenland? Two dog sleds. Two. They can't protect that place at all."
"Two dog sleds"—this is a sarcastic reference to the Sirius Sled Patrol. This special forces unit of the Royal Danish Navy is one of the world's most elite polar operations units. They patrol in extreme environments where even machines cannot operate, guarding the most desolate borders on Earth using the oldest method—sled dogs.
This is not just a comparison of military power, but of two attitudes toward the Arctic: one of conquest and surveillance, the other of adaptation and coexistence.
Choices for 2025
On March 11, 2025, Greenland will hold parliamentary elections. This election is being held amid great pressure on the United States, and every vote is an answer to the question of "who owns Greenland".
The result was unexpected. The party advocating radical independence lost, and the Democratic Party won—a party that advocates gradual independence, emphasizes economic stability, and maintains close ties with Denmark.
New Prime Minister Jens-Frederic Nelson, 33, is the youngest head of government in Greenland's history. After his victory, he said, "If we had to choose between the United States and Denmark, we would choose Denmark. We choose NATO. This is not because we have given up our dream of independence, but because we are unwilling to make a choice under the threat of gunfire."
A resident of Nuuk said in a street interview, "If we had to choose between the US and Denmark, we would choose Denmark. Because in Denmark's eyes, we are human beings. In the US's eyes, we are real estate."
This is a highly ironic conclusion: American pressure has only solidified Denmark's "ownership" of Greenland. The Greenlanders realized that it was better to maintain the status quo within a kingdom that respected their autonomy than to be an independent but vulnerable small country coveted by larger powers.
They temporarily laid down the banner of independence. For survival.
8. Coexisting with Ice
Politicians debate sovereignty, businessmen calculate mineral deposits. But in the heart of Greenland, another time flows.
Glaciers don't care about election results, and icebergs don't care where the boundaries are drawn. They simply move, disintegrate, and melt slowly at their own pace—a pace measured in millennia.
Ilulissat, meaning "iceberg" in Greenlandic, is Greenland's third-largest city and the gateway to the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Ilulissat Icefjord.
At the end of the Icefjord lies the Sémeco-Cuyarego Glacier—the Northern Hemisphere's largest ice glacier by volume. It moves 40 meters per day, discharging 35 billion tons of ice into the bay annually. Some of these icebergs are tens of meters high, drifting in the bay for months, slowly melting, and eventually disappearing into the Atlantic Ocean.
One traveler wrote, "Those enormous icebergs floated on the sea like skyscrapers, like giants of nature, palaces of the gods. For the first time, I felt the insignificance of humanity in the face of nature."
At the Eqi Glacier Hut, there is no cell phone signal, no Wi-Fi, and electricity is barely maintained by solar power. At night, you can hear the breathing of the glacier—the low groans of movement within the ice sheet.
Then, with a deafening roar, a block of ice weighing hundreds of tons broke off from the glacier and tumbled into the sea. The sound wasn't one of shattering, but of release—like the earth sighing.
In Eqi, you can hear the sound of time. Each collapse is the snow from thousands of years ago completing its long journey. From the center to the edge of the ice sheet, from solid to liquid, from Greenland to the Atlantic Ocean, it eventually evaporates, condenses, and falls again.
Glaciers are the slowest cycle on Earth.
IX. The Melting Frontier
Greenland is melting. This is not a prophecy, but a fact.
Satellite data shows that the Greenland ice sheet is losing approximately 26.4-27 billion tons of ice annually—equivalent to dumping 8,900 tons of water into the ocean every second. Over the past thirty years, Greenland's contribution to global sea-level rise has increased sixfold. Scientists warn that even if humanity were to stop all carbon emissions today, the partial melting of the Greenland ice sheet is already irreversible.
The reduction of sea ice is a disaster for Inuit hunters. Seals breed on the sea ice; without sea ice, there are no seals, and traditional seal hunting methods cannot be sustained.
Sled dogs are also declining. There were once tens of thousands of Greenland sled dogs, but now fewer than 15,000 remain. When the sea ice disappears, the sled dogs will lose their purpose.
A survival technology that has lasted for nearly 10,000 years is coming to an end.
The Sémegco-Cuyarego Glacier has nearly doubled in speed over the past two decades. Scientists believe this means the glacier's base is being eroded by warmer seawater, which is loosening its grip on the bedrock. As the glacier accelerates, sea-level rise accelerates as well. This is not a linear change, but a potentially runaway feedback loop.
If the Greenland ice sheet were to completely melt—a process that could take hundreds of years or even longer—global sea levels would rise by more than seven meters. Much of Manhattan would be submerged, Shanghai would almost entirely disappear, and London, Mumbai, Jakarta, and Miami—the world's largest cities—would face annihilation.
The ice in Greenland is not just a problem for Greenland. It is a problem for all of humanity.
Epilogue: Whose Greenland?
"Who owns Greenland?" This question has been asked repeatedly over the past thousand years.
The Vikings thought they owned it. They built churches and farms and exported ivory and furs. Then they vanished, defeated by climate and time.
The Danes thought they owned it. They missioned, colonized, and "reformed" the Inuit. What they left behind was trauma and regret.
The Americans thought they could buy it. They buried nuclear waste under the ice sheet and built military bases on the Inuit's homeland. They used capital to acquire mines and used threats to test sovereignty.
But the Greenlanders said: No.
Perhaps the real answer is: no one can "own" Greenland.
This land is too ancient, too vast, too unpredictable to belong to any human ambition. It merely temporarily accommodates those who have learned to coexist with it.
The Inuit understood this principle. They didn't try to conquer the land; rather, they adapted to it. They didn't try to change the ice sheet; instead, they learned to survive on it.
In Inuit, Greenland is called "Kalaallit Nunaat"—"the land of the Greenlanders." This is not a declaration of ownership, but an expression of belonging.
Land does not belong to people. People belong to the land.
New Prime Minister Nielsen said, "We chose to remain in the Kingdom of Denmark. But this is not the end, it is the beginning. One day, we will be independent. But that will be our own choice, on our own timetable. Not because anyone forced us, but because we are ready."
A traveler wrote in front of the Eqi Glacier: "On my last night in Eqi, I sat alone outside my cabin, listening to the sound of the glacier. It was a strange feeling—both insignificant and whole. I realized I wasn't there to 'see' Greenland. I was there to 'hear' it. It was telling me something, about time, about fragility, about our species' relationship with this planet. I'm not sure I fully understood it, but I know I will always remember that sound."
Greenland. The second heart of the Earth.
It's melting. It's being fought over. It's sending us a warning.
Perhaps the question of "who owns Greenland" is flawed from the start.
The real problem is:
As glaciers melt, as great powers approach, as everything changes—
Can the Greenlanders hold onto their land?
Can humanity protect this planet?
Key figures
• The Greenland ice sheet loses approximately 26.4-27 billion tons of ice annually.
• If it were to melt completely, global sea levels would rise by 7.2 meters.
• In 2025, the Danish intelligence agency listed the United States as a "potential security threat" for the first time.
• A 2025 poll showed that 85% of Greenlandic voters opposed being annexed by the United States.
• The number of Greenland sled dogs has declined by about half in the past thirty years.
• As of 2026, Greenland remains an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark.
The road to independence still lies ahead.
