The unthinkable has arrived. On Monday, 12 January, European NATO allies, led by German and British officials, were finalising a joint proposal aimed at deterring the United States of America from seizing Greenland.
A group of European states, led by the two countries, has been discussing plans for a NATO deployment on the world’s largest island. They hope to show US President Donald Trump that Europe can secure the Arctic without—or even against—American intervention.
A visible presence
According to people familiar with the talks, Germany was to propose a permanent NATO mission—dubbed Arctic Sentry—to patrol Greenland’s coasts and key facilities. The plan would borrow heavily from last year’s Baltic Sentry operation in the Baltic Sea. It calls for rotating multinational units and enhanced surveillance to pre-empt any notion of a US takeover.
Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has pressed fellow European leaders to back the idea. He spoke last week with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz to underline the need for a visible allied presence in the High North.
Europe’s sense of urgency follows a US special-forces raid in Venezuela on 3 January and increasingly bellicose rhetoric from the White House on Greenland. Those developments have prompted European capitals to cobble together a swift response. They fear that, absent a credible European shield, Mr Trump may press ahead with plans to add Greenland to US territory.
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High-stakes Arctic security
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul is due in Washington this week (probably Tursday) to discuss the island’s security with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. “Because security in the Arctic is becoming increasingly important, I also want to discuss on my trip how we can best bear this responsibility in NATO—in view of old and new rivalries in the region by Russia and China—together,” Mr Wadephul said on Sunday.
Denmark and Greenland, meanwhile, are dispatching their own envoys. Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and Greenland’s foreign affairs minister, Vivian Motzfeldt, are set to meet Mr Rubio on Wednesday to press home a simple message: Greenland is not for sale.
President Trump has long mused about acquiring Greenland for national-security reasons. “If we don’t take Greenland, Russia or China will take Greenland and I’m not going to let that happen,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One. Yet his own bases on the island remain limited under the 1951 US-Danish defence agreement.
US signals, European resolve
Mr Rubio has told lawmakers that the administration still prefers to purchase Greenland rather than seize it by force. European diplomats hope to use that nuance to rally moderates in Congress against any coercive option.
Influential voices stand up to Washington. Bill Emmott, ex-Editor-in-Chief of The Economist, warns that Europe must be ready to call the US bluff. “European states must face up to the fact that our long-time American partner has become coercive, even violent,” he wrote in his column for the Italian La Stampa on Monday. “The only hope of making President Donald Trump change his behaviour will be to convince him, and crucially the US Congress, that we are willing to walk out.”
I want to discuss on my (US) trip how we can best bear this responsibility in NATO together. — Johann Wadephul, Germany’s foreign minister
Under the proposed Arctic Sentry scheme, three forward-operating sites would rotate allied battalions equipped for winter warfare. Surveillance drones would range over the coastal fjords and ice-covered straits. Naval task groups—drawn from Germany, Britain and Norway—would conduct regular patrols off Greenland’s west coast.
Blueprint for Arctic Sentry
The alliance hopes that by the defence ministers’ meeting in February it can secure political sign-off. Berlin has already floated commitments of armoured vehicles and logistical support. London is considering sending an air-transport squadron. Paris has offered satellite imagery to track ship movements in the Greenland Sea.
Denmark, which retains formal sovereignty over Greenland, has invoked Article 5 in reverse—arguing that NATO must help defend an ally from another ally. Yet Copenhagen cannot shoulder the burden alone. It is exploring a trilateral security arrangement with Canada, which shares a maritime boundary with Greenland, to coordinate patrols and infrastructure projects in the Arctic.
Germany, too, has reached out to the Netherlands and Italy for naval support, though Rome has been cautious. Officials in Paris and Warsaw have also received briefings on how Greenland’s defence could fit into broader Arctic strategy—from countering Russian submarine forays to discouraging Chinese ambitions in polar shipping routes.
Legacy, coercion and divorce
Mr Emmott argues that Mr Trump’s interest in Greenland stems less from military necessity than personal vanity. “He wants Greenland for the same reason that he has demolished part of the White House and is building a vast ballroom: he wants his legacy as president to be a physical one, as the president who… added the world’s largest island to the United States,” he observed.
That analysis underpins Europe’s hardening stance. By deploying troops and assets, they aim to make any American grab not only unpalatable but politically costly in Washington. “The aim must be to make it clear that the price America will pay for coercion or seizure of Greenland will be high: that the US will lose NATO and with it its vast array of military facilities in Britain and Europe,” Mr Emmott advised.
European states must face up to the fact that our long-time American partner has become coercive, even violent. — Bill Emmott, ex-Editor-in-Chief, The Economist
Europeans have also tied their Greenland gambit to support for Ukraine. Mr Emmott urged that the continent “increase further its support for Ukraine, preferably by supplying the long-range missiles that Germany has long withheld and by sending more missile-defence systems.” Berlin, mindful of that critique, is preparing to approve export licences for long-range cruise missiles in tandem with its Arctic commitments.
Financing Arctic defence
Money remains the key constraint. Mr Emmott proposes tapping the €210 billion of Russian central-bank assets frozen by the EU in December to underwrite both Ukrainian aid and Arctic infrastructure. Berlin and Paris are now exploring legal avenues to recycle those funds for dual use—defence and development—in Europe’s strategic hinterland.
For Europe, Greenland has become a test of collective will. Is the continent ready to defend a remote ally—or even contemplate a break with its oldest transatlantic partner? As Mr Emmott concluded, “The possibility of divorce must be embraced, and planning for how to deal with the costs of it should already be under way.”
Arctic Sentry’s fate will hinge on the coming days. If London and Berlin secure enough pledges, they may yet avert a crisis. If they falter, Mr Trump may yet advance on Greenland. Any notion of NATO unity would then be gone for good.
