In 982 AD, Erik the Red was exiled from Iceland for turning his neighbors into ex-neighbors.
By which I mean, he killed them.
With nowhere to go, Erik set sail west based on rumors of an island.
But what he found wasn’t a fertile paradise. No palm trees, no sandy beaches.
Instead, it was a colossal chunk of frozen badlands—ice, snow, and a whole lot of nothing.
But Erik wasn’t just a warrior; he was a marketer.
He called this icy area “Greenland” — a name designed to trick people into moving there.
And then he sent word back to his viking friends.
It worked.
Erik turned Greenland into a Viking migration hotspot.
Fast-forward to 2019…
Trump’s Greenland Pitch
Trump announced he wanted to buy Erik’s former viking promised land.
At first, I thought he was nuts.
Greenland is brutal. It struggles with the highest suicide rate on the planet. Alcoholism and depression are off the charts.
Winters are long, dark, and harsh, and ironically, in the short summers (with 24 hours of sunlight), nobody can sleep.
It’s circadian-rhythm hell.
Long story short, nothing happened with Trump’s announcement. Everyone forgot about it, assuming it was another one of his crazy antics.
But apparently Trump’s not giving up. He just announced AGAIN he wants the US to buy Greenland.
Is he nuts? Or is this the smartest geopolitical move on the planet?
Maybe both.
In 2019, when Trump tweeted that he wanted to buy Greenland, Denmark’s prime minister wasn’t happy.
He tweeted right back: “No, Greenland isn’t for sale.”
Why Denmark?
Technically, Greenland is an autonomous territory under the Danish crown.
Denmark foots a big chunk of the bill (hundreds of millions of dollars in annual subsidies). In exchange, they get to make the final call on Greenland’s external affairs.
But just a few days ago, Trump declared Greenland a “strategic necessity” for the U.S.
He even brought out Ken Howery—a co-founder of PayPal—to be his ambassador to Denmark.
The real reason you keep hearing about Greenland boils down to rare earth minerals.
It’s all about the gallium, germanium, antimony (yes, that’s a real thing).
And it’s not just weird metals.
Greenland’s got uranium—lots of it. If you want to run nuclear reactors or build that next big bomb (not supporting, just stating facts), you need uranium.
And here’s the thing:
China just banned exporting some of these elements to the U.S. And guess what? China controls something like 70% of the global supply. Russia has a chunk, too.
Again, Denmark technically “owns” Greenland, but they don’t have the resources (or the technology, or the money) to mine all of it.
China, however, does—and they’re already in there, scooping up mining rights through a company called Shenghe Resources, which is basically half-owned by the Chinese government.
Throw in massive oil and natural gas deposits that are now easier to access (since Greenland’s ice is melting), and you see why every superpower wants a piece of this place.
The Long Game
Look, historically, we’ve done stuff like this. The U.S. bought Alaska from Russia in 1867.
We picked up the Louisiana Purchase from France back in 1803. The U.S. Virgin Islands were once the Danish West Indies. Harry Truman tried to buy Greenland right after World War II for $100 million.
So it’s not like we haven’t gone shopping for large land masses before.
And this time, it’s strategic.
China is playing a global long game by controlling rare earth minerals.
The U.S. is trying to cut in before we lose total leverage. Greenland is the third biggest stash in the world.
That’s not a coincidence.
Either way, we’re probably going to hear a lot more about Greenland soon.
its called trolling, congratulations you got sucked in hook line and sinker.
trump says lots does little, for someone who claims theyll be responsible with economy and finances he sure is going after some expensive stuff if hes serious. 500k bitcoin aint cheap, greenland will be trillions, his tarrif war will cost more trillions…. theres 3 things outve hundreds of his to do list and the usa is already bankrupted right there.
hes either a fucking bullshitter, a fucking moron or both.
Greenland
a really BIIIIGGG Diego Garcia
I read the history of Greenland about 10 years ago.
It was an interesting comparison to the Maori.
In fact the time of Norse entry to Greenland was the early part of the mediaeval warming period. (MWP)
It was colonised precisely because it was inhabitable .
The medieval warming period was 3 to 4 degrees average higher than, say, the 1970s
This was caused by cows farting and burping and a proliferation of Fred Flintstone-type cars.
Nah, just bullshitting….. like the climate retards DO.
Climate changes for a variety of reasons. Sun activity, the elliptical Earth orbit, and much more.
Anyhoo, Greenland in the MWP was green and fertile . Not warm, not freezing.
like a Gore Summer.
Just as NZ in the MWP was warmer.
The Vikings arrived in Greenland near the start of the MWP. They managed to get a few hundred years of agricultural and fishing living.
Then it turned cold; or stopped being warm.
Maybe they had taxes to cool the planet down ! Records are vague on this.
Most left back to the Scandinavian lands but some dug in and stayed. They perished.
Meantime, the maori went to NZ isles late in the MWP.
It was warm and pleasant and crops grew well down the north island.
And then, ….they didn’t.
In this short time the Maori early settlers had lost much skill.
They could not return to homelands – like the Viking/Norse .
Was it because they were the troublemakers and were expelled !!!.
Perhaps the oral history will help us understand.
Radio silence on this great oral history!!!
So compare
The Vikings colonised and flourished while the MWP allowed, When the weather turned most returned. Some stayed. They had a choice.
The Maori had no choice and were stuck on cold wet windy isles with limited food growing opportunities or even hunting or fishing. Life was crap.
War was a relief from the misery.
Here endeth the story.
good article, except the ice is not melting….