Trump Eyes a New Real-Estate Purchase: Greenland | Hacker News Reader

Trump Eyes a New Real-Estate Purchase: Greenland

wsj.com

20 pointsalokrai14 comments

Previous US attempts to buy Greenland:

- President Harry Truman developed a geopolitical interest in Greenland and in 1946 offered to buy Greenland from Denmark for $100 million. But Denmark refused to sell.

- The State Department launched an inquiry into buying Greenland and Iceland in 1868. Here's a link to the published report - https://books.google.com/books?id=U9lIAAAAMAAJ&pg=PP13#v=one...

There was an interesting thread on Reddit about the 1868 inquiry:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/cd3jul/why_d...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenlandic_independence#Moves...:

”As part of the self-rule law of 2009 (section §21), Greenland can declare full independence if they wish to pursue it, but it would have to be approved by a referendum among the Greenlandic people. A poll in 2016 showed that there was a clear majority (64%) for full independence among the Greenlandic people, but a poll in 2017 showed that there was a clear opposition (78%) if it meant a fall in living standards.”

⇒ Why try to buy it? Offer them to become a US state and invest there if they vote to become independent, and see whether they bite.

A new state comes with new federal representatives and senators. With control of congress balancing on a knife's edge, that makes statehood a huge political football. One side or another will see an advantage in it, and the other side will oppose it in force ... regardless of any other potential benefits.

If you're Greenland, and you want to become independent in something like an Iceland or Singapore sense, you wouldn't want to become part of the US state system. You would want to forge a relationship with the US (and plausibly Canada simultaneously) that gives you maximum advantages with minimum downside (the downside of being part of the US state system is several fold right now, including the broken US healthcare system). Greenland would draw up its own terms, use the USD reserve currency, join USMCA (new NAFTA), and proceed to ride the dollar and US economic proximity to being the Singapore (or previously Hong Kong) of the greater US economic region. It could be a fascinating go-between entity with North America and Europe.

See also: HN discussion on gwern's "Why Didn’t Denmark Sell Greenland?" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20366039

Sure for 100 billion-1 trillian dollars. It's at least worth as much as a large startup. They should also drive up the price by letting other countries like China and Russia bid on it.

It probably also has a bunch of resources on it, that will be accessible once it melts. They should rename it Trumpland if the purchase happens.

For a price that low, Google should buy it. Finally a use for that cash mountain.

Googlestan has a nice ring to it. Just buys its own country off the coast and declares independence.

I set my Facebook marketplace location as Nuuk Godthab to stop it alerting me about junk that I didn't want.

That'll be some nice beachfront property in 100 years at the rate we are emitting CO2.

I think it’s actually a really good idea. Strategically at least, it’s possible that it could be done, but I think it would first need the approval of everyone living there.

I bet the reason Trump wants Greenland is for more claims to Arctic oil

Is this Trump's Sudetenland?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com