The US has a long history of wanting to buy Greenland and once offered $100 million.
During his second term, US President Donald Trump continued to express his intention to buy the autonomous island of Greenland from Denmark, even more resolutely than in his first term when he emphasized that he did not rule out the possibility of using military force to control the island.
However, Mr. Trump is not the first high-ranking US official to express his desire for the country to control Greenland. Over the past 150 years, the US has repeatedly expressed interest in Greenland and once officially submitted a proposal to buy the island, according to History .
Tasiilaq Town in Greenland
Keep an eye on Greenland
In 1868, the late US Secretary of State William Seward was tasked with finding and purchasing additional territory for the US, following the purchase of Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million a year earlier.
According to Ron Doel, a historian at Florida State University (USA), the long-standing US interest in Greenland and other northern territories, including Canada, is the issue of expanding Washington's control in North America and the increasingly important Arctic region.
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In the mid-19th century, when Alaska was little known to Americans, Greenland was even less well known. That is why Seward ordered a detailed survey of the Danish-owned island in 1867. The 1868 report described Greenland as a rich land. In his summary, Seward said it contained valuable animals and fish, coal mines, and was close to many ports.
As he had done to promote the purchase of Alaska, Seward promoted Greenland as a land of nearly inexhaustible natural resources that could “empower America to control world commerce.”
The late US Secretary of State William Seward, who proposed the US purchase of Greenland more than 150 years ago
PHOTO: US DEPARTMENT OF STATE
However, at that time, the Alaska purchase was criticized because it was a barren, snow-covered land that did not border the US territory, in the context of the US still having many difficulties after the end of the Civil War. Therefore, the US Congress and the American public in 1868 were not interested in having another frozen territory, so Mr. Seward's proposal to buy Greenland failed. After several decades, the Americans discovered the valuable gold mines and mining potential in Alaska, turning the purchase that was once considered "Seward's Folly" by the media into a great bargain for the US.
3-way exchange proposal
In the early 20th century, the United States devised another plan to acquire Greenland. The proposal was initiated by the late US Ambassador to Denmark Maurice Egan and relied on a complex three-way transaction, rather than a direct purchase of the territory.
In September 1910, Mr. Egan sent the US State Department a plan for a territorial exchange. At this time, Denmark wanted to regain control of the territory of Schleswig-Holstein, which had fallen to Germany in 1864.
According to Mr. Egan's proposal, Denmark would give Greenland to the United States, which would then give Denmark control of a cluster of islands in the Philippines. Denmark would use the islands to trade with Germany (which wanted to expand its influence eastward) and regain Schleswig-Holstein.
Mr. Egan himself called it a “bold suggestion.” Ultimately, the plan was not implemented, although it paved the way for the United States to buy the Virgin Islands from Denmark in 1917.
$100 million deal
The last time the US directly offered to buy Greenland was in 1946, shortly after the end of World War II. During the war, the island had an important strategic location, when more than 10,000 Allied aircraft landed in Greenland to refuel for the attack on Germany.
The Pentagon sees Greenland as “the world’s largest fixed aircraft carrier” and wants to use the island as an air base, since planes cannot fly across the Atlantic in one go, said Ron Doel.
Allied activity in Greenland proved to be a valuable strategic asset, prompting high-ranking US officials to become interested in purchasing the island. In 1946, the US State Department offered $100 million in gold to buy the island.
The proposal from Washington took Denmark by surprise. “The Danes were quite shocked that the US thought they could get a piece of territory by asking a price and Denmark was willing to accept it,” said Mr. Doel.
“Although we owe a lot to the United States, I do not feel we owe the whole island of Greenland,” the late Danish Foreign Minister Gustav Rasmussen told the US ambassador at the time.
Importance in the Cold War
The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union placed Greenland at the center of the rivalry between the two nuclear powers. After World War II, the United States signed a treaty with Denmark in 1951 that allowed the U.S. military to expand its operations in Greenland, including the construction of the Thule Air Base. This base allowed the U.S. military to respond quickly to nuclear threats from the Soviet Union, as bombers could take off and reach strategic Soviet cities such as Moscow and Leningrad within hours.
Thule US Air Force Base in Greenland
According to a 1955 memo from the Pentagon chief to former US President Dwight Eisenhower, the US Department of Defense remained interested in acquiring Greenland, but no formal proposal was ever made. Greenland was granted autonomy in 1979, and Denmark remained involved in the island's defence and foreign affairs.
Source: https://thanhnien.vn/my-da-co-y-dinh-mua-lai-greenland-tu-hon-150-nam-truoc-185250209101247357.htm
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