Listen to this articleListen to this article | 6 minsAs threats by the United States to take over Greenland mount, Denmark is in panic mode. More Danish soldiers have been deployed to the island while European allies have sent small contingents in a symbolic show of support.The language of sovereignty, self-determination and international law has suddenly become urgent. Danish politicians are speaking of principles, borders and the dangers of great power politics.What is striking is not that Denmark is panicking but that it appears surprised.Greenland is strategic. It always has been. Its location, resources and military value make it a desired prize in an increasingly competitive global order. The renewed American interest in the island is neither an anomaly nor a momentary excess of rhetoric. It is the logical expression of an imperial worldview – one that prioritises power, access and control over the formalities of international norms.What makes the Greenland case uncomfortable for Denmark is not merely the threat itself. It is the mirror it holds up.For decades, Denmark has been a reliable partner in advancing that very same imperial worldview elsewhere. It aligned itself closely with the US, not only diplomatically but also militarily. Denmark participated in wars that reshaped entire regions under the banner of security, values and alliance loyalty. Now as the same imperial logic is being applied to Danish territory, the abstractions of geopolitics suddenly become tangible.This is the irony Denmark must confront.The concern over Greenland rests on arguments Denmark knows well. That sovereignty matters. That territories are not commodities. That international law cannot be selectively applied. Yet these principles were notably absent from Denmark’s considerations when it joined the invasion of Iraq, a war launched without a legal mandate and justified by spurious claims that quickly collapsed. Advertisement These arguments were also diluted in Afghanistan, where two decades of war ended not in stability but in exhaustion and the return to the status quo. They disappeared almost entirely in Libya, where Danish aircraft played a decisive role in …
