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47
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Domestically, people are unhappy about Minneapolis. Internationally, people are unhappy about Greenland. In the past 48 hours, there were four different responses about the situation, from various notable folks, which we thought we would pass along:
Norwegian PM Jonas Gahr Støre: Støre received a letter from Trump, one of those "open letters" that was also shared with many European ambassadors. Since the missive is therefore not a secret, Støre decided to share the message with the world. Here it is:
Dear Jonas: Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America. Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China, and why do they have a "right of ownership" anyway? There are no written documents, it's only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also. I have done more for NATO than any other person since its founding, and now, NATO should do something for the United States. The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland.
Thank you!
President DJTHow much of something like this does Trump really believe? You never know, but it's probably a lot. For the record, Trump did not stop eight wars plus, there are MANY written documents (including some signed by the U.S.) confirming Denmark's relationship with Greenland, Trump has done nothing for NATO (much less "more than any person since its founding"), and "a boat landed there hundreds of years ago" could also describe the United States' claim to ITS territory.
We'll also note the disrespect entailed in using the PM's given name, rather than his title and last name. There's also the problem of holding Støre responsible for what the Norwegian Nobel Committee does; that's like blaming Trump if Leonardo DiCaprio does not win the Oscar for Best Actor this year. Finally, note that this administration does not seem to notice (or maybe it doesn't care about) the implications of its words. That first sentence makes very clear that, at least up until this year's Nobel Peace Prize was announced, Trump was sometimes putting his personal needs ahead of those of the United States. But at least he's not going to do that anymore. Right?
Francis Fukuyama: The prominent political scientist, and one-time neoconservative, actually shared his views on YouTube on Sunday, but they didn't get public attention until yesterday. In the latest installment of Frankly Fukuyama, the Stanford prof opined:
I want to say this straight out: as an American, I have one thing to say to my many European friends—do not back down in this confrontation. Up to now, both the E.U. and the major European powers have sought to appease Trump by offering him concessions, flattery, personal gifts, and other forms of tribute. This strategy has not worked and should be abandoned immediately. Donald Trump is fundamentally a bully who wants to dominate everyone around him.
Trying to placate him with concessions is a fool's errand. He despises weakness and those who display it. Last spring, the E.U. cut a trade deal with him that accepted a 15% tariff on all European goods with no retaliation against American products. This was a bad decision. The E.U., which in terms of population and wealth is on a par with the United States, should have taken a common position and retaliated. What makes any European think that conceding Greenland will mollify Trump? He will simply come back for more later.
The arguments that Europeans have used for a concessionary policy is that they are still dependent on the United States for security and need help in dealing with Russia. They also argue that they don't want to provoke a mutually destructive trade war. But at this point, Trump's America has amply demonstrated that it will not be a reliable ally when push comes to shove.
It has already abandoned Ukraine and stated in its national security strategy document that Europe has fallen behind the Western Hemisphere in terms of American priorities. Europeans should keep in mind that those countries that stood up to Trump's threats in 2025, which include Brazil, India, and China, have actually done well for themselves. They've increased domestic support, and in the case of China, they forced America to back down.
My European friends need to keep in mind that Donald Trump is not the United States. A majority of Americans are dismayed and outraged by his policies, and they will likely vote against him and the Republican Party in the coming November election. It may be the case that the world will have to suffer a global recession as more countries stand up to Trump and retaliate against his policies. But a U.S. politician who wants to weaponize trade and use it as an instrument for territorial aggrandizement really needs to be stopped. Thanks for listening.We don't see anything there we disagree with. And we are confident that world leaders and their advisors, around the globe, have done this same analysis. They just can't say it out loud, like Fukuyama can.
Stephen Miller: White House capo Stephen Miller appeared on the show of Fox entertainer Sean Hannity, and unleashed his inner imperialist. He decreed:
The new domain of international competition is going to be polar competition. That is where more and more resources are being spent by our nation's adversaries and rivals is the ability to control movement, navigation, lanes of travel in the polar and arctic region. To control a territory, you have to be able to defend a territory, improve a territory, inhabit a territory. Denmark has failed at every single one of these tests.There is nothing there that Rudyard Kipling or Theodore Roosevelt would disagree with.
However, there are some very good reasons that imperialism disappeared from the globe in the first half of the 20th century. It's out of step with modern values, of course. But imperialism is also bad for trade and the economy, since it cuts off at least some trade partners who are political and military rivals. Also, it's all good and well for people with guns and cannons and airplanes to impose their will on people with, say, spears or swords or bows and arrows. But when anyone in the oppressed group could plausibly get a suitcase nuke, or some other devastating weapon, the risk-reward analysis doesn't work so well.
We also wonder, at this point, whether it's fair to call Miller a fascist. Yes, fascism is a violent system, and a system based on racial purity, and one that is at least implicitly expansionist. Miller embraces all those things. But it also has a philosophy behind it (albeit an abhorrent one). Miller seems to have little in the way of philosophy, and seems to be advocating plunder and conquest for the sake of plunder and conquest, which is more in line with imperialism than it is fascism. Maybe he's more Leopold II than he is Benito Mussolini.
We will also note that Miller is a supporter of Israel, or at least he claims to be. If the standard is that to control a territory, a nation must be able to defend a territory, improve a territory, inhabit a territory, well... Israel might not be doing so well on those fronts if it had to rely solely on itself for arms and funding. It's yet another example of this administration saying things without thinking through the implications of their words.
The fact that Miller is going on TV and pushing this cockamamie Greenland stuff probably tells us that he's one of the White House insiders driving the whole thing. And it definitely tells us that the administration is serious about this, at least until a future TACO moment (if it comes).
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX): This was also on Sunday, and involved an appearance with Fox entertainer Maria Bartiromo. Cruz allegedly has been won over to the merits of the Greenland plan, and is now singing its praises. During his appearance, he declared: "I believe it is overwhelmingly in America's national interest to acquire Greenland." He said that the territory has incredible natural resources AND strategic importance, which means it's a two-fer. Left un-asked, because it was Fox, was why the U.S. could not achieve its goals through trade pacts and alliances, and instead had no options other than outright acquisition.
While managing to keep a straight face, Cruz also went so far as to compare the acquisition of Greenland to the acquisitions of the Louisiana Purchase and Alaska. He even noted that Alaska was once called "Seward's Folly," obviously strongly implying that one day, Trump would be proven to be a visionary. We know, of course, that Donald Trump is an ignorant man with a 4th-grade grasp of U.S. history, at best. Cruz, however, is not (B.A. Princeton, J.D. Harvard Law School). So, he surely knows how dishonest his examples are, since both France and Russia WANTED to sell, to the point that it was they who approached the U.S. and not the other way around. You can tell that Cruz knows he's selling a load of manure, because he neglected to mention the other really big land purchase in American history, namely the Mexican cession. For that one, the U.S. invaded a weaker country, beat the crap out of them, and then forced a giant sale of land at gunpoint. How did that one happen to slip your mind, Rafael? Perhaps it was a little too on-point?
We pass this along, in part, because other Trump allies are also committing crimes against the historical record in order to make it seem like "buying" Greenland is totally normal, totally healthy. But we also pass it along because we continue to be amazed that Cruz is still looking in the mirror and seeing a future president. The Senator is a hawk, certainly, but he doesn't believe in acquiring Greenland any more than we do. He is just saying what he is saying to kiss Trump's rear end, and to position himself to take over the MAGA throne.
Cruz is, to say the least, delusional. We cannot think of any current Republican officeholder where the gap between "name recognition" and "influence on the Trump White House" is larger. The administration has no use for Cruz; they've got his vote on everything in the Senate already because he's beholden to MAGA voters. And the administration has no respect for Cruz, since they know full well he's a craven opportunist and a chameleon, and his apparent Trumpism is entirely a pretense. Republican primary voters have already made clear twice that they are not interested in what Cruz is selling, and that's not going to change in 2028, 2032, or any other year beginning with "20." If you're going to completely sell out your integrity (not to mention your wife, whom Trump insulted) for a chance at the presidency, then at least you'd better have... a chance at the presidency. Cruz doesn't.
We don't believe there will actually be an invasion of Greenland. That said, lots of people believed there would not be a second world war just a couple of decades after the first one. So, because we could be proven wrong, we would like to share some reader analyses of why such an invasion would be folly for the United States. We were going to do that today, but we don't want to overdo it on length. That's why we just slapped a "Part I" on the headline for this item. So, tactical analyses are up tomorrow! (Z)