'For the Protection of the Free World'

It goes without saying that trying to take over someone else’s country against the wishes of the inhabitants has nothing to do with freedom.

Trump is sounding more and more like George W. Bush and Dick Cheney:

"I think the people want to be with us," Trump said when asked about the island in the press room on board the presidential plane.

"I don't really know what claim Denmark has to it, but it would be a very unfriendly act if they didn't allow that to happen because it's for the protection of the free world [bold mine-DL]," he added.

"I think Greenland we'll get because it has to do with freedom of the world," Trump continued.

It goes without saying that trying to take over someone else’s country against the wishes of the inhabitants has nothing to do with freedom. The people of Greenland have no desire to be part of Trump’s Greater United States, as their own leaders have said many times. Wben an American leader declares that the people of another country will welcome our domination of their land (“we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators”), that is usually a prelude to an act of aggression. American nationalists can’t imagine that other nations don’t want to be Americans, and they assume that that the U.S. is doing the others a favor by annexing or attacking them.

Many people wanted to treat Trump’s Greenland fixation as a joke at first because it was so stupid, but he isn’t kidding. According to The Financial Times, Trump’s call with the Danish prime minister went very badly as he threatened Denmark with punitive measures if they didn’t go along with selling the island. As usual, his first and only move is to use coercive threats to try to intimidate the other side into giving him what he wants. This approach usually provokes anger and defiance, as it has in this case.

One of several flaws in this heavy-handed approach is that Trump’s demand is so unreasonable and obnoxious that no self-respecting government could agree to his terms. Another flaw is that the goal itself is wrong. The U.S. should not be pursuing territorial expansion. The fact that it is threatening friendly countries in the process makes it even more despicable.

Thanks to this stupidity, the U.S. has managed to strain relations not only with Denmark, but with our largest European allies as well. Germany and France have warned the U.S. against pursuing designs on Greenland after Trump refused to rule out military threats. At best, this episode will have damaged important U.S. relationships for no reason and all to the detriment of American interests. As is usually the case, the loudest nationalist blowhards are the worst stewards of the national interest.

One of the stranger parts of Trump’s expansionist mania over the last few weeks is his insistence that he wants to grab more territory for the “protection of the free world.” Talking about “the free world” is a relic of the Cold War that some hawks have tried to repurpose for great power rivalry today. The phrase doesn’t inspire much enthusiasm now, if it ever did, and Trump’s use of the phrase suggests that he is probably just reciting the talking points some hawkish advisers gave him.

To the extent that “the free world” has ever been a real thing, coercing a democratic ally to sell the U.S. territory over the objections of the local population would make a mockery of it. Other great powers would use it as an occasion to ridicule the U.S. for its crude imperialism, and they would have a point. When imperialists and aggressors want to conceal their real goals, they often like to cloak them in the garb of “freedom.” George W. Bush had his “freedom agenda” to provide political cover for his aggressive and interventionist policies, and Trump seems to be trying something similar by dressing up territorial expansionism as “protection of the free world.”

The U.S. should leave its neighbors alone in peace. If the people of Greenland wish to pursue independence, that is their right and the U.S. should not hinder them. Under no circumstances should the U.S. seek to gobble up their territory.