At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on January 21, 2026, President Donald Trump delivered a speech that sent shockwaves through the corridors of global power. The annual gathering, usually a showcase for international cooperation and economic optimism, was instead dominated by Trump’s renewed—and controversial—push for the United States to acquire Greenland from Denmark. The president’s remarks, both defiant and unyielding, left world leaders, diplomats, and business executives alike scrambling to make sense of what many saw as a bold, if bewildering, gambit.
Trump wasted no time addressing the elephant in the room. “We probably won’t get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force, where we would be, frankly, unstoppable. But I won’t do that,” he declared, according to ABC News. He doubled down on that message, stating, “I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force.” The president’s assurance that military action was off the table was, as Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen later noted, “positive”—but it did little to allay concerns about the underlying ambition. “What was quite clear after this speech is that the president’s ambition is intact,” Rasmussen told reporters in Copenhagen.
Trump’s insistence on “immediate negotiations” with Denmark over Greenland was clear. He argued that no other country could defend the vast, icy expanse but the United States. “No nation or group of nations is in any position to be able to secure Greenland other than the United States. We’re a great power,” he said. In his eyes, U.S. control of Greenland was not just a matter of national pride but a strategic necessity—one that would, he claimed, benefit both Europe and the world at large.
But the president’s approach was anything but conciliatory. While ruling out force, he issued a thinly veiled warning to NATO allies and Denmark: “You can say yes and we will be very appreciative, or you can say no and we will remember.” According to TIME, this blend of conciliation and coercion ran through the entirety of Trump’s address, which stretched over an hour and was peppered with boasts about America’s economic might and global leadership.
The president also announced a new front in his campaign to acquire Greenland: tariffs. Days before traveling to Davos, Trump had unveiled new tariffs on eight European countries, with a 10% rate set to take effect on February 1, 2026, escalating to 25% on June 1 if the U.S. was still unable to purchase Greenland. “We want a piece of ice for world protection, and they won’t give it. We’ve never asked for anything else,” Trump said, according to ABC News. The message was unmistakable: economic pressure would be brought to bear until America got its way.
Trump’s rationale for the acquisition was couched in terms of security and stewardship. He claimed Denmark was spending “hundreds of millions a year” to run Greenland and suggested that U.S. control would enhance the island’s security against Russia and China. “It’s very important that we use that for national and international security. That can create a power that will make it impossible for the bad guys to do anything against the perceived good ones,” he argued. Trump further insisted that only full ownership—not a lease—would enable the U.S. to defend the territory effectively. “You need the ownership to defend it. You can’t defend it on a lease. No. 1, legally it’s not defensible that way, totally. And No. 2, psychologically, who the hell wants to defend a license agreement or a lease which is a large piece of ice in the middle of the ocean?”
Yet, despite Trump’s entreaties, both Danish and Greenlandic officials have flatly rejected the proposal. As ABC News reported, several NATO allies, including Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, also condemned Trump’s Greenland push. In the days leading up to Davos, European nations sent small contingents of troops to Greenland for exercises—a clear signal of their intent to defend the status quo.
The president’s combative tone extended well beyond the Greenland issue. Throughout his speech, he lambasted NATO, claiming the alliance had treated the U.S. “very unfairly” and questioning whether America’s allies would come to its defense. “The problem with NATO is that we’ll be there for them 100%, but I’m not sure that they’d be there for us,” Trump said. He also took aim at European leaders, criticizing their policies on migration, environmental issues, and trade. “The more windmills a country has, the more money that country loses,” he quipped, taking a jab at Europe’s green energy initiatives.
Trump’s address was, in many ways, a showcase for his transactional approach to foreign policy. He boasted of slashing regulations and cutting tariffs on domestic producers while raising them on foreign goods. He claimed credit for what he described as “the fastest and most dramatic economic turnaround in our country’s history,” asserting that inflation had been “defeated” and growth was poised to surpass previous records. “The USA is the economic engine of the planet,” he proclaimed. “And when America booms, the entire world booms.”
His rhetoric left European leaders uneasy. Emergency summits and retaliatory tariff planning have become routine as Europe grapples with a more confrontational Washington. As TIME reported, Denmark and other European countries have responded to the Greenland proposal not just with words but with action—bolstering their military presence on the island and rejecting any suggestion of a sale or transfer.
Trump’s speech also revisited familiar grievances and controversial claims, including the assertion that his 2020 election loss was “rigged” and that he had single-handedly ended eight wars in the past year. He touted successes in Venezuela and Iran, praised the expansion of U.S. nuclear and AI infrastructure, and even took credit for allowing private companies to build their own power plants. Yet, at the heart of his address was a single, unyielding theme: American power, unapologetically wielded, is the ultimate guarantor of global stability.
For many in Davos, the spectacle of a U.S. president openly pressuring allies and threatening economic retribution over a territorial acquisition was both jarring and unprecedented. As one senior Western European official told TIME, “We can’t react to everything he says. We have our values and our interests, and we have to work with the U.S. to protect them. We have to talk. We listen; then we talk.”
As the dust settles from Trump’s dramatic appearance in Davos, one thing is clear: the debate over Greenland is far from over, and the world is watching closely to see what America’s next move will be.