Politics
Why does Trump want Greenland? Arctic security, critical minerals at stake – National TenX News
For months, U.S. President Donald Trump has said he wants to take control of Greenland.
That rhetoric has returned in the aftermath of the U.S. military operation in Venezuela last weekend, which underscored Trump’s overall vision of American dominance over the Western Hemisphere.
Trump and the White House have since made clear that approach also extends to Greenland, which is a self-governing territory of Denmark, a NATO ally of the U.S. and Canada.
“The president has been very open and clear with all of you and with the world that he views it in the best interest of the United States to deter Russian and Chinese aggression in the Arctic region,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Wednesday.
Leavitt wouldn’t rule out possible U.S. military action to acquire Greenland, saying the administration was considering “all options” but that Trump’s “first option always has been diplomacy.”
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters Wednesday that he’ll be meeting with Danish officials next week, and that it’s “always been” Trump’s intent to purchase Greenland, rather than acquire it by force.
“This is not new,” he said. “He talked about it in his first term, and he’s not the first U.S. president that has examined or looked at how we could acquire Greenland.”
Greenland and Denmark, as well as Canada and European allies, have reaffirmed this week that Greenland’s future must be decided by its people alone.
Here’s why Trump may be keen on acquiring Greenland, and why it’s an important strategic security asset no matter who’s in charge.
Location and military capabilities
Greenland sits off the northeastern coast of Canada and is one of the largest land masses in the world.
About 80 per cent of the island lies within the Arctic Circle, with a vast ice sheet and protected lands.
Most of the population of 56,000 people, 90 per cent of which are Inuit, live along the southwestern coast of the territory, which includes the capital of Nuuk.
The Norse first arrived in Greenland around 982 AD and stayed there for centuries before disappearing for unclear reasons around 1500, according to the Visit Greenland tourism page.
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The colonial period is considered to have begun in 1721 when the Dano-Norwegian crown re-established contact and “in 1916, Denmark’s rights to Greenland were confirmed by the United States, as part of a deal that facilitated the American purchase of the Danish West Indies,” according to the Danish Institute for International Studies.
U.S. forces first set up in Greenland during the Second World War to ensure it didn’t fall into the hands of Nazi Germany, and to preserve North Atlantic shipping lanes.
Today, the island is home to several military and research bases. While most of those are Danish-owned and run, the U.S. military operates the remote Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland.
That base was built under the Defense of Greenland Treaty signed by the U.S. and Denmark in 1951, which supports missile warning, missile defence and space surveillance operations for the U.S. and NATO.
The U.S. also gained expanded access to Danish military and air bases under a military agreement signed in 2023. Danish lawmakers approved a bill last June to allow U.S. military bases on Danish soil, widening that agreement.
“There are no advantages to be gained” for U.S. national security by taking over Greenland, said Andrea Charron, director of the Centre for Defence and Security Studies at the University of Manitoba.
“In fact, there is significant damage that can occur” to NATO and the overall western alliance, she added, warning that “rupture” could be permanent.
Denmark is already moving to strengthen its military presence around Greenland and in the wider North Atlantic as part of an overall defence boost. The country is one of NATO’s top spenders with 3.22 per cent of its GDP dedicated to defence this year — matching the U.S.
The U.S. has already begun making moves with regard to Greenland, however. In June, the Pentagon announced that Trump had ordered that Greenland be shifted from the U.S. European Command area of responsibility to U.S. Northern Command.
That was done without consultation with European allies, Charron noted.
The closer focus on Greenland’s security comes as new access points through the Arctic open up thanks to thinning ice fuelled by climate change.
While Canada, the U.S., Russia, Denmark and other Arctic states have claim to exclusive economic zones within their respective portions of the Arctic, the northernmost area of the world remains unclaimed by any one power, particularly around the North Pole.
In 2018, China declared itself a “near-Arctic state” in an effort to gain more influence in the region, and has announced plans to build a “Polar Silk Road” of economic links with countries around the world.
Russia, meanwhile, has been restoring and expanding its Arctic military bases and airfields since 2014, while seeking to exert its own influence in the region.
Chinese and Russian military incursions into Arctic waters, including off Canada’s northern coast, have increased in recent years. NATO members have sought to boost their Arctic presence accordingly, fuelled by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“Russia already has more than 50 per cent of the Arctic by population and territory,” Charron said. “Russia and China both have missiles that can hit targets in North America. So Denmark and Greenland are really important for that domain awareness and anti-missile defence.”
Canada has prioritized Arctic security and sovereignty both as it rebuilds its military capabilities and in its foreign policy.
Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand is set to open a new Canadian consulate in Nuuk early this year as part of that strategy.
Greenland is also home to several critical mineral reserves that are attractive to global powers racing to secure them for semiconductors, batteries and magnets.
In particular, Greenland is a rich source of so-called rare earth minerals — a key component of smartphones, computers and other high-tech gadgets — with reserves of 1.5 million metric tons, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
That’s more than Canada’s total reserves but well below global leader China.
China also dominates rare earth mining and production, while Greenland has no such capabilities in place.
A 2021 ban on uranium mining by Greenland’s government over environmental protection concerns effectively barred mining for rare earths, of which uranium is a byproduct.
Trump has made clear he’s willing to overturn similar laws in the U.S., where he has expanded mining and oil production in protected lands.
Emma Ashford, a senior fellow with the Reimagining U.S. Grand Strategy program at the Stimson Center, said Trump’s focus on Venezuela’s oil reserves following the U.S. capture of President Nicolas Maduro offers clues to his foreign policy strategy.
“Trump appears to, in many ways, conflate the interests of America’s national security with American energy companies,” she said.
Ashford said Trump may use the successful Venezuela military operation to try and coerce Denmark to give up at least some control of Greenland — and could even increase pressure on Canada.
“I do think we will continue to see this pattern where military force is used as a signal to try and turn up the heat on places like Canada or Denmark,” she said.
— with files from Global’s Reggie Cecchini and The Associated Press
Politics
Sick astronaut returns to Earth with crew in NASA’s 1st medical evacuation – National TenX News
An ailing astronaut returned to Earth with three others on Thursday, ending their space station mission more than a month early in NASA’s first medical evacuation.
SpaceX guided the capsule to a middle-of-the-night splashdown in the Pacific near San Diego, less than 11 hours after the astronauts exited the International Space Station. Their first stop was a hospital for an overnight stay.
“Obviously, we took this action (early return) because it was a serious medical condition,” NASA’s new administrator Jared Isaacman said following splashdown. “The astronaut in question is fine right now, in good spirits and going through the proper medical checks.”
It was an unexpected finish to a mission that began in August and left the orbiting lab with only one American and two Russians on board. NASA and SpaceX said they would try to move up the launch of a fresh crew of four; liftoff is currently targeted for mid-February.
NASA’s Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke were joined on the return by Japan’s Kimiya Yui and Russia’s Oleg Platonov. Officials have refused to identify the astronaut who developed the health problem last week or explain what happened, citing medical privacy.
Support teams onboard the SpaceX recovery ship SHANNON work around the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft shortly after it landed off the coast of Long Beach, Calif., Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026.
NASA via AP
While the astronaut was stable in orbit, NASA wanted them back on Earth as soon as possible to receive proper care and diagnostic testing. The entry and splashdown required no special changes or accommodations, officials said, and the recovery ship had its usual allotment of medical experts on board.
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The astronauts emerged from the capsule, one by one, within an hour of splashdown. They were helped onto reclining cots and then whisked away for standard medical checks, waving to the cameras. Isaacman monitored the action from Mission Control in Houston, along with the crew’s families.
NASA decided a few days ago to take the entire crew straight to a San Diego-area hospital following splashdown and even practiced helicopter runs there from the recovery ship. The astronaut in question will receive in-depth medical checks before flying with the rest of the crew back to Houston on Friday, assuming everyone is well enough. Platonov’s return to Moscow was unclear.
NASA stressed repeatedly over the past week that this was not an emergency. The astronaut fell sick or was injured on Jan. 7, prompting NASA to call off the next day’s spacewalk by Cardman and Fincke, and ultimately resulting in the early return. It was the first time NASA cut short a spaceflight for medical reasons. The Russians had done so decades ago.
Spacewalk preparations did not lead to the medical situation, Isaacman noted, but for anything else, “it would be very premature to draw any conclusions or close any doors at this point.” It’s unknown whether the same thing could have happened on Earth, he added.
The space station has gotten by with three astronauts before, sometimes even with just two. NASA said it will be unable to perform a spacewalk, even for an emergency, until the arrival of the next crew, which has two Americans, one French and one Russian astronaut.
This screengrab from video provided by NASA shows NASA astronaut Mike Fincke getting helped out of the SpaceX Crew-11 capsule.
NASA via AP
Isaacman said it’s too soon to know whether the launch of station reinforcements will take priority over the agency’s first moonshot with astronauts in more than a half-century. The moon rocket moves to the pad this weekend at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center, with a fueling test to be conducted by early next month. Until all that is completed, a launch date cannot be confirmed; the earliest the moon flyaround could take off is Feb. 6.
For now, NASA is working in parallel on both missions, with limited overlap of personnel, according to Isaacman.
“If it comes down to a point in time to where we have to deconflict between two human spaceflight missions, that is a very good problem to have at NASA,” he told reporters.
© 2026 The Canadian Press
Troops from several European countries, including France, Germany, the UK, Norway and Sweden, are arriving in Greenland in a show of support for Denmark as talks between representatives of Denmark, Greenland and the U.S. on Wednesday highlighted “fundamental disagreement” between the Trump administration and European allies on the future of the Arctic island.
Denmark announced it would increase its military presence in Greenland on Wednesday and several European partners started sending symbolic numbers of troops on that day, just as the Danish and Greenlandic foreign ministers were preparing to meet with White House representatives in Washington.
The troop movements were intended to portray unity among Europeans and send a signal to U.S. President Donald Trump that an American takeover of Greenland is not necessary as NATO together can safeguard the security of the Arctic region amid rising Russian and Chinese interest.
“The first French military elements are already en route” and “others will follow,” French President Emmanuel Macron announced Wednesday, as French authorities said about 15 soldiers from the mountain infantry unit were already in Nuuk for a military exercise.
Germany will deploy a reconnaissance team of 13 personnel to Greenland on Thursday, its Defence Ministry said.
On Thursday, Danish Defence Minister Troels Lund Poulsen said the intention was “to establish a more permanent military presence with a larger Danish contribution,” according to Danish broadcaster DR. He said soldiers from several NATO countries will be in Greenland on a rotation system.
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, flanked by his Greenlandic counterpart Vivian Motzfeldt, said Wednesday that a “fundamental disagreement” over Greenland remains with Trump after they held highly anticipated talks at the White House with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Rasmussen added that it remains “clear that the president has this wish of conquering over Greenland” but that dialogue with the U.S. would continue at a high level over the following weeks.
Inhabitants of Greenland and Denmark reacted with anxiety but also some relief that negotiations with the U.S. would go on and European support was becoming visible.
In Greenland’s capital, Nuuk, local residents told The Associated Press they were glad the first meeting between Greenlandic, Danish and American officials had taken place but suggested it left more questions than answers.
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Several people said they viewed Denmark’s decision to send more troops, and promises of support from other NATO allies, as protection against possible U.S. military action. But European military officials have not suggested the goal is to deter a U.S. move against the island.
Maya Martinsen, 21, agreed and said it was “comforting to know that the Nordic countries are sending reinforcements” because Greenland is a part of Denmark and NATO.
The dispute, she said, is not about “national security” but rather about “the oils and minerals that we have that are untouched.”
On Wednesday, Poulsen had announced a stepped-up military presence in the Arctic “in close cooperation with our allies,” calling it a necessity in a security environment in which “no one can predict what will happen tomorrow.”
“This means that from today and in the coming time there will be an increased military presence in and around Greenland of aircraft, ships and soldiers, including from other NATO allies,” Poulsen said.
Asked whether the European troop movements were coordinated with NATO or what role the U.S.-led military alliance might play in the exercises, NATO referred all questions to the Danish authorities. However, NATO is currently studying ways to bolster security in the Arctic.
Rasmussen, the Danish foreign minister, announced the creation of a working group with the Americans to discuss ways to work through differences.
“The group, in our view, should focus on how to address the American security concerns, while at the same time respecting the red lines of the Kingdom of Denmark,” he said.
Commenting on the outcome of the Washington meeting on Thursday, Poulsen said the working group was “better than no working group” and “a step in the right direction.” He added nevertheless that the dialogue with the U.S. did not mean “the danger has passed.”
“We are really happy that action is being taken to make sure that this discussion is not just ended with that meeting alone,” Greenlandic MP Aki-Matilda Høegh-Dam said on Thursday during a news conference in Copenhagen.
She said Greenlandic people understood they were a “pivotal point” in a broader transformation of the international rules-based order and that they felt responsible not just for themselves but also for the whole world to get it right.
Høegh-Dam said the military operations should not happen “right next to our schools and right next to our kindergartens.”
Line McGee, a 38-year-old from Copenhagen, told AP that she was glad to see some diplomatic progress. “I don’t think the threat has gone away,” she said. “But I feel slightly better than I did yesterday.”
Speaking to FOX News Channel’s Special Report on Wednesday after the White House talks, Rasmussen rejected both a military takeover and the potential purchase of the island by the U.S. Asked whether he thinks the U.S. will invade, he replied: “No, at least I do not hope so, because, I mean, that would be the end of NATO.”
Rasmussen said Greenlanders were unlikely to vote for U.S. rule even if financial incentives were offered, “because I think there’s no way that U.S. will pay for a Scandinavian welfare system in Greenland, honestly speaking.”
“You haven’t introduced a Scandinavian welfare system in your own country,” he added.
Trump, in his Oval Office meeting with reporters, said: “We’ll see how it all works out. I think something will work out.”
© 2026 The Canadian Press
Politics
A Canadian citizen has died in Iran, Ottawa says as protests intensify – National TenX News
A Canadian citizen has died in Iran, Global Affairs Canada told Global News as the protests against the Iranian regime have intensified over the last few days.
“Global Affairs Canada is aware of a Canadian citizen who died in Iran. We express our condolences to the family and loved ones during this difficult time,” a spokesperson for GAC said.
As of Wednesday, there were 3,054 Canadian citizens and permanent residents registered in Iran, the spokesperson said.
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However, they added that since registration with GAC is voluntary, the actual number may be outdated.
Canada does not have diplomatic relations with Iran.
More to come
Sick astronaut returns to Earth with crew in NASA’s 1st medical evacuation – National TenX News
European troops arrive in Greenland after ‘disagreement’ with U.S. – National TenX News
A Canadian citizen has died in Iran, Ottawa says as protests intensify – National TenX News
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