President Donald Trump will not rule out using military force to seize Greenland.
Trump said during an interview with NBC News on Saturday, “We’ll get Greenland. Yeah, 100 percent.”
During the quick-fire telephone interview, he added, "There's a good possibility it could be done without military force," but "I don't take anything off the table."
His remarks came a day after Vice President JD Vance arrived in Greenland alongside his wife, Second Lady Usha Vance. He attacked the Danish government for failing to invest in vital security measures while urging an alternative approach for the country.
“Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told reporters at the Pituffik Space, a U.S. base on the northwestern coast of Greenland, as per The Associated Press.
Vances’ diatribe came just hours after Greenland’s youngest leader was sworn into power.
Trump and Vance have been adding fuel to the fire ever since Trump first revealed his plans to obtain control of the Danish territory just days into his second term.
However, Greenland’s newly sworn-in prime minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen has since retaliated against the U.S. in a fiery social media post that read: “President Trump says that the United States ‘will get Greenland.’
“Let me be clear: The United States will not get it. We do not belong to anyone else. We decide our own future”, as per a statement posted to Facebook.
The 33-year-old former minister of industry and minerals was voted in to serve as Greenlands’ PM Friday.
Lars Løkke Rasmussen, the Danish foreign minister, condemned Trump and Vance's delivery “tone,” declaring: “This is not how you speak to your close allies, and I still consider Denmark and the United States to be close allies.”
Trump has frequently expressed his desire for the island territory, claiming it is a vital resource for U.S. economic and national security.
