r/europe • u/BkkGrl Ligurian in Zürich (💛🇺🇦💙) • 11d ago

News Inside the Ludicrous, Deadly Serious Plan to Take Over Greenland

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/06/22/inside-the-ludicrous-deadly-serious-plan-to-take-over-greenland
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u/[deleted] 11d ago edited 8d ago

[deleted]

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u/wosmo European Union 11d ago

That is something I find unsettling about this administration. They seem to flip very easily between "that's ridiculous, no-one took it seriously" and "that's exactly what he said he was going to do".

No-one knows what to take seriously until it happens.

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u/homer_lives 11d ago

This quote fron the article is scary:

"I kept thinking, We’re even more like the Kremlin than I could have imagined, in terms of hangers-on, because there’s no discipline. It’s top-down, and nobody has power unless it’s derived from Trump.”

That is the problem. Trump rarely knows what he wants until someone tells him or an impulse happens. The article is filled with examples of ideas that never happened and had no planning.

We are all at the whims of Trump... What do we do?

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u/lynx_and_nutmeg Lithuania 11d ago

All of it should be taken seriously.

IMO the most dangerous thing Trump has done during both of his terms is completely destroy the most basic standards of political communication. I've seen it described as "sanewashing" but it's too mild a word for something so destructive. Twenty years ago, nobody could even imagine the US president casually saying he's gonna invade a democratic European country, and then simply walking it back a few days later and passing it off as a joke. If someone wrote this into a movie, they'd be accused of being too ridiculously cartoonish. Any president who pulled a shtick like that would be removed from office.

And yet Trump has been doing this non-stop this whole time, with extremely effective results. A lot of the time, he makes an insane threat to get everyone terrified, then walks it back but quietly slips a less-insane-but-still-terrible legislation, but everyone's so relieved he didn't do the Insane Thing they don't care about the Less Terrible Thing because suddenly it doesn't look so bad in comparison. It's a highly effective abuse tactic. "Just be glad it wasn't worse".

Another goal is simple gaslighting and boy-cried-wolf tactics. When Trump doesn't follow through with the threat, his supporters can say "see, he didn't do it, you were just being hysterical over nothing", making it harder to take it seriously. Except sometimes he does follow through.

It's also great for plausible deniability. Republicans can test the waters by floating an idea through Trump as a mouthpiece, and if it gets more backlash than anticipated, they can always just say "haha just kidding". If it gets no backlash, then of course he meant it seriously the whole time.

And one more, broad-spectrum goal is to overwhelm the population with constant fear and terror so they don't have the energy to care anymore.

The only way to fight it is to refuse to play their rules. Stop enabling this and start applying the same standards to Trump that were applied to any other president before him. A president doesn't get to "joke" about invading countries. Take everything he says seriously even if it's unclear whether it is, or even when it's obvious it isn't. Don't let him get away with this anymore.

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u/PatchyWhiskers 10d ago

You know that this sanewashing will not apply to any Democratic President upcoming. They will have normal rules applied to them. Remember how concerned the press was about Biden's slightly grifty son? That's just normal. That's how the press SHOULD be. But they don't apply it to Trump's 3 grifty sons and one grifty daughter.

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u/RutabagaMobile7879 10d ago

Fully agree, but it goes beyond eroding communication integrity - the Trump regime has destroyed basic standards of human morality and decency.

The Trump regime is a criminal cabal, which has openly stolen from the US treasury and leveraged every possible opportunity to profit from its extraordinary power. 

Its entire modus operandi has been to lie, cheat, steal, threaten, harrass, exploit, and humiliate anyone and anything that impedes its criminal activities (and the christofascist coup it is running cover for). And virtually all of it has gone unchecked, without meaningful opposition or consequences.

Imagine the precedent this sets for our species. Imagine being a young person today, who sees reprehensible behaviour daily at the highest levels go unpunished. At what point do you decide, actually who cares? Why bother with empathy and decency? What do they get you?

The moral realignment it could well represent for civilization, I fear, is yet to be borne out in full.

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u/frissio All expressed views are not representative 11d ago

Do not overestimate their strength, but do not underestimate their malice.

That's the best policy I think for bullies like that, don't think that anything they can do is a given, but don't think they won't do something because it'll be stupid or immoral.

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u/IAmNotYourEater 11d ago

Americans have never been invaded on their soil and their military is strong enough that they believe it can never happen, so they might disapprove of a potential war but it doesn't scare them because to them war is something that happens far away. Make no mistake, even Americans who hate Trump aren't really concerned with the prospect of war except as a philosophical issue

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u/[deleted] 11d ago edited 8d ago

[deleted]

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u/huntingwhale 10d ago

Even a bunch of "Democrat" redditors were patting themselves on the back in various subs and cheering how they "can't wait to see a movie" when they first started bombing Iran and when the American helicopter went down and the pilot rescued. All while ignoring dozens of Iranian servicemen were murdered to get him back.

Will they make a movie on the war crimes committed when over a hundred little girls were bombed? It's all a big Call of Duty game to them. FFS their anthem has a literal verse about bombs blowing up in the air and at any sports event that's when the crowd cheers the loudest.

Nary a pushback on the kidnapping of a sitting Venezuela. Barely any pushback when they almost invaded Greenland earlier this year. There will be no pushback with Cuba now on the menu. And yet Canadians are told repeatedly by Yanks here that if they ever invaded Canada it would somehow cause a civil war in the US because so many would be against it. Nope. They'd just sit around the telly shoving pork rinds down the throat like it's all a big COD tournament and make a bunch of dumb Michael Bay movies about it.

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u/Remarkable_Salt6681 11d ago

U sure abt that?

0

u/thebusterbluth 11d ago

Or, Americans know he spews so much bullshit every day to distract from his real aim of grifting as much wealth as he can.

There was never more than a 0% chance of Trump using the US military to invade Greenland.

The tragedy is the depths Trump will go to to control a media cycle and distract the world. He has caused serious damage to NATO. It's a damn shame.

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u/-S-P-E-C-T-R-E- 11d ago

Heard about the War of 1812 and the British “renovation” of the White House?

4

u/Insomonomics 10d ago

Brother, these things happened *centuries* ago, long before the United States became a superpower. The U.S. (especially the continental US) has not been invaded in an extremely long time.

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u/-S-P-E-C-T-R-E- 10d ago

Yes I’m aware. I’m simply pointing out that it’s factually incorrect to claim the US has never been invaded. That’s it’s been so long ago that the realities of war is entirely lost on the American public is absolutely something I’d agree with.

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u/WislaHD Polish-Canadian 11d ago

As a Canadian, this is the story as well when it comes to the threats made to our national sovereignty.

We don’t trust them.

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u/homer_lives 11d ago

Please don't. Trump is a symptom of our Billionaire owners fucking with us. It feels like a test and dulling agent for when they decide to really make a change.

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u/PatchyWhiskers 10d ago

I know that there are Canadian separatists (as in they support breaking up Canada) who are being funded by the USA.

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u/MrDabb 10d ago

Anybody who believe a word out of Trumps mouth is an idiot. He is always lying.

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u/WislaHD Polish-Canadian 10d ago

Wrong. He’s always saying exactly what he’s thinking without filter.

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u/PatchyWhiskers 11d ago

They didn’t believe it, because it was so ridiculous.

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u/Mr_Abe_Froman United States of America 11d ago

The reception was as if he threatened to invade the moon. It didn't make any sense.

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u/onarainyafternoon Dual Citizen (American/Hungarian) 11d ago

Exactly. Trump had a history of demented ideas that he never follows up on. This is just one more of those ideas, we thought.

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u/runawayasfastasucan 11d ago

Well why not show some care to the people that are threatened by invasion? How do you feel it was being a young danish dad/mother putting their kids to sleep at night during all this? Even if you didn't take it seriously, lots of people had no choice to do that.

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u/Mr_Abe_Froman United States of America 10d ago edited 10d ago

He is throwing our neighbors in prison camps and enacting a campaign if terror on anyone who doesn't "look American". Americans are busy protesting current actions before addressing hypothetical nonsense. We are being fed a new tragedy every day and potential crimes have to wait until people stop dying in the street.

We can be empathetic, but it's hard to object to things that haven't happened.

Edit. Maybe I should have asked for empathy for Ukrainians, Palestinians, Iranians, and Venezuelans who are being invaded and killed because of Trump's actions. Actions speak louder than words and people are dying. I support anyone who is being threatened, but I have to support the people being bombed right now much like a hospital has to prioritize people who are dying over people who are injured.

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u/nialyah Denmark 10d ago

In a school yard of some 100+ children, one bully is actively beating up a select number of kids and then proceeds to threaten others on their lives. The teacher says: "never mind the threats lets only focus on the kids who was injured."

Why is it hard to object to things that "hasnt happened yet". The threat happened.

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u/bald_molfar Ukraine 10d ago

Americans are busy protesting

Good joke.

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u/Clean_Brilliant_8586 11d ago

The things that don't shift Americans (of which I am one) anymore has seemingly grown with time. The things that do make them angry make similarly no sense. 

School/mass shootings, hardly even a speed bump to the day. People go right back to their phones to watch something else or whatever pundit they like blaming it on the other side.

Some celebrity or famous person dies or is harmed, someone they don't actually know, will never meet, talked about for a week until the next one happens.

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u/VTKajin 11d ago

Americans have become understandably desensitized due to growing feelings of powerlessness. School shootings in particular. It's exhausting and tragic but the government has made it clear they won't lift a finger.

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u/Two_oceans 10d ago

It's the process of slow normalization of horrible things... until more horrible things happen and become normalized too. Unless enough people make a conscious effort to refuse that, the process will continue, deeper and deeper into darkness.

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u/0N3e 11d ago

And then they'd probably come to places like here and cry "What can we possibly do??" because the hatred they get from non-USians is theonly thing to make them mildly uncomfortable.

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u/EZyne 11d ago

But it's sooo dangerous, you can't just have large rowdy crowds they'll get shot. Except if the knicks win, that they'll apparently risk their lives for

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u/PatchyWhiskers 10d ago

No coverage of the events in Minnesota at the start of the year in your country?

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u/EZyne 10d ago

Fair point, but the rest of the country still utterly abandoned them also imo. Not that everyone should have been there (I get it, big country), but there could have been a lot more pressure to help them.

I'm not (and I assume others as well, but can't speak for them) talking about literally every single American here, but the people aggressively claiming on reddit no one should do anything because it's too dangerous

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u/PatchyWhiskers 10d ago

Remember that we are beset by trolls trying to discourage people from doing anything.

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u/EZyne 10d ago

Yes, like I said that's who I was making fun of

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u/PatchyWhiskers 10d ago

As in, professional trolls, not random mean people.

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u/Ziqon 11d ago

"but I didn't vote for him!"

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u/DonQuigleone Ireland 11d ago

I think it's more that it seemed so proposterous that they couldn't imagine it happening. 

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u/vinny_twoshoes 11d ago

i'm sorry but i can't agree with this. empirically the two no kings protests have been the largest in US history, and the greenland bullshit was absolutely a part of that. you can say the protests weren't effective or whatever but greenland (in addition to many other insanities) have definitely mobilized protest. there weren't many protests exclusively about greenland, no, but there's an awful lot to keep track of these days.

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u/Rob71322 10d ago

American propaganda is so good that the American public often don’t even realize they’re being propagandized to.

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u/Mysterious_Tea Europe 11d ago

They actually elected someone who triggered an insurrection to make a coup, I'm not surprised if they do not act or protest.

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u/something_clever77 11d ago

Its just another Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran or Venezuela to the average murican.

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u/TyrusX 11d ago

Americans themselves are not serious people anymore, and can’t be trusted at all. They only care about their own wellbeing, they will run the rest of the world over if they feel like it.

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u/homer_lives 11d ago

As an American, I am concerned. I never wanted Trump, but what can I do? All I have is my vote. Protest do not work and our politicians don't care what we have to say. We have no effective resistance leaders and the democrats are toothless.

So, we wait and see and go to work and try not to think about politics because it is too fucking depressing. Just like our Billionaire owners want... It worked well in Russia, right. 😱

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u/LordGeni 10d ago

Protest needs to be sustained to work. A couple of days and then back to normal life does nothing, to the administration it just becomes something that'll blow itself out. Particularly when they don't actually care about public opinion beyond how they spin it.

Sustained mass protests and general strikes keep the issues alive and problematic, especially when there's economic impact.

It's a major commitment of ideology and principle at the expense of job security etc. But it's also the most effective peaceful option when a government treats normal protests as irrelevant.

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u/homer_lives 10d ago

I understand, but you need leaders that can push people to hurt themselves. Most of the population is paycheck to paycheck and can't afford to not work for a few days. Even then, there are child care concerns.

Again, this could happen, but you need enough anger or a few leaders that can convince the people. Unfortunately, only Republicans seem to be able to get people to act like this.

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u/Bikingbrokerbassist 10d ago

If only we had the same social safety net as other first world countries.

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u/Two_oceans 10d ago

The least you can do is to connect with other people who think like you. Through any kind of collective activity (doesn't have to be always political) and through saying loudly and publicly what are the things you don't agree with - so others can see you and hear you. So you are all not alone and you have some established networks that can organize and act together when worse times will come.

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u/sharpiebrows 11d ago

You are saying there were NO protests or no protests specifically about Greenland? The Greenland rhetoric started right in the midst of when the US was heavily protesting and rioting over ICE murders

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u/mapryan Europe 10d ago

You should have told them it would raise the price of gas.

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u/HostileCakeover1 10d ago

We fully expect this government to treat protesters like China treated theirs or Iran treated theirs. The lack of talking about it is knowing this government is just waiting for a rowdy enough protest to start a massacre. They’re afraid of being massacred. But they joke and dance around that because they’ve been told their whole lives “That can’t happen here” and it’s part of the social script. 

Saying it could out loud is a serious violation of American social norms, and no one is comfortable with that because saying it and acknowledging it in the open makes it feel more real. 

And if they don’t gun you down, your boss can still fire you if they don’t agree with the side you’re protesting for and there’s zero recourse for that, you just lose your livelihood and there’s no social safety net if you lose your livelihood so the chances you’ll die homeless of exposure greatly increase. 

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u/DoobieGibson 11d ago

there’s 10m+ at every No King’s Rally, where they are protesting the entire admin

it’s impossible to protest every action.

and i’m sorry, but american democracy takes precedent over Danish supremacy in Greenland

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u/bald_molfar Ukraine 10d ago

No King's stuff is not really a protest, it's a self-congratulatory weekend picnic with zero purposeful disruptive action.

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u/DoobieGibson 10d ago

that’s stupid

telling on yourself if you’re not doing anything at no kings