Donald Trump dispatched his son Don Jr. on a weird real-estate reconnaissance mission Tuesday. The president-elect, who made his identify as a developer of “properties” in Manhattan and Atlantic Metropolis earlier than enterprise setbacks and controversies steered him towards a steadier profession as a reality-TV billionaire, is obsessive about making Greenland part of the US—both by buy or, as Trump recommended in a televised press convention on the identical day as his son’s Arctic journey, by pressure. So Trump Jr. was dispatched, like some 18th-century prince, to take a look at the world’s largest non-continental island on behalf of the king.

The journey got here amid rising tensions over Trump’s obsession with what CNN refers to as “imperialistic land grabs,” an obsession that in current months has led him to invest about including Greenland, the Panama Canal, and Canada to the US. Trump’s refusal to rule out using pressure introduced fast rebukes from French and German leaders, with French Overseas Minister Jean-Noël Barrot going as far as to say, “There isn’t a query of the European Union letting different nations on this planet, whoever they might be, assault its sovereign borders.” Barrot advised French media that he didn’t imagine the US would truly seize Greenland, however he warned that “we’ve got entered an period that’s seeing the return of the regulation of the strongest.”

And a brand new period of imperial tourism, with an eye fixed towards forging empires, seems to have opened.

Trump Jr.’s journey to Greenland was a fast one. The presidential progeny performed sightseer for a couple of hours in Nuuk, the snowy capital metropolis of what stays an autonomous territory of Denmark.

The excessive level of the go to got here when the president-elect known as in to speak together with his child. The few locals who have been within the neighborhood of Trump Jr. when the decision got here have been assured by Trump Sr., with a basic imperial flourish, that “we’re going to deal with you nicely.” Across the similar time, the person who on January 20 will turn into the chief of a world superpower that was based in revolt towards the colonial overreach of King George III, posted a social media recap of the journey and its mission, saying, “Don Jr. and my Reps touchdown in Greenland. The reception has been nice. They, and the Free World, want security, safety, power, and PEACE! It is a deal that should occur. MAGA. MAKE GREENLAND GREAT AGAIN!”

What was notable in regards to the go to—which prolonged from a dialog that Trump Sr. has been having with himself since his first time period within the White Home—is that Trump Jr. and his parka-clad posse didn’t truly meet with the elected leaders of Greenland’s parliament.

Why? As a result of these leaders have no real interest in being purchased and offered by oligarchs or empire builders.

“Greenland is ours. We’re not on the market and can by no means be on the market,” says Múte Egede, the elected prime minister of the island, whose democratic socialist Inuit Ataqatigiit celebration gained probably the most votes within the final normal election. Erik Jensen, the chief of the second-largest celebration, the social democratic Siumut motion, mentioned. “I can affirm that I’ve not deliberate to fulfill with him.”

Echoing the prime minister, Jensen advised Greenland’s Sermitsiaq newspaper: “I say it once more that Greenland will not be on the market and by no means can be.”

Each Inuit Ataqatigiit and Siumut favor independence for the island, which is now a self-governing territory of the Kingdom of Denmark. Eighty p.c of the votes in Greenland’s 2021 election have been solid for pro-independence events. And Egede now says, “The historical past and present situations have proven that our cooperation with the Kingdom of Denmark has not succeeded in creating full equality, It’s now time for our nation to take the following step.”

The purpose, explains the prime minister, is to “take away the shackles of colonialism.”

And nothing says “shackles of colonialism” fairly so loudly because the prospect {that a} self-governing island of 57,000 individuals is likely to be bought on the open market or, as was recommended in Tuesday’s press convention, taken below duress. When a reporter requested Trump whether or not he would rule out utilizing “army or financial coercion” to seize Greenland and pursue one other territorial ambition—reclaiming the Panama Canal—the president-elect replied, “No, I can’t guarantee you on both of these two, however I can say this: We’d like them for financial safety.” Later within the press convention, Trump speculated about imposing excessive tariffs on Denmark with the intention to pressure the longtime US ally to barter off Greenland—it doesn’t matter what the independence-minded individuals on the island need.

Why is Trump so decided to make Greenland—a left-leaning Arctic land with its personal parliament, a social-welfare state and an Inuit inhabitants that refers back to the place as Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenlanders’ Land)—part of the US?

As in all issues imperial, it has nothing to do with the individuals of the place that Trump has all of a sudden reimagined as a “parcel” that’s up for grabs. It’s no secret that Greenland is situated in a strategically important area of the world for the US and neighboring Canada, in addition to Russia, China, and a number of different international locations. And that significance is rising, in accordance with a Harvard Worldwide Overview evaluation from final yr, as “the consequences of worldwide warming have thawed Arctic glaciers, thereby rising the island’s liveable floor space and unlocking new pure assets akin to oil and minerals.”

“Whereas Greenland stays intently linked to Scandinavia as an autonomous area of Denmark,” notes the Harvard evaluation, “international powers akin to the US, China, and Russia are racing to increase army and financial affect within the area because it turns into extra liveable.”

There’s only one catch: For the individuals of Greenland, the island is already fairly liveable. They stay there, as did their ancestors earlier than them. They need to proceed residing there. And they aren’t smitten by Donald Trump’s imperial ambitions. “I feel some individuals discover it fairly disrespectful,” Aaja Chemnitz, a Greenlandic member of the Danish parliament, says of the president-elect’s current rhetoric. “And the best way it has been finished, and simply the truth that you’re saying which you could purchase one other nation.”

Certainly, if election outcomes are any indication, the individuals of Greenland would very a lot want to go their very own manner. “Work has already begun on creating the framework for Greenland as an impartial state,” says Prime Minister Egede, who has recommended {that a} referendum on independence may very well be held this yr—as part of Greenland’s effort to “take away the shackles of colonialism.”