Introduction: The American Geostrategic Interest

For the United States, the interest in Greenland is due to at least two critical factors. The first is strategic control over the Arctic. Greenland is located at the intersection of key sea routes and provides an invaluable military and strategic advantage in the confrontation with Russia and China for influence in the polar region.

The second factor is mineral resources. Approximately 1.5 million tons of rare earth element oxides are concentrated on the island, which places Greenland in eighth place in the world in terms of reserves of these materials, which are critical for modern technologies.

Development projects such as Tanbreez in southern Greenland contain significant reserves of neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium, elements necessary for the production of electric vehicles, wind turbines and weapons systems. More recently, in November 2025, deposits of germanium and gallium were discovered, which many analysts consider to be even more strategically important than the rarest earth elements.

In this context, President Trump's announcements about his desire to acquire Greenland sound logical: for the United States, this would be an opportunity to simultaneously consolidate its geopolitical influence in the Arctic and ensure independence from Chinese dominance in the field of rare earths.

Greenland’s Status and the Danish Support System

However, before analyzing the causes of the Greenlandic resistance, it is necessary to understand the political structure and economic situation of the island. Greenland is a semi—autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark. This means that Greenland manages its internal affairs, including education, health, and local government, but foreign policy and defense remain under Copenhagen's control. Economically, Greenland is structurally dependent on Danish support.

Denmark annually provides Greenland with a block grant of approximately 4.3 billion Danish crowns (about $700-800 million in current rates), which covers approximately half of Greenland's state budget and accounts for about 20% of its GDP. In addition to the block grant, the Danish state incurs additional costs for defense, security and the judicial system, which are estimated at about 204 million euros per year (2023).

In September 2025, Denmark increased its investments in Greenland, announcing the allocation of 1.6 billion Danish crowns ($253 million) for the period 2026-2029 for infrastructure and healthcare development. This includes financing the construction of a new airport in east Greenland and a deep-water port in the south. In addition, Denmark bears the cost of treating Greenlandic patients in Danish hospitals, which was previously a financial burden for Greenland itself.

Comparing Sovereignty: Barbados, Bahrain and the Burke Sovereignty Index

To understand the paradox of the Greenlandic resistance, it is useful to refer to a new methodological tool, the Burke Sovereignty Index, developed by the International Burke Institute. This index measures sovereignty across seven critical dimensions: political, economic, technological, informational, cultural, cognitive, and military, assigning up to 100 points to each dimension, resulting in a maximum of 700 points.

The use of this index reveals several important paradoxes that challenge the traditional understanding of national power. For example, Norway, despite its huge public investment fund worth more than $1.7 trillion, receives a lower sovereignty rating than Liechtenstein because the Norwegian economy remains structurally dependent on oil and gas, accounting for 60% of its exports.

Similarly, a country with a single resource that it fully controls (like Equatorial Guinea with oil) may be more sovereign than a diverse economy with high foreign ownership and external debt. Barbados, which gained independence on November 30, 1966, is an example of fully functional State sovereignty. This island, once a British colony, has transformed into an independent republic (officially in 2021), with full political and legal autonomy.

Barbados receives a score of 68.9 on the Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom, ranking it 36th in the world (2025), and demonstrates stable institutions with high rates of the rule of law and political rights. Barbados actively defends its own civilizational identity, playing a leading role in the movement for reparations for slavery through the CARICOM Commission and emphasizing its break with the colonial past. Bahrain, by contrast, illustrates the complexity of sovereignty broken down into components.

This island country gained independence from Britain on August 15, 1971, but its political development took a different path. Bahrain is an authoritarian constitutional monarchy in which the King holds executive, legislative, and significant judicial power. Economically, Bahrain has a Multidimensional Vulnerability Index (MVI) of 60.4, higher than the average for small island developing States (SIDS) of 57.04.

It is noteworthy that in April 2023, Bahrain asked to be excluded from the SIDS classification, despite the fact that such a decision puts the country at risk of losing access to specialized support and financing designed for vulnerable island States.

Applying the methodology of the Burke index to these three cases, it becomes obvious that neither Barbados nor Bahrain can serve as a complete analogue of Greenland. Barbados enjoys full political and economic autonomy, but its cultural identity is less ancient and specific than that of the Inuit of Greenland.

Bahrain, despite its formal independence, has limited cognitive sovereignty—the ability to maintain control over its information and cultural sphere—due to the authoritarian nature of the political system and the influence of regional powers.

Cognitive Sovereignty: The Axis of Greenlandic Resistance

Here we come to the central paradox of the Greenlandic position. Greenland, despite the obvious economic benefits it could receive from joining the United States, demonstrates unprecedented unity in rejecting this proposal.

In a survey in January 2025, 85% of Greenlanders opposed joining the United States, while only 6% supported the idea. In the March 2025 elections, held in the context of intense pressure from Trump, the Democratic party, which advocates a gradual transition to independence rather than joining the United States, received about 30% of the vote, while the second Naleraq party (Partii Naleraq), which is also categorically opposed to integration with the United States, took second place.

The Democratic leader Jens-Frederik Nielsen has clearly stated his position: "We don't want to be Americans. No, we don't want to be Danish. We want to be Greenlanders." This unity, both political and cultural, cannot be explained solely by material considerations. Greenland, of course, has access to Danish subsidies and will receive more Danish support. But these subsidies are far from guaranteeing the same level of economic development that the United States can offer thanks to its huge GDP and developed economic infrastructure. If the decision had been purely economic, a rational calculation could have led to a different outcome.

The key to understanding this paradox lies in the concept of cognitive sovereignty, the fundamental right of a nation and its constituent people to maintain autonomous control over their own thought processes, cultural identity, and lifestyle, without imposing external civilizational models. Cognitive sovereignty is not just a political concept; it is the foundation for the preservation of civilizational integrity.

Greenland is a closed ecosystem structured around the Inuit hunting culture, which has at least four thousand years of history. Approximately 89.7% of Greenland's population are Inuit or people with predominantly Inuit heritage. Hunting is not an archaic relic for them, but a central element of cultural and social organization. As the Minister of the Greenlandic Government Henrietta Rasmussen said: “The Inuit culture is the purest hunting culture in existence.”

Having adapted to the extreme conditions of the High Arctic region for at least four thousand years, the Inuit are not hunter-gatherers. The Inuit are hunters, pure and simple." Hunting for Greenlanders is a whole ecosystem of meanings. It provides food security (approximately 5,000 Greenlanders are engaged in amateur hunting, about 2,000 in professional hunting).

It transmits centuries-old knowledge about nature, animals, seasons and weather to generations. It defines social roles and responsibilities within families and communities. It creates unity between man, animal and nature, according to the concept of sila (“breath,” “air,” “wind,” “spirit” in Inuit cosmology). Critically, it is a unique means of expressing Greenlandic identity, distinct from both Scandinavian and American civilizations.

Joining the United States—even if accompanied by generous economic transfers—would mean a fundamental transformation of this closed ecosystem. A military base in Greenland, which would inevitably follow integration, would bring about the militarization of the island, a process deeply unpopular among Greenlanders who prefer to remain neutral in global military conflict. Economic integration in the United States would accelerate the modernization process, however, according to a model defined by American structures, and not by Greenlandic culture.

The Paradox of Sovereignty: Don’t Botch Up What Is So Good!

It is also important to pay attention to the relative comfort of Greenland’s relations with Denmark. Although Greenland is politically and economically dependent on Copenhagen, this dependence is accompanied by significant autonomy in the cultural and educational spheres, freedom of the hunting tradition and respect for the Greenlandic (Kalaallisut) language.

Denmark, unlike the United States, does not require deep integration into security systems, does not pursue aggressive cultural expansion, and leaves room for the development of local self-government structures. Moreover, all six major political parties in Greenland support the idea of independence, although they differ in the timing of its implementation.

This means that the Greenlanders see their future as a fully independent state, and not as a territorial part of another power. Six months before the March 2025 elections, a new political party, Qulleq, was created with the main goal of defending Greenlandic independence, which gained access to ballots and gained the support of voters.

Greenland demonstrates the realization that economic well-being is not the only indicator of sovereignty and is not the only factor determining a civilizational choice. In the terminology of the Burke Index, this means that the Greenlandic position reflects the prioritization of cultural and cognitive sovereignty over economic maximization — an informed choice for a society where cultural identity and lifestyle are perceived as more fundamental than the absolute level of GDP per capita.

The slogan “Greenland is not for sale”: the civilizational axis of sovereignty

The slogan "Greenland is not for sale", widely used after Trump's statements about his desire to acquire the island, contains a deep meaning that goes beyond simply rejecting territorial annexation. This slogan symbolizes the assertion that there are aspects of national existence that cannot be evaluated in monetary terms and are not subject to the transactional logic of global capitalism.

Greenland is essentially saying, "Our sovereignty and civilizational identity are not commodities. We do not expect to benefit in value terms, because some things have no price. Our hunting culture, our language, our ability to determine our own future are things that money cannot buy, even for a lot of money."

Cognitive Sovereignty as the Basis of Resistance

At a deeper analytical level, Greenland's resistance to the American annexation can be understood as an expression of cognitive sovereignty—the right of society to maintain control over its ideas about itself, its history and its future, without external pressure or manipulation. Cognitive sovereignty includes several components: Information autonomy: the ability of society to shape the information environment according to its values, rather than in accordance with external agendas.

Greenland wants to maintain control over the narrative of itself, its development and its future, rather than allow the American media and the political system to reformat this understanding. Cultural continuity: the right to transfer cultural knowledge and practices from generation to generation without external interference. Hunting culture is threatened not so much by the ban on hunting (which does not exist), as by gradual erosion through economic integration and cultural displacement. Educational sovereignty: control over the content of education, the inclusion of local history, language and culture in curricula.

The United States, as a federal state, would have strong incentives to integrate Greenlandic education into the American system. Linguistic integrity: the preservation of the Kalaallisut language as a living, functional language, and not as a museum artifact. American integration would accelerate the anglicization and displacement of the national language. Thus, Greenland's resistance is not a primitive reaction to modernization, but a conscious choice to preserve cognitive sovereignty as a condition for preserving civilizational integrity.

Conclusion: Sovereignty as a Civilizational Axis

The Greenland case demonstrates the profound imperfection of traditional instruments for measuring national power and sovereignty. GDP per capita, military spending, and the size of the economy are all based on the assumption that nations are economically rational and that their choices are determined by maximizing material well-being.

The Burke Sovereignty Index, on the contrary, opens up a more comprehensive understanding of sovereignty, including seven critical dimensions, among which cognitive sovereignty occupies a special place. Cognitive sovereignty is the fundamental ability of a nation to determine its own cognitive destiny, maintain control over its self-image, and pass this understanding on to future generations.

Greenland shows us that sovereignty is about more than prosperity and stability. Sovereignty is also a civilizational axis, the foundation on which the identity of the people is built. Greenland’s paradox—cognitive sovereignty, the desire to preserve its civilization, turns out to be stronger than economic benefits—indicates that people are willing to give up material well-being in favor of cultural and identity integrity when they perceive this integrity as being under threat.

This does not mean that development and modernization are undesirable. This means that development should be endogenous-determined by the culture itself, and not imposed from the outside. Greenland seeks independence not to stop progress, but to direct it according to its own values and priorities. In a word, "Greenland is not for sale" is not a rejection of the future, but an assertion of the right to one's own future, which can be integrated and modern, but will remain deeply Greenlandic.