Waltz, Wright to Visit Greenland Amid Heightened Tensions With Territory

Relations between Greenland and the United States have been tense since Trump said the United States would seek to take over the Danish autonomous territory.

Apartment buildings and houses in Nuuk, Greenland, on March 24, 2025. Juliette Pavy/AFP via Getty Images

White House national security adviser Mike Waltz and Secretary of Energy Chris Wright will visit Greenland in the coming days as the territory wrestles with how to counter the Trump administration’s threats of annexation.

Waltz and Wright will take part in cultural events and also visit Pituffik Space Base, formerly known as Thule Air Base, in northwestern Greenland, according to the White House.

“The United States has a vested security interest in the Arctic region and it should not be a surprise the national security adviser and Secretary of Energy are visiting a U.S. Space Base to get first-hand briefings from our service members on the ground,” National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said in an email shared with The Epoch Times.

Relations between Greenland and the United States have been tense since President Donald Trump said the United States would seek to take over the Danish autonomous territory.

Trump has described owning Greenland as an “absolute necessity” for maintaining international security. He has vowed to bring the territory under U.S. control by any means necessary and hasn’t ruled out using military force to do so.

Denmark’s current government seeks a path of slow reform toward official independence for the territory.

Greenland Prime Minister Mute Egede has dismissed notions of an American takeover of the island, saying that the territory will seek a future of independence on its own terms.

“We don’t want to be Americans, nor Danes; We are Kalaallit. The Americans and their leader must understand that. We are not for sale and cannot simply be taken. Our future will be decided by us in Greenland,” Egede said in a March 5 Facebook post.

Kalaallit refers to the Inuit people in Greenland who form the island’s majority population.

Egede has suggested that the forthcoming trip of Waltz and Wright, which also coincides with a visit by Second Lady Usha Vance, is a form of foreign interference and has caused a “mess” in Greenland amid already heightened fears that a long-time ally might turn aggressor.

Speaking for the National Security Council, Hughes said that the visit by senior officials would allow the United States and Greenland to cooperate in a way that recognized the island’s right to self-determination.

“We also look forward to experiencing Greenland’s famous hospitality and are confident that this visit presents an opportunity to build on partnerships that respect Greenland’s self-determination and advance economic cooperation,” Hughes said.

“This is a visit to learn about Greenland, its culture, history, and people and to attend a dogsled race the United States is proud to sponsor, plain and simple.”

The United States has long taken an interest in Greenland for its strategic position in the Arctic, overseeing strategic air and sea routes.

The Pituffik Space Base, for example, is key to some of the United States’ most important missile defense operations going back to World War II.

Among those responsibilities is defending the United States from a ballistic missile attack from Russia or China, which would pass over the Arctic to get to America.

The Arctic also harbors an immense array of natural resources including oil, natural gas, rare-earth metals, diamonds, and pristine fishing grounds.

Those have drawn great powers into the region, and the Pentagon has gone so far as to publish a strategy largely aimed at countering Russian and Chinese power in the region.