Ahmed Kamel – Egypt Daily News
Senior U.S. officials are scrambling to soften the tone of President Donald Trump’s renewed push to acquire Greenland, as concerns mount at home and abroad that Washington’s rhetoric is drifting toward open territorial expansion. In closed-door briefings with lawmakers, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has sought to draw a clear line between purchase and force, insisting that the United States has no plans to invade the Arctic island but is instead pursuing its acquisition from Denmark through pressure and negotiation.
According to U.S. media reports, Rubio told members of Congress that the increasingly aggressive language emanating from the White House is intended to persuade Copenhagen to sell Greenland, not to prepare the ground for military action. He argued that the administration’s hardline posture should be understood as leverage rather than a signal of imminent force.
The reassurances come at a sensitive moment, following the recent U.S. military intervention in Venezuela, which has heightened international anxiety about Washington’s willingness to use power to reshape borders and governments. Adding fuel to the controversy, Katie Miller, the wife of Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, posted an image on the social media platform X showing Greenland colored like the American flag, accompanied by the caption “Coming soon.” The image quickly circulated online, provoking sharp reactions in Denmark and Greenland.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Trump has asked his aides to submit an updated plan for acquiring Greenland, reviving an idea he first floated during his initial term in office. At the time, the proposal was widely dismissed as unrealistic, but the administration now appears determined to revisit it as part of a broader foreign policy agenda centered on strategic dominance.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that discussions are ongoing. “The president and his team are considering a range of options to achieve this important foreign policy objective,” she said, adding pointedly that “the use of the U.S. military is always an option available to the commander in chief.” The remark, intended perhaps as a show of resolve, instead deepened concerns that force has not been fully taken off the table.
Not all senior Republicans are comfortable with that ambiguity. House Speaker Mike Johnson publicly rejected the idea of any U.S. military action to seize Greenland, distancing Congress from the White House’s more provocative statements. “No, I don’t think that would be appropriate,” Johnson told reporters on Tuesday, while acknowledging that “many people consider Greenland a strategic location for the United States.”
Denmark, meanwhile, has responded with growing unease. Danish Ambassador to Washington Jesper Møller Sørensen said Copenhagen expects full respect for the kingdom’s territorial integrity. Greenland’s prime minister went further, describing the circulating imagery and rhetoric as disrespectful and dismissive of the island’s people and political institutions.
Trump has repeatedly argued that Greenland should become part of the United States, citing its strategic importance for U.S. national security and NATO operations in the Arctic, a region of intensifying competition with Russia and China. In the same vein, he has previously referred to Canada as the potential “51st state,” comments that allies have largely brushed off but which now appear part of a broader pattern.
Rubio’s attempt to reframe the Greenland initiative as a commercial transaction rather than an act of coercion reflects an awareness of the political and diplomatic costs of unchecked rhetoric. Yet critics argue that the distinction between “buying” and “taking” becomes blurred when economic pressure, public threats, and references to military options are deployed simultaneously.
As Washington presses forward, the Greenland question is increasingly seen not as an isolated episode, but as another test of how far the Trump administration is willing to push traditional norms of sovereignty in pursuit of strategic advantage. Whether framed as a purchase or something more forceful, the message to allies is already resonating and unsettling in capitals far beyond the Arctic.
