BEN MORGAN – Greenland, Davos and the rules-based order

The weeks preceding the 2026 World Economic Forum Meeting in Davos, Switzerland were turbulent. The US flexing its military ‘muscle’ in Venezuela, and President Trump escalating his call for the US to annex Greenland.  European and Canadian leaders took a strong stance to Trump’s bombast, even sending military forces to Greenland in recent days.  

However, events culminated in Davos where Trump capitulated, rejecting the use of force to annex Greenland and dropping threatened tariffs on European countries supporting the nation.

Why Trump was always going to back down over Greenland

Trump’s position on Greenland was always illogical, poorly reasoned and therefore unsustainable. Even an American president’s actions are limited by some realities, and in this case, they can be summarised as follows:

• Why? The first principle of war, or of politics is ‘selection and maintenance of the aim’ or defining what you want to achieve and why it is important. In the case of Greenland there is no logical reason for the US to hold the territory.  Greenland is an important base for surveillance and control of the Arctic and the northern approaches to the continental US but America already has the right to base troops, aircraft, ships, radar stations and anything else it needs on the island. So why would American’s support trying to annex a barren, cold and inhospitable island in the Arctic? Possibly, the Trump White House is looking ahead to a withdrawal from NATO that would limit its rights to use Greenland. Perhaps he wants access to the land’s mineral wealth. Or maybe it is just a silly idea, we do not know, but the deployment of troops or other resources that need to be authorised by Congress requires sound reasoning. 
• Greenland cannot be bought or sold.  Greenland is a country within the Kingdom of Denmark. Greenland may rely on Denmark for defence but it is autonomous.  This means that any decision to become part of America is a decision that should be made by Greenlanders rather than by the Danish government. 
• Denmark and the European Union are never going to give in to threats.  The European Union exists for the collective support of its membership. If one member is threatened then the Union must respond.  The alternative is a collapse of the Union, a situation that would have severe security and economic implications for its members.  
• Europe is the US’s most important trading partner. The European Union is America’s biggest trading partner and holds more that $ 10 trillion of US government bonds.  Together the factors mean that the Union has the financial power to damage the US economy. 
• Acquiring new US territory like Greenland requires Congressional approval. If Trump did use military force to acquire Greenland it is debatable whether Congress would approve its incorporation into the US.  

Therefore, Trump’s ‘stand over’ tactics in Greenland are flawed from the beginning because Greenlanders, and their supporters in Europe are unlikely to bow to diplomatic pressure or bribery. This immediately removes these options for a peaceful resolution and inevitably escalates military intervention into being the only option.

However, Europe is never going to try and fight the US and does not need too. Instead, Europe has the economic power to hurt American voters. On Wednesday it fired its first ‘shot across Trump’s bow’ when the European Union rejected the US-Europe trade deal agreed in July.  A move that sent the US dollar and stock markets tumbling, a fall that Trump’s backdown today seems to have arrested.

If Trump did invade Greenland, we can imagine a campaign of passive resistance from Europe starting with economic sanctions but including the removal of US military bases in Europe, withdrawal of European support for US diplomatic or military activities around the world and freezing intelligence sharing with the US.  Slowly, but surely Trump’s America would suffer catastrophic economic and military impacts. 

Europe’s leaders clearly learnt from Trump’s backdown during his trade war with China. The Trump White House’s foreign and economic policy is poorly thought out so is inevitably inconsistent.  This makes America weak and easily out-manoeuvred in diplomatic contests. 

Europe demonstrated how to handle Trump

The Greenland saga is very important in wider international relations because it provides a model for the managing the US. A model that demonstrates the weaknesses of current US decision-making and that will be carefully studied by America’s competitors. The model’s key components are simple; and can be summarised as follows:

• Be agile.  We know that Trump had not thought his position through before starting to make threats.  The lack of any kind of military build-up demonstrated his threats were not credible. Any build up of force for use in Greenland is a likely to have been well-signalled by senior officer resignations and leaks to the media.  This did not happen, instead Trump’s threats backfired by providing ample time for the European Union to act.  
• Do not be afraid to use proportional force as a deterrent. Although the White House can make military interventions, it cannot go to war without Congressional approval. This imposes limits on the use of military force, especially for poorly considered adventures like invading Greenland. For instance, Europe’s small commitment of forces to protect Greenland is not going to stop a US invasion.  But it demonstrates resolve, creates headlines and importantly would cause US casualties if Trump followed through on his threat. So, even a successful operation would be subject to heavy scrutiny by US lawmakers.  Specifically, from pro-Trump, isolationist Republicans a key group in the president’s support base. 
• Trump will buckle under economic pressure. Trump talks tough, and does not care about conventional measures of success liked being respected in the international community. But Europe’s response proves that he is concerned with the economy, specifically the stock market. This backdown follows an historic pattern of behaviour. For example, drops in US stocks forced roll backs of his tariff policy and his trade war with China.   

Greenland provides anybody studying Trump with useful insight into how weak US foreign policy is at the present time.  Essentially, the saga provides a ‘play book’ for other nations looking at challenging the US.  Worse, Trump’s backdown reinforces the weakness of US foreign policy, potentially encouraging more challenges and escalating global tension. 

It sets precedents for the Pacific; China is committed to enforcing its ‘9-Dash’, extending its military reach and capturing Taiwan. It is also about to enter trade negotiations with the US.  In China, teams of focussed, clever strategists will be analysing this situation and drawing the conclusion that US foreign policy is inconsistent, and therefore easily manipulated. The next step in their analysis is how to use this situation to achieve China’s goals. 

Does the Trump administration signal a permanent change for international relations? 

At Davos, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney referenced Greek historian Thucydides’s thought that “the strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must.”  A quote that authoritarians and ‘realist’ diplomats accept as the underlying principle of all international relationships.  However, after the war a group of forward-thinking American leaders like Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, General George Marshall, Harry Hopkins and Edward Stettinius Jr had vision for a different kind of world.  After living through two cataclysmic World Wars, they understood the fallacy of using short-sighted, self-interested foreign policy ideas to govern the modern world and created the current international ‘rules-based order.’ 

It is fair to say that the ‘rules-based order’ is not perfect, but it has provided 80-years of relative peace and prosperity.  Carney admitted as much at Davos when he said…

“We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically, and we knew that international law applied with varied rigor, depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.  This fiction was useful, and American hegemony in particular helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security, and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.”

The US has benefited enormously economically from being the keystone that holds this system together. Benefits that Trump seems keen to throw away, and the question for world leaders is now about the future. Is it better to persist with America, minimising the damage and waiting for Trump’s presidency to end? Or is it better to create a new rules-based order?  

Conclusion 

This international crisis is exciting and dangerous but it is important that world leaders retain perspective because Trump’s power is limited, and he is not representative of Americans generally.  The Economist’s presidential approval tracker surmised on 21 January 2025 that…

“366 days into Donald Trump’s term. The president’s net approval rating is -19%, down 2.0 points since last week,37% approve, 56% disapprove, 5% not sure.”[vi] It is only one of many opinion polls that show Americans disapprove of his actions a CNN poll from a week ago showing “A majority, 58%, calls the first year of Trump’s term a failure.”[vii]

Even Fox News recently highlighted the unpopularity of the president[viii] reporting that “… one year into his second tour of duty in the White House, public opinion surveys suggest many Americans are souring on the president and his agenda.” Notably, Fox News also reports that American do not support Trump’s push to acquire Greenland. [ix] 

It is important to remember that Trump’s presidency, and its foreign policy, is likely to be a short aberration in a longer US tradition. Therefore, the key issue is managing the Trump Whitehouse in a manner that minimises the damage. Something that is likely to become easier as Trump’s weaknesses become more apparent to people in the US. 

Ben Morgan is a bored Gen Xer, a former Officer in NZDF and TDBs Military Blogger – his work is on substack