I think an interest in controlling both sides of the Northwest Passage which is just starting to open up may have been a justification.
Well Greenland is one third of the GIUK sonar belt anchors… But the thing is, the sonar buoys are, well, buoys. The buoys are back in sea, driving all the Russians crazy !
(I will NOT apologize)
That being said, y’all Californians oughta hurriedly send an ambassador to Denmark for a deal. Guarantee they don’t really give a shit about Greenland, and if you guys can score a land exchange…
Exchange? Can we give them Texas? Please let us give them Texas.
The effect on our schoolbooks alone would be wildly beneficial.
Trump postpones Denmark trip after prime minister refuses to sell Greenland
I literally had to double check to see if I had accidentally switched to the Borowitz Report or The Onion, but no, this is not parody, this is real. This is the total insanity that this presidency has brought us to.
Denmark should put in a counter-offer.
New york for $2500
(after all, it is 1/50000th the size of greenland, and quite severely secondhand. Dirty, too)
Looking top-down…Greenland is a good deal closer to Moscow than anything we have right now land-based.
No I’m not making a Trump-Putin joke. I’m talking NEWCLEARALL MISS ILLES!
Why not buy Greenland?
We can get Mexico to pay for it!
And we wouldn’t even have to pay all at once, if we choose the Danegeld installment plan.
Since no one else will step up and do it (damn PC snowflakes!) the hither unknown to me Danish PM is a hottie.
From your link:
(bolding mine)
Hope to hell none of the staffers reads this to him-it might give him ideas.
Knock it off and keep it in your pants.
[/moderating]
As far as the natural resources go Coase theorem says that it does not matter who is running Greenland, if the US can use those resources it will.
It only makes sense if the US has some way of exploiting the resources unavailable to the Greenlanders, or if the US has a better idea of the resource’s worth than the Greenlanders.
I would think neither is likely to be true, and the only strategic reason would be to better press Greenland’s claim to Arctic reasons against the Chinese and Russians because the US would have a better negotiating position than Denmark or Greenland.
I do like the fact that the Danish PM called the idea “absurd”.
Yeah, but regardless of results that could make sense, the whole effort from Trump here looks like if the Underpants Gnomes are now advisors to the president.
Step 1: [del]Steal[/del] Go make an offer for Greenland to the Dutch
Step 2: ???
Step 3: PROFIT!
I see that the PM of Denmark has now joined the distinguished legion of women whom Trump has called “nasty”, in this case for refusing to sell him Greenland. Which leads me to wonder if there’s any country left in the world that Trump has had dealings with whose leader he hasn’t insulted. Actually, I believe there are two countries and their leaders that Trump holds in the highest regard – Vladimir Putin of Russia and Kim Jong-Un of North Korea – America’s new allies and models for Making America Great Again™.
The Danes. Not the Dutch. The Danes.
I basically agree with that but would just further comment on the condition under which it would apply.
Right now as the Danish PM said (supporting with my earlier post before she commented publicly, thanks! 
) Danish politics of recent decades presumes Greenland ‘belongs’ to Greenlanders certainly as far as internal Greenland issues. So under the current arrangement, or Greenland independence which is also actively discussed, Greenlanders basically set the conditions of resource development as to things like leases to explore, severance taxes for resources extracted, local hiring requirements, etc. If Greenland as a US territory had the same autonomy the result would be the same. If instead Greenland was more centrally controlled under the US and the US federal govt set lower severance taxes, looser local hiring requirements etc then resource company shareholders and/or resource consumers might get a better deal and Greenlanders a worse deal. But why would Greenlanders want to do that, assuming the terms they set autonomously are attractive enough for the companies to come and develop?
Also though, as ‘insulting’ as Trump’s reference to Denmark ‘losing money’ in ‘carrying’ Greenland might be, it’s true (order of $10k per capita per year*). That’s a factor in the real existing two option choice (continue as is, or Greenland independence) and would be if a US offer were taken seriously: how long/much could the US be expected to subsidize Greenland v how much/long Denmark will continue to?
Then the US is a bigger protector in ‘big power arctic rivalry’ but Denmark is a member of NATO, and it’s a matter of opinion how much protecting Greenland needs.
So hardly an obviously compelling idea, Greenland as US possession. But, calling it absurd is in IMO emotional more than rational. Again the US did take over Denmark’s role in Greenland during WWII when Denmark lost out in ‘great power rivalry’ albeit to a much more extreme degree than anything likely in the foreseeable future, being occupied itself by Nazi Germany. But Denmark sold the then-Danish Virgin Islands to the US in 1917, basically because it was an economic drag on Denmark, in the absence of any real crisis.
But if the average person in Greenland (it doesn’t matter as much what metropolitan Danes think) thinks it’s stupid, insulting or a joke, which seems the pretty uniform person-in-the-street response per US media articles, then it is. Brexit isn’t necessarily a good idea either, but it won the vote.
*tallies of net subsidies to US states/territories are controversial, because potentially politicized and numbers vary widely but number for Puerto Rico per person is generally around a couple $1k per year per person, less than some states. Although Greenland has ~50k people not 3 mil+ plus like Puerto Rico, even Denmark is 100 times more populous than Greenland.
So you’re saying Danishes look like snacks ?
No wonder his pitch failed! 
IOW, yeah, I had a brain fart there.
I’m stealing this.