President Donald Trump’s new Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, confirmed during a Thursday interview that the commander-in-chief’s intentions to buy Greenland from Denmark are genuine and “not a joke.”
Rubio, a former Florida senator, told SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly that Trump’s desire to purchase the Arctic autonomous territory is based on national security concerns for the U.S. and the rest of the world as China increases its activities in the region.
“This is not a joke, like what he’s saying is pretty accurate. People have been talking about it for years,” Rubio said.
”This is not about acquiring land for the purpose of acquiring land. This is in our national interest, and it needs to be solved. President Trump’s put out there what he intends to do, which is to purchase it.”
Rubio said that even as China currently doesn’t have a heavy presence in the Arctic, it’s “realistic” to think that the country would “install facilities that give them access to the Arctic with the cover of a Chinese company, but that in reality, to serve a dual purpose, that in a moment of conflict, they could send naval vessels to that facility and operate from there.”
Trump has, both in private and in public, shared his willingness to purchase the island, and he has previously claimed that Denmark would “come along” in the end, even in the face of staunch opposition from the Danes.
Greenland’s Prime Minister Mute Egede previously appeared on Fox News, saying: “We don’t want to be Danes. We don’t even want to be Americans. We want to be Greenlanders.”
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen took part in an at times combative and antagonistic phone call with Trump on January 15, five days before he was sworn in for a second term in the White House.
“I wasn’t privy to that phone call, but I imagine the phone call went the way a lot of these phone calls go, and that is, he just speaks bluntly and frankly with people,” said Rubio on Thursday. “And ultimately, I think diplomacy, in many cases, works better when you’re straightforward, as opposed to using platitudes and language that translates to nothing.”
The SiriusXM interview was highlighted by The Hill.
The secretary also claimed that if China attacked Greenland, there would be no way for the Danes to stop them.
“Denmark can’t stop them. They would rely on the United States to do so,” said Rubio. “And so his point is, if the United States is on the hook to provide as we are now, we have a defense agreement with them to protect Greenland, if it comes under assault, if we’re already on the hook for having to do that, then we might as well have more control over what happens there.”
Earlier this week, the Danes announced that it would spend another $2 billion on defending its North Atlantic territories, including using long-range drones and new ships built for operating in Arctic waters.
The Danes recently rejected a proposal from the French to send E.U. troops to Greenland, and a Danish MP suggested that the island rejoin the union for security reasons following its 1985 departure.
