What does Trump want?

15 January 2025 ·

No one can know at this point what Trump and MAGA will evolve into. Will he become a new American version of Putin or Hitler, or is he just a president like any other, with big words but no action? No one knows yet, but somehow we will have to take a stand and act according to what we think it will lead to. I am very nervous. If I were a Greenlander with a desire for greater independence, I would say that Trump currently poses a greater acute security threat than Putin. Not because Putin would not like to take Greenland or Denmark if he could, but because he has no realistic opportunity to do so. The United States, on the other hand, has the ability to do so, and now Trump is openly saying that he also has the will to do so. It is not just about military power. It is also about the ability to influence opinion through prejudice and misinformation, and with economic means of both the carrot and stick variety. The US has all the means at its disposal to take over Greenland, and Denmark has no defence against the toolbox that Trump has at his disposal. Putin, on the other hand, is far from having the military apparatus to engage in direct military conflict with a NATO country, and his ability to gain influence through economic means or opinion-shaping information is very limited. We know that Putin will stop at nothing to achieve his dreams of making Russia great again, but we do not know what means Trump is willing to use to fulfil his election promise of making America great again. But right now, Trump seems to pose a more acute threat than Putin, because we in Europe are both militarily and informationally defenceless and completely unprepared for the knives that may be stabbed in our backs. Welcome to the new world order.