(Bloomberg) — President Donald Trump’s fixation on Greenland offers a chilling reminder to leaders in Europe and beyond: No deal is final.
Trump, on eight European countries, including Denmark, for saying they would hold symbolic NATO military exercises in Greenland in response to what they called US intimidation.
While it is not certain that the tariffs will take effect, the threat represented a bold escalation and an insult to close US allies, trampling on the US-EU trade deal struck just six months earlier at Trump’s Turnberry resort in Scotland.
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. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the tariff threat “completely wrong”. French President Emmanuel Macron said it was “unacceptable”. The Prime Minister of Sweden, Ulf Kristersson, stated that his country would not be “blackmailed”.
A senior European lawmaker has called for suspending the U.S.-EU trade truce reached with Trump in July, and the bloc’s national ambassadors will meet on Sunday to discuss next steps, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The tariff letter also highlighted several lessons emerging from the second Trump administration: nothing is beyond the reach of negotiations, alliances are viewed with suspicion, and power and leverage are decisive.
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“Anyone who thought year two would be a year of tariff stability should recognize that this is looking a lot like year one,” said Josh Lipsky, president of international economics at the Atlantic Council. “There will be a unified reaction. First, because of how united Europe is on the Greenland issue; second, because of the political price Europe has already paid for the Turnberry agreement.”
EU is the largest source of US imports
Trump’s tariffs would apply to Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland. The announcement came as protests were held across Denmark with firm opposition to any US control over Greenland.
Remarkably, Trump made the announcement of the tariffs after these countries — some of the United States’ oldest allies and all NATO members — said they would participate in a joint exercise.
“We’re not talking about Iran, we’re talking about Denmark,” said Scott Lincicome, a trade analyst at the libertarian think tank Cato, adding that the move will anger “a lot of people.”
Republican Senator Thom Tillis and Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen released a joint statement calling on the Trump administration to “turn off the threats and turn on the diplomacy.”
The co-chairs of a Senate group dedicated to NATO wrote: “Continuing on this path is bad for the United States, bad for American businesses, and bad for U.S. allies.”
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It is unclear whether Trump would actually consider invading Greenland, although he has consistently left that possibility open. One of his top aides, speaking Friday night on Fox News, accused Europe of taking advantage of the U.S. and said Greenland’s fate should reflect who has the power to protect it — even though, because it is part of Denmark, any attack by an adversary could trigger the alliance’s mutual defense clause, known as Article 5, and a possible U.S. response.
“Denmark is a small country, with a small economy and a small army. They cannot defend Greenland,” deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller told the broadcaster. “To control a territory, you have to be able to defend it, improve it and inhabit it. Denmark has failed all these tests.”
Trump’s demands on Greenland spark protests across Denmark
Protesters hold Greenlandic flags during a demonstration in Copenhagen on January 17.
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As part of Denmark, Greenland is also “in principle covered by the mutual solidarity clause of Article 42.7 of the Treaty on European Union”, European Commission spokeswoman Anita Hipper said this week.
Instead, NATO members now face economic pressure from a member of the bloc itself to support a forced takeover of the territory, an extraordinary development even by the standards of Trump’s professed transactionalism.
Change of route
So far, European leaders have largely tried to appease Trump by cutting deals and avoiding confronting him, especially as they work to maintain U.S. military and intelligence support for Ukraine to counter Russian aggression.
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But a move involving Greenland could change the European Union’s calculations.
Allies had previously concluded that “it was better to appease Trump and move on than to escalate, and if you did that you could give companies and investors some predictability,” Lincicome said. “It’s clear that this is simply wrong. The only government so far that appears to have made Trump back down is China, and it has done so through very aggressive retaliatory actions.”
The Greenland-related tariffs may not go into effect — Trump could try to impose them under a law the Supreme Court is expected to review soon, potentially limiting the powers Trump has used so far to quickly implement tariffs against friends and foes.
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Both Lipsky and Lincicome said they believe it is unlikely, given the Supreme Court case and other factors, that the tariffs will actually take effect on Feb. 1.
“It’s not impossible, but the probability is low,” Lipsky said. It is also unclear what Europe could give up in a negotiation to obtain a delay, as has occurred in other tariff disputes. “This is different from a traditional threat.”
Trump’s threat drew criticism from retiring Republican Rep. Don Bacon, who said Congress should take back tariff powers that Trump had seized and called for impeachment if Trump invaded Greenland.
“I feel like it’s incumbent on people like me to speak out and say that these threats and intimidation of an ally is wrong,” Bacon told CNN. “And on the off chance that he is serious about invading Greenland, I want to make clear that that would likely be the end of his presidency. Most Republicans know that is morally wrong and would stand up against it.”
Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, called Trump’s latest threat a “useless imperial fantasy” and called on other lawmakers to repudiate it. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats will introduce a bill to block Trump from imposing the tariffs.
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