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I first met Per Stig Møller last April. I had gone to Denmark to look into US-Danish relations. This is not usually an explosive subject. But there were new and bizarre threats from Washington against Denmark—of which Greenland is an autonomous territory.
While in Copenhagen and its environs, I met with many leading Danes in the fields of foreign policy and defense. Møller was foreign minister from 2001 to 2010. (He is also a literary scholar, but that’s another story.)
I published a piece titled “America Rattles Denmark: A report from an allied capital in a strange time.”
Though I was there to ask questions of Per Stig Møller, among others, he had a question for me: “Do you think Trump will take Greenland by force?” I replied, “I would like to say, ‘No, of course not. We’re a civilized country.’ But I’m not sure.”
Now it is eight months later, and the administration has renewed its threats against Denmark—intensified them, even. If President Trump does not follow through, will he look “weak,” in his own eyes?
I have now talked with Mr. Møller again, in a podcast. His opening line to me is, “Nice to see you, even if you’re American.”
The new hostility from the U.S. government has bewildered Danes such as Møller. He was born in 1942. He and his peers grew up with a great appreciation, and a great admiration, of the United States. From Truman to Bush 43, says Møller, all the presidents were Atlanticists.
But America is now different, he says. Barely recognizable. We seem to have entered a “post-truth” era, accompanied by “might makes right” and “spheres of influence.” The law of the jungle.
The Trump administration says that the US must take Greenland for the sake of security. This is bunk, as Møller explains. He would prefer honesty: Just say that you have a land-grabbing imperial ambition!
If America did, in fact, invade Greenland, what would that look like? We already have a base there. And if we took military action, would Denmark invoke Article 5 of the NATO Treaty, which says, in effect, that an attack on one is an attack on all? How would that work?
“China and Russia must be sitting there laughing,” says Møller. “I’m sure they can’t believe their luck. It used to be ‘The West against the rest.’ Now it is ‘The West against the West.’”
A dark question: Is there some agreement between Trump and Vladimir Putin, along the lines of “You take your ‘near abroad,’ I’ll take mine”? Many people suspect so, including wise heads such as Per Stig Møller.
Russia is now menacing Denmark and other Scandinavian nations with drones. Europe, broadly, is under threat (and in the case of Ukraine, under daily assault). Be careful of world war, says Møller. Humanity has a record of “sleepwalking” into them.
In our podcast, we talk about the meaning of NATO and the future of NATO. We talk about what seems to be a “hinge moment” in modern history. Our subjects are deadly serious—yet Mr. Møller’s warmth and humor shine through.
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