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Comment by threemux | Hacker News Reader

I think it even makes sense if it were pursued in a different way. Greenland is looking for full independence but can't really hack it financially without aid. I think the COFA (Compact of Free Association) model that we have with Palau and Marshall Islands would work well.

We get expanded military rights and potentially some mineral/drilling rights, while Greenland gets protection, lots of money, access to USPS domestic rates, and probably increased tourism in addition to the independence they desire. Their citizens could also live and work in the US indefinitely.

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I think the Danish intelligence services should apply this model to Hawaii and Guam. It would make a lot of sense. Hawaii and Guam could get better health care on average while being semi independent. The EU could protect both with nuclear weapons.

Native Hawaiians would escape the continued mistreatment:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/article/hawaii-no...

I think Radio Free Denmark should launch a soft power campaign.

Lol I realize this is tongue in cheek but Denmark has no ability to administer or protect anything that far away. Nor are those places seeking independence.

But hey, maybe I'm wrong and the Danes will successfully integrate a large group of people that don't share their values. They've already done that, right?

> I realize this is tongue in cheek

That's your mistake.

> Lol I realize this is tongue in cheek but Denmark has no ability to administer or protect anything that far away

Does the US? They don't seem to have a great track record of that

I mean do you even remember Pearl Harbor?

/S :^)

> Their citizens could also live and work in the US indefinitely.

Not sure why Greenlanders would care at all.

They can already do the same in Denmark, which is a country with far better standards of living.

Oh gimme a break. That's one of the largest benefits to COFA and is heavily used by the Marshallese. Greenland on its own is not a first world country - there simply isn't enough population/work and it's a hard existence as detailed in TFA.

You may not want to come here and that's fine, but it's a huge draw and will continue to be. Administrations are fleeting, but the allure of opportunity remains. You're posting on a forum that is somewhat of a monument to exactly that.

EDIT: some of this made a bit more sense prior to your hasty edit

Florida on its own is also not a first world country. This goes for many places and it isn't the flex you make it out to be, the fact that Greenland is part of Denmark which in turn in part of the EU and which the USA through NATO is bound by treaty to defend rather than that threaten to invade is a detail that may have escaped your attention but it matters rather a lot to the rest of the 'first world'.

Florida on its own would absolutely be a first world country with a GDP comparable to Spain or South Korea. Pick a less prosperous state haha it has multiple cities with a greater population than the entire island of Greenland

There is a lot more to being a first world country than you make it out to be. Florida only works because it is part of the USA, if it were not it would not manage.

Denmark is one of the countries with the highest standards of living by any metric possible, consistently ranking among the best countries to live in the world.

The US is not.

Sure, there's allure in going to US if you're from a poor country, or if you have an ambition your country cannot satisfy (some scientists and entrepreneurs will find America only in America, that's true).

Greenlanders are neither of those two categories.

If they don't care moving to Denmark or rest of Europe you can be sure they don't care coming to US either.

The primary threat to Greenland is USA and USA is extremely unreliable country. USA can't sell protection. It may extort or invade or commit some kind of atrocity ... but is not capable of selling protection.

You are talking about getting a colony and stealing their resources.

Greenland needs protection from whom? The only country threatening it is the US.

The Arctic will be the battleground and trade route of the future as it warms. Being associated with the US is preferable to the other options (Russia, China most likely). There won't be an option of the status quo.

Greenland, as part of Denmark, is part of and protected by NATO. As its in the Atlantic it benefits fully from that treaty.

It is also protected by Denmark's membership in the EU and the CSDP by virtue of the EU's collective self defense clause (which protects all of all member states territory, not just the parts in europe).

The status quo - apart from the part where the US is threatening to violate its NATO treaty obligations and invade something it is obligated to protect from invasion - is just fine.

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