When our Nordic business delegation arrived in Nuuk in early March, the mood on the island was still raw. Greenlanders were shaken after what scholars have called the darkest hour in NATO’s 81-year history.
“Geopolitics have been our reality for 80 years,” says Naaja Nathanielsen, Greenland’s Minister of Business, Mineral Resources, and Justice, when we meet on March 6. “What is new is the global spotlight.”
That spotlight arrived abruptly in January, when President Donald Trump revived an idea, he has floated since 2019. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security.”
The reaction was swift. European governments rejected the proposal outright, Denmark warned that any breach of its sovereignty would unravel NATO, and even Republicans in Washington called the idea a step too far. The crisis eased only after Trump reassured the audience in Davos on January 21 that the United States would not annex Greenland.
Our mission was to understand the validity of U.S. arguments for needing Greenland: national security, critical minerals, Arctic shipping routes, and consolidating Western hemispheric influence.
Strategic Case Meets the Arctic Reality
The military facts are well known. The U.S. already maintains a long-standing military presence at Pituffik Space Base under agreements with Denmark. That security architecture exists precisely because Greenland is part of the NATO framework.
Minerals and shipping seem like pipe dreams.
Nuuk’s mayor, Avaaraq Olsen, explains the logistical realities. Her municipality alone is roughly the size of France. To visit communities on the east coast, she must first fly to Iceland and then take a specialized helicopter into the ice-covered terrain. There are no roads connecting Greenland’s towns. The longest road on the island stretches just 25 kilometers.
Ships are often blocked by ice. In winter, a dog sled, mocked in one remark by President Trump, is sometimes not merely the most practical means of transport, but the only one.
The island is less a frontier waiting to be opened than a frozen vault. The permafrost releases its treasures slowly. Even as climate change accelerates ice melt, large-scale extraction remains decades away.
The Fallout in Nuuk
Politically the shock has been immediate.
In January, residents were quietly advised to secure water, food, and other necessities in case the crisis escalated. Some families explored moving away. Business leaders told us that the small and fragile economy could have tipped into a downward spiral if a wave of migration had begun.
The emotional aftermath is still visible.
Presentations by Greenlandic officials are candid. One included a photograph of a massive White House aircraft parked on the tarmac in Nuuk, a village-sized capital of just 20,000 people.
At one of the city’s best restaurants, a young Inuit waitress wore a bright red cap styled after a MAGA hat, but with “Make America go away” stitched across the cap. It wasn’t just an idea. Two American experts in our delegation were unexpectedly disinvited from a high-level meeting.
For the defense community the episode has been unsettling. NATO’s strength has always rested on both capability and predictability: the understanding that disputes among allies are resolved within shared institutions, not through pressure politics.
The Arctic’s Strategic Importance Is Rising
Greenland’s strategic significance is growing. It sits at the intersection of three long-term shifts reshaping the High North: climate change, the global search for critical minerals, and a rapidly evolving security environment.
Russia has strengthened its Arctic posture. China increasingly describes itself as a “near-Arctic state.” Meanwhile, NATO’s enlargement with Finland and Sweden has extended the alliance’s northern flank and intensified military planning across the region.
The Arctic is becoming central to the strategic map. In Nuuk, after the alliance’s most uncomfortable winter in decades, people are still deciding what this new Arctic reality will mean for Greenland, and for NATO itself.
Kristiina Helenius is CEO of Miltton USA, the U.S. arm of the Nordic consultancy group Miltton. In this Perspective piece for Nordic Defence Sector, she shares observations from a recent visit to Nuuk, reflecting on how recent geopolitical tensions have shaped the mood in Greenland and what they may mean for NATO and the Arctic. If you would like to submit your own Perspective, please contact our editorial team at news@nordicdefencesector.com.