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You might be right that the usa has the military means to conquer Greenland, but Europe has the means to make it not worth it
This is exactly it. There is only one force in the world that can take out a US aircraft carrier, and that's the non-US part of NATO.
Yes, the US has nuclear subs that can stay underwater forever, but they're noisy. They don't have stealthy subs like Sweden, Netherland or many other European countries have. NATO exercises have shown that even one of these subs can wipe out most of a carrier group.
Greenland is far from the US; they'll have to send a carrier. NATO can sink that carrier. How will Trump look if he loses a carrier?
The only thing necessary for this scenario is for the EU to finally grow some balls.
Even my shitty-shit country - Portugal - which most definitelly can't afford the costs of a single aircraft carrier even though it has a massive exclusive economic area in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, some years ago had a submarine win a NATO exercise when it popped up undetected in the middle of the carrier group.
Even with its main focus of "force projection" being on Trade rather than Military power, Europe is a whole different beast to face militarily than Latin America, and not just because it's far more likely to be united in its response.
This is probably why Trump hasn't invaded Greenland yet - his military people know very well it would be a very different story militarily and his diplomats know it would be a very different story in terms of the broader consequences.
I think modern Navies are mostly useless. Between drones and stealth submarines they can all be sunk basically immediately. Honestly this could make it difficult for Europe to intervene at all
Unfortunately the US has the capability to move troop to Greenland by air. It's how it moved most things into Afghanistan. A country much further away.
Truthfully they could launch ballistic missiles from the mainland and then follow with aircraft, paratroopers, etc. The existing bases provide airfields.
I say this not because I want it, but because it's possible and that's frightening.
Well, sorta.
The US's main power projection strategy is still (and has been for decades) to have an aircraft carrier group parked about 1000km away from the coast of whichever nation they're attacking, pouding their target with airpower and cruise missiles whilst being far out enough that most cruise missiles can't even reach them and those which can take so long that the carrier group has plenty of time to prepare and defend itself.
The Chinese and the Russians both developed hypersonic missiles exactly to counter that, as such missiles get there much faster so the carrier group has maybe half a minute of advanced warning to try and take them down rather than 10+ minutes.
This strategy has been very successful against militarilly second and lower tier nations, which is why the US has been using it since the first Iraq war.
However, for all its underinvestment in its military, Europe isn't second tier (and neither is China).
As for the second part of your post, "boots on the ground" is exactly were the US massivelly sucks beyond the initial invasion stage: they're great at getting there and breaking shit up whilst completelly sucking at actually holding territory. Personally, from the videos I've seen of US troops trying to "create good will with the locals" in places like Afghanistan, they seem to be completelly shit at understanding and respecting the way of life of the locals and they reeking with a mindset of "I'm a member of a superior civilization trying to civilize the barbarians" (which, as an European, I find hilarious, since America isn't actually all that culturally or societally civilized - especially in treating people as actual human beings - compared just about all European countries).
All this to say that the US invading Greenland would succeed, but directly cost the US far more than even Afghanistan and in a far shorter time, and they would almost certainly lose control of it in at most a decade or two, not least because they totally suck at getting the locals around to support them: trying to take on the most hardcore and resilient of the descendants of the Vikings in a land which in some ways is the polar equivalent of Afghanistan - huge, harsh and with massive uninhabited and hard to occupy areas - whilst the people there don't at all feel they have an inferior culture to America's (so they're hardly attracted by the prospect of becoming American citizen) seems to me like an impossible task.
The issue is the US can park a carrier at the northernmost part of Maine and be about 1,200 km from the largest city in Greenland. So still within range.
I also think Afghanistan is a poor comparison. The US never intended to conquer the nation. It wanted to setup a puppet government. It also didn't throw the full military force at it.
Truthfully we've never seen the US engage in a total war to conquer a nation.
If the US threw everything it had at Greenland they could take over most major cities within days. Likely before Denmark/the remainder of NATO could mount a response.
Now that being said effectively patrolling all of Greenland probably wouldn't be realistic. This would allow for counter insurgency, which is effective against the US typically. Although I doubt this government would give up based in that. More notably the vastness of Greenland will give Denmark and allies an opportunity to establish a foothold to reclaim Greenland.
The best thing Denmark and its allies could do right now is to put more defenses in Greenland. Make it impossible for a quick strike to topple it.
Ideally defensive posturing would discourage an attack entirely. If it doesn't it would save Denmark and it's allies more lives while costing the US more.
Either way if the US does invade it will be a lot of pointless bloodshed.
Also unrelated to the war bit, but Greenland is mostly populated by native peoples. Not the descendants of vikings (although there is certainly a percentage that are)
Ahem: Vietnam.
Also I think you're missing a massive point here: You can't "topple" Greenland by totally destroying or taking over Greenland because it's part of Denmark and the seat of the Danish Government isn't there, nor are their main military assets, and this is before you even consider their European allies.
If Greenland was a country relying only on itself, it would totally make sense that it could be taken by just taking its major cities, but it's not, it's an independent region of Denmark, a country which in turn is allied with almost all other European countries.
The US can invade and totally crush Greenland's big cities and that will still do very little to crush resistance because that's not were most of it will be coming from. This also brings us around the whole carrier group thing: the carrier group would be how the US would be trying to stop the feeding of resistance in Greenland from Europe, since that would be coming from the very opposite side of the island (and as "islands" go, Greenland is huge, with 25% of the area of the US, so that's a pretty insane task).
IMHO what the Greenlanders and more in general the Danish should be doing is not to try and stop the elements of warfare that the US does best - such as the actual initial invasion - but actually try and make that as costly as possible whilst at the same time setting up the conditions for a long term Resistance effort from the areas outside the cities to turn Greenland into a graveyard for American soldiers, something which is far more likely to end up with an outcome like Vietnam were the daily procession or american coffins turns an overwhelming majority of the population against the War and the end result was that America ultimatelly lost it.
Finally on the last point, fighting Greenland is fighting Denmark and there are way more people in the rest of Denmark than in Greenland. That said you are right that many (if not most) of the people living in Greenland who know the whole place including the hardest and most remote areas, are probably descendants of the Innuit rather than of the Vikings (both people colonized the place).
While more involved than Afghanistan the goal was still never to annex a nation. It was to prop-up another puppet government. Plus the US relied more on sending bodies to the meat grinder there. If we see the US engage at WW2 levels that's where things get much bleaker. Also worth mentioning we've never really seen the US engage in total war this close to home. The last notable war that happened this closely was the Civil War. Greenland is close enough that you can move soldiers from the continental US and have them engaged in combat within the same day. If not under 12 hrs. That was not the case in either Vietnam of Afghanistan
Not what I said. You can 100% occupy Greenland and remove it from the control of Denmark before they can respond. I'm well aware that Greenland is a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark.
But anyway the rest I'm in agreement.
Vietnam was definitelly "all out" but I grant your point that America wasn't trying to make it part of its territory, not least because since the days of Puerto Rico and taking territory from Mexico, America's Imperial strategy has always being one of installing puppet governments rather than direct control.
As for the rest, I disagree on it being possible for even America to 100% occupy Greenland unless the locals agree - remember it's 25% of the territory of America, most of it being far harsher. As long as support for a Resistance keeps on arriving from Denmark and Europe, an American occupying force would keep suffering casualties.
This is actually the basis of my point: America invading and occupying Greenland's cities is probably easy, its actually controlling a territory the size of 25% of America with very specific characteristics that totally favor the locals over American troops (hence my reference to Afghanistan, were the territory was equally large and almost equally harsh and Poshtun were in a very similar situation vs the American occupiers) is impossible unless to locals overwhelmingly side with America.
IMHO Greenland would quite possibly turn in the kind of quagmire war that happens at the stage of empires when they're starting to fall and engage in reckless military adventures to try and prop-up the elites, which end up overextending their military and draining most of their power.
The real problem with Greenland is it being worth taking back. It has a population of 50k. The biggest town has a population smaller than all but the most rural towns in most countries. The expenditure of untold quantities of money and unknown numbers of lives to re-take it is going to be hard to swallow for most of NATO.
Yes, that's a big question.
The thing is, as we've seen with Russia, letting a bully keep what they stole only leads to even more bullying and stealing later.
If, instead, you fuck the bully up, they don't do it again an go look for targets that don't resist as much.
Having a Resistance relentless blooding an occupying American presence in Greenland and destroying the infrastructure they would deploy to exploit Greenland's mineral resources (which are the whole point of trying to get Greenland) would definitelly fucking that bully up.
I ~~suspect~~ hope that Russia's invasion of Ukraine after letting it have Crimea some years ago has retaught most European leaders the lesson that giving in to an earlier aggression will just mean more and greater aggressions later.
You're absolutely right, but the US is not right next door to Greenland, and Greenland's allies include Canada. When the US attacked Afghanistan, it had tons of allies. All of NATO was on their side, they had air bases they could use everywhere. Afghanistan had no allies and no capabilities to do much about the US.
Greenland is different; if they attack by air, Canada would by NATO treaty be obliged to shoot them down. And Canada has plenty of defenses against ballistic missiles, because they were basically the US's northern flank during the cold war.
If the rest of NATO stays united, this would be a disaster for the US. Of course war within NATO would be terrible for Europe and Canada too. The only winners here would be Putin and Xi.
The US regularly moves military personnel and equipment to Europe straight from domestic bases via air. They can certainly reach Greenland as it is closer all while avoiding Canadian airspace.
Personally I believe if the US were to attack quickly it could successfully occupy Greenland in a matter of days. Leading to a very bloody drawn out war shorty thereafter.
If Denmark and it's allies began increasing defenses now it would likely discourage the US or at the very least prevent a successful invasion.
Either way if deterrence fails there will be a very bloody conflict.