NBC's Kristen Welker interviewed Trump on Meet the Press on Sunday and tried to pin him down on a number of foreign policy issues: where is he regarding Ukraine? He's still working a deal. Is he serious about making Canada the 51st state? He'll bring it up when new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney visits the White House.
What about military action against Greenland?
“You are not ruling out military force to take Greenland?” Welker asked.
“I don't rule it out. I don't say I'm going to do it, but I don't rule out anything. No. Not there. You need that, we need Greenland very badly,” Trump responded.
Are we really going to invade Greenland? Pentagon Analyst Bob Maginnis, a senior fellow for national security at Family Research Council, says probably not.
“I doubt it. I think most of what's going about is rhetoric on the part of the administration. However, there are some serious issues at stake.”
Claims of military action, though rhetoric according to Maginnis, might be Trump’s only avenue to ultimate control of Greenland. Political leaders in both Denmark and Greenland have pushed back at the idea that the U.S. might purchase the island.
Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, 33, assumed office on April 7 and said that he won't be the one who lets Greenland be purchased by the U.S.
Nielsen (shown above, right) said last month that Trump's statements about Greenland are 'disrespectful' and it “will never, ever be a piece of property that can be bought by just anyone.”
Maginnis says with the Arctic opening up to military and commercial exploitation, Greenland is geographically important.
Invasion, no but interest, yes
“What President Trump is saying, that it's in our strategic interest to have Greenland totally within our security umbrella, and that's true.”
In the end, Maginnis says Trump can get more out of diplomacy than he can with force of arms, and for a lot less.
“We already have a facility in northern Greenland, and of course, we have operational facilities in Iceland, which is to the east, and then, of course, the Canadians, which work closely with us,” Maginnis said.
