15 ms·

Denmark was reportedly preparing for full-scale war with the US over Greenland

417 points by mariuz 7mo ago

throwa356262 7mo ago
Those Danes should study the Falklands war. Using F35 in this situation is like brining in a billion dollar paperweight to the battle.s
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  That doesn't matter. It is not so much about whether the USA could do this and expect to win, of course they can. Nobody has any doubt about that. It is about gross miscalculation of consequences. Attack Greenland ->attack Denmark, attack Denmark -> Attack the EU. So you don't attack Greenland. Because that would be wrong. Unless all that stuff about shining cities on hills was nonsense. Instead of making America great again the US has ceded power to China.
  - ericmay 7mo ago
    The US wouldn’t even need to “attack” Greenland. What is there to even attack? 50 Danish soldiers? They could just say “that’s ours”, ignore whatever Europe says, and start doing whatever they wanted to do and instead force the EU to attack American forces or civilian business interests. I’m not suggesting this is a good idea or anything but there’s a ton of other ways that something like this could play out which involves more difficult ways to counter than you might think. > Instead of making America great again the US has ceded power to China. What power has the US ceded?
    - ta20240528 7mo ago
      The UK only had to send a single officer to Greenland to stop Trump's previous attempt to annex Greenland. That was a signal, thankfully there are still adults in the USA who recognised it.
      - ericmay 7mo ago
        [flagged]
        ta20240528 7mo ago
        You clearly don't know British understatement. Firing on one British officer would be as bad a firing on 10000. It's about lines.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        This kind of stuff masked you feel good to say but the UK isn’t going to stop the US if it (somewhat foolishly in my opinion) decided that it was going to take Greenland. Neither is the EU.
        ta20240528 7mo ago
        You are mistaking the battle for the war: Denmark / EU would no doubt lose the BATTLE for Greenland. Within hours. But the sun would rise the next day and the USA won't like the 'non-kinetic' consequences. Too many to enumerate. Eventually the adults in USA would just return it.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        No it would be a point of no return. But the "non-kinetic" consequences would go both ways. It's not an exercise we should entertain, though the EU needs to step up in a very serious way and spend billions of Euros adding new equipment to Greenland to beef up detection and defense.
        Jensson 7mo ago
        EU has more arctic warfare equipment than USA does, USA doesn't do much arctic warfare so the war would likely be much more expensive for USA than EU. Most regular equipment doesn't work in -40C temperatures, to take Greenland USA would need to develop more arctic enabled weaponry just for that.
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      > What power has the US ceded? Seriously? You live in a multi-polar world, there are three major power blocks and Europe isn't one of them, though that may change now (we're sick of war, but we're also sick of the threat of war, which one of the two will win out is up for grabs). There is - or rather, was, by now - Russia, China and the USA. Russia is unacceptable for many reasons, China is too clever for its own good in the longer term and the United States was historically our ally. The United States has thrown away 80 years or so of very carefully and very expensively built up soft power because someone didn't understand the concept (apparently just like you). That doesn't translate into ownership and it doesn't in any way give you control but it ensures that things will, at least most of the times, go your way because of momentum and because it makes sense by default. Just like you may disagree on some stuff with your friends but you're not going to rob their homes, just because you can (and maybe just because they gave you the key to the back door). You throw that away at your peril and because Russia is in no way capable of capitalizing on that the Chinese are. I wouldn't be surprised at all if in a decade or two the US$ is no longer the reserve currency. It could happen a lot faster than that. The US economy is teetering on the edge of the abyss and if you think that your ability to project power isn't diminished then maybe by the end of the Iran war you'll get it. The US maximized its post-war power on the 10th of September 2001. Since then it has gone down hill very steadily and the fall rapidly accelerated with Trump. I see no reason to believe this will change, all institutions that were supposed to provide checks and balances have failed. And all China has to do is to look sane in comparison, that's not super hard.
      - ericmay 7mo ago
        > You live in a multi-polar world, there are three major power blocks and Europe isn't one of them, though that may change now (we're sick of war, but we're also sick of the threat of war, which one of the two will win out is up for grabs). There is - or rather, was, by now - Russia, China and the USA. Russia is unacceptable for many reasons, China is too clever for its own good in the longer term and the United States was historically our ally. We live in a multi-polar world. Sure. But I disagree with your assertion that there are three major power blocks. The US and China are the only two. Europe has a decent sized and advanced economy but it lacks military power and is politically fragmented and always will be. China is building military power but lacks the ability and will to project that power. Manufacturing and economic powerhouse rivaling the United States. No doubt about that. Russia isn't a pole in this world. As President Obama said back in the 2010s I believe "Russia is a nuclear armed gas station". That was true then, and it's still true today. > The United States has thrown away 80 years or so of very carefully and very expensively built up soft power because someone didn't understand the concept (apparently just like you). Well, I don't think this is true for one. And secondly if it takes just a year or so to throw away that power then it was just a matter of time until the EU got mad at the US for doing something and threw it away anyways. > You throw that away at your peril and because Russia is in no way capable of capitalizing on that the Chinese are. What soft power is the Chinese capitalizing on? Is it their support for Russia and supplying money, weapons, and equipment for their war in Ukraine? Or is it the soft power they had in Venezuela, Cuba, and Iran that they have just lost because of US military action? > I wouldn't be surprised at all if in a decade or two the US$ is no longer the reserve currency. It could happen a lot faster than that. The US economy is teetering on the edge of the abyss and if you think that your ability to project power isn't diminished then maybe by the end of the Iran war you'll get it. The US ability to project power isn't being diminished by the Iran war, only being exercised. Talking heads for some reason think that when you launch an aerial assault against a country that is amassing ballistic missiles, drones (which they build and sell to Russia to go bomb innocent Ukrainians), and more that it should be over within 24 hours and that the enemy shouldn't be able to fight back. It's unrealistic. Nevermind Iran launching these missiles at civilian targets in countries throughout the Middle East. I get the argument that if you hose a US military base that the base is a target, but there's no excuse for attacking civilian apartment complexes and such. It also misses the fact that, we've seen this movie before with North Korea. Except if Iran gets a nuclear weapon they also have control over your oil supply and it would kick off a nuclear arms race in the region because Saudi Arabia and others certainly aren't going to let Iran be the only one with nuclear weapons. These are tough problems to deal with, and from the sidelines it's easy to think about how simple the solution is or point out all the mistakes, but the alternative headline here is the US does nothing, all of these Middle Eastern countries get nuclear bombs, Iran loads up on ballistic missiles, and then who knows exactly what will happen? Do they nuke Israel and Israel nukes them back? Do they extract a toll on oil passing through the Straight of Hormuz like they are as of today declaring they will do?
    - enoint 7mo ago
      It wasn’t even about Greenland, but a distraction from the extent of Trump’s knowledge of Epstein. Anyway, there’s actually an index for soft power. Eliminating USAID halved that index. China built the highways, hospitals and water treatment instead.
    - Eupolemos 7mo ago
      What power? Economic power (US will no longer be the world reserve currency). The power of allies (see Trump begging for help in Hormuz). All the soft power it ever had.
      - ericmay 7mo ago
        > Economic power (US will no longer be the world reserve currency). As a reminder, reserve currencies are just currencies that are held in large amounts by national banks and other important institutions. The USD, like the Euro, Yen, Pound, and others are all reserve currencies. The USD is the dominant currency, in part because the US is in the Middle East right now doing exactly what it is doing by using the military to enforce trade for oil in USD. But if the US loses that "status" it just.... reverts to being more like the EU? Doesn't seem so bad to me. There's also pros/cons with being "the reserve currency". > The power of allies (see Trump begging for help in Hormuz). See Europe begging for help in Ukraine. I don't think this is a good argument. If 4 years of Trump being mean was all it took to erase all soft power the US ever had, then it never had it in the first place and it wasn't worth caring about.
        saulapremium 7mo ago
        >If 4 years of Trump being mean was all it took to erase all soft power the US ever had, then it never had it in the first place and it wasn't worth caring about That's a weird statement. Like all it was were some empty words. The current system, which you don't think is worth caring about, has been exceptionally good for the US. The US is the wealthiest nation in the world. Do you think this is simply because Americans are superior human beings? Also, >See Europe begging for help in Ukraine ..what, exactly, are you trying to say here? Other than yes, the US does in fact seem to be siding with Putin in spite of a few attempts at acting neutral.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        > That's a weird statement. What do you find weird about it? > The current system, which you don't think is worth caring about, has been exceptionally good for the US. I'm not against the current system, generally speaking. Critical of it, at times, absolutely. But not against it. Apologies if I gave you the wrong impression there. > The US is the wealthiest nation in the world. Do you think this is simply because Americans are superior human beings? I think our culture and policies were superior, and then toss in a gigantic country with access to both oceans, incredible natural resources, and well protected and you have a recipe for an economic and military super power. So it's a combination of things really. I wouldn't be quick to dismiss the cultural attributes though. > ..what, exactly, are you trying to say here? Idk, people are making fun of the US "begging for help" against Iran. I'm going to make fun of the EU begging for US help against Ukraine. > Other than yes, the US does in fact seem to be siding with Putin in spite of a few attempts at acting neutral. US isn't siding with Putin. China and Iran are though. Or have you forgotten that Iran [1] is building and selling drones to Russia who is using those drones to bomb innocent civilians in Ukraine? Or have you also forgotten that China is supplying Russia with equipment and weaponry, often times under cover to evade sanctions? But sure, saulapremium, it's the US who is siding with Putin and we certainly didn't give Ukraine tens of billions of dollars in support, we certainly didn't rush missiles to Ukraine to help them fight against Russia, nor did we sanction Russia to hell, stop Venezuela from skirting those sanctions, and we can't possibly still providing intelligence and targeting support to Ukraine. This is what I'm talking about. If all it takes are a few mean words from our idiot president and now all of a sudden it's the US who is siding with Russia, then what are we even doing here? Why should Americans even bother caring about our allies? You need a recalibration in your understanding of who is doing what here and who the bad guys are. [1] Iran is also funding militias in the Middle East to try and start wars, today is hanging people for peacefully protesting, killed an estimated 30,000 of its own citizens this year over protests, and when the US attacked its military instead of just targeting military bases, or even the oil infrastructure, Iran is lobbying missiles at apartment complexes, threatening to kill people at amusement parks worldwide, and more.
    - KaiserPro 7mo ago
      > What power has the US ceded? Before this, we (large multinational infra company) were happily using AWS, microsoft and a bunch of other US based companies. Now we are beginning the migration away, not because its cheaper or better, but because we just don't think that we can trust the contracts we have with them any more. This isn't a sudden thing, we are not going to do it over night. But we are not renewing multi-million dollar contracts in the coming years for stuff that would have been a no brainer last year.
      - traceroute66 7mo ago
        > not because its cheaper or better Actually, in a number of cases EU cloud is cheaper and better. In terms of "better", spec wise it is not uncommon to get more bang for your buck in the EU cloud, especially around compute. In terms of "cheaper", that too. AWS, Azure etc. will happily sit there all day nickle and diming you through obscure pricing structures with all sorts of small-print. Good luck, for example, figuring out if you're going to go over your "provisioned IOPS-month" on AWS EBS, whatever the hell that is. And have fun with all the nickle-and-diming on AWS S3. Meanwhile on EU providers a lot of stuff is free that the US providers nickle and dime you for, and the stuff that is charged is done in a manner where you actually CAN forecast your spend. And then of course there is the real EU sovereignty. Not the fake US-cloud-in-Europe which despite what the US providers salesdroids try to tell you is still subject to CLOUD, PATRIOT and everything else.
      - ericmay 7mo ago
        It’s interesting how these conversations always start and end with “my company isn’t buying XYZ American cloud provider services” while ignoring other incredibly important products and services that you can’t or are unwilling to boycott. Are you turning in your MacBook Pro and iPhone, or are you putting a bumper sticker on it saying you bought it before you knew America was crazy? Similarly, while it's great to take a principled stand here (it's yet again interesting how it's always a principled stand against American companies but never others), while you are busy spending time and money migrating away from AWS to a competing product that has worse features and is more expensive as you said, you should hope your competitors are too because if not, they're going to be delivering features faster and more cheaply. Something worth thinking about there. I don't think Microsoft losing some European contracts is an example of the US ceding power.
  - petterroea 7mo ago
    Living in Japan, I meet and talk to Chinese when out drinking. Many of them are almost literally ROFLing about how the US practically just gave away everything they had to China. It's as if the US is playing poker with their cards facing up on the table. Chinese already consider themselves the defacto superpower. If mainstream media in the US showed this, I bet the politics would look different.
    - steinvakt2 7mo ago
      Seems weird. China is definitely falling behind. India is not.
      - petterroea 7mo ago
        They are pretty happy with having superiority on high tech manufacturing and robotics. You basically cannot manufacture something without using China - even if you try. I don't think they consider the TSMC EUV monopoly a long term threat. Doing good on AI as well, you bet the OSS chinese models causing stock panic in the US makes them laugh. On the topic of manufacturing outside China, the YouTuber "Smarter Every day" (Destin Sandlin) has a series on manufacturing and feels strongly about manufacturing having moved out of the country. As an experiment he tried to manufacture something without China, but was unable to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZTGwcHQfLY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZTGwcHQfLY
        jacquesm 7mo ago
        I have some friends who are doing things 'China free' and it is possible but it comes at a very substantial premium.
        petterroea 7mo ago
        I think the most interesting takeaway from this video in question is that he tried to buy material from an Indian seller, who promised it was Indian. When the box arrived, it had the name of a Chinese factory on it.
  - 1over137 7mo ago
    >It is not so much about whether the USA could do this and expect to win, of course they can. Nobody has any doubt about that. Um, lots of us have doubts about that. The USA couldn't win against Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq; why do you think it could win against Greenland? Greenlanders actually have a lot of guns; and likely most of Europe and Canada would also go to war against the USA.
    - Quothling 7mo ago
      I'm Danish. There are 56k people in Greenland and almost half of them live in Nuuk. The USA could frankly "take" greenland simply by putting a warship there and saying it was theirs. Not really sure why it was ever on the table though. The USA has basically free reign to expand it's military bases there, aside from the ban on nuclear weapons. Sure it would need approval by both Greenland and Denmark, but up until recently we were frankly more allied with the USA than the EU, and I doubt we've ever really said no before. We even bought the damn f35's despite them being so much more expensive than the alternatives, primarily because our history with the F16's. Which would probably have been a possiblity considering we're now debating whether or not to have french nuclear weapon carrying planes stationed on Danish soil in the fallout of the USA no longer being a trusty NATO ally. If it was because of resources, then American companies are frankly free to extract them as long as they reach deals with Greenland about it. If the USA had waited a few years for Greenland to gain more independence then it would have been even easier.
    - gregw2 7mo ago
      Not the parent poster but, while I acknowledge your point on Canada and Europe entering the conflict (and I'd add that the highly motivated Dutch punch well above their weight in intelligence and economic spheres and this whole scenario of US invasion is a Putin dream), when you ask "why do you think it could win...", the 50k population of Greenland is smaller than Granada (100k) and three orders of magnitude smaller than Vietnam/Afghanistan/Iraq (~40m). So I find its insurgency potential hard to compare to those examples you give.
    - iso1631 7mo ago
      Doesn't need to. America can just leave the towns alone and do whatever it wants elsewhere. It will cost a fortune, but nobody is going to go 500 miles over an ice pack to raid a US mining settlement.
  - eunos 7mo ago
    > Attack Greenland ->attack Denmark, attack Denmark -> Attack the EU. Rhetoric and public support aside, I honestly very much doubt that there will be a solid EU military response. For many countries like Baltic, Eastern Europe and Nordic countries (ironically DK included). US military support means life or death of their countries. I imagine they'd stall response like what Hungary did and hope that Greenland annexed become fait accompli.
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      > US military support means life or death of their countries. Meant. They have begun to realize that this has changed and realize that if this were put to the test that the US military would likely not hold up their end of NATO. What you wrote would have made good sense in 2015, but today it makes a lot less sense and with every passing day that gap is widening. The Baltics have become the voice of reason and ethics in Europe, Poland is much stronger than parties outside of Europe seem to realize, France is always going to be a force to be reckoned with and we have no doubt about where the UK stands, then there are Finland, Sweden and Norway who all are automatically on the side of anything that Denmark is involved in and I wouldn't be surprised at all if Canada would become part of it, because they too have a lot to lose. There is a good reason why Putin has not risked engaging the EU and that's not just because the United States is still formally part of NATO.
  - fulafel 7mo ago
    From military consequences pov, EU isn't a military alliance but it would of course also be attacking NATO.
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      The EU absolutely is a military alliance as well.
      - fulafel 7mo ago
        That's a heterodox interpretation. Something akin to it was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_European_Union but it's no more.
        jacquesm 7mo ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_and_defense_pacts_of_the_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_and_defense_pacts_of_... https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/glossary/collective-defence.html https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/glossary/collecti...
        fulafel 7mo ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_alliances https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_alliances The EU treaty has a clause that calls for assistance for part of the members (who are not neutral) but there's no military structure outside NATO. There's also a perpatual public debate about whether EU should become a military alliance. eg https://theloop.ecpr.eu/can-the-eu-form-an-autonomous-military-alliance/ https://theloop.ecpr.eu/can-the-eu-form-an-autonomous-milita... In practical terms, in event of a invasion, only NATO has a organisation set up for coordinated response.
        jacquesm 7mo ago
        You are really completely clueless, I have no idea why you keep posting comments that contradict your own comments but fine, whatever. There are four different mutual defense pacts in Europe and there is an umbrella one and they all operate independently of NATO. And then there is NATO, with or without the USA.
- WinstonSmith84 7mo ago
  Argentina didn't lose the war because they came with fighter jets, but because their fighter jets were throwing scrap metal at British boats. Had these detonated, the outcome would have been different, and expensive for UK. I don't doubt that F35 are working very well in comparison to the junk Argentina was using.
  - throwa356262 7mo ago
    Wasn't there a kill switch in the missiles? Didn't UK get really really annoyed with France in the one instance their kill switch Didn't work?
    - zelos 7mo ago
      Argentina only had 6 Exocets. I think the parent is referring to the failure of the fuses in the bombs the Argentinian pilots dropped on British ships.
- KaiserPro 7mo ago
  They did study the falklands war, thats why they were planning to blow up the runway should shit go wrong. The idea was to make it as difficult as possible to invade, not to stop it, because that’s largely impossible.
- IAmBroom 7mo ago
  I'm sure they'd be grateful for your expert analysis. Maybe you could offer to teach at their war college?
- tim333 7mo ago
  I'm not sure what lesson they are supposed to learn from the Falklands. It was somewhat swung when we sank the Belgrano using a nuclear sub. Sometimes these billion dollar high tech things work.
jacquesm 7mo ago
Of course they were. The United States has never before damaged its own reputation in Europe as much as they did in the last 12 months. And the same goes for Canada, possibly worse. You don't go around threatening your allies unless you really have plans and that's why you don't elect senile old guys to positions of power.
- equilibrium 7mo ago
  Europe and the rest of the world.
- philipallstar 7mo ago
  > that's why you don't elect senile old guys to positions of power. Anyone of principle would have been saying this before 2025, and far louder.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    Note that this is from a country that wouldn't exist if not for the allied countries and that the US has somehow managed to all but erase that reputation. We recognize our debt, we also recognize that this is to a country that no longer exists in a meaningful way. All we have now is multiple variations of the mob.
    - jjtwixman 7mo ago
      Yeah the US we knew is gone. I think about this sometimes when I am listening to American music from the 20th century, how much soft power they had, how great they made America sound either directly or indirectly. That America that we all looked up to and admired is gone. Pity.
      - butILoveLife 7mo ago
        [flagged]
        7mo ago
Planktonne 7mo ago
That is a very reasonable response to the threats they faced.
- butILoveLife 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - ta20240528 7mo ago
    Nah mate, Rich powerful countries could also keep slaves and no one would be able to stop it by force. But they don't. Civilisation advances.
    - philipallstar 7mo ago
      They don't because the west banned slavery on moral grounds, and enforced it on the rest of the world. That advance is actually just western power in effect.
      - mcv 7mo ago
        That ban on slavery is not being enforced on the rest of the world. The west had no problem playing football in Qatar in stadiums built by slave labour.
        philipallstar 7mo ago
        Well, not any more! This was hundreds of years ago. The British Empire isn't exactly around any more.
        mcv 7mo ago
        What was hundreds of years ago? Several western countries still allowed slavery well into the second half of the 19th century.
      - 7mo ago
matsemann 7mo ago
Russia's invasion ironically strengthened NATO, with more countries joining or feeling the usefulness of it. Somehow the US managed to break down all that good will in such a short amount of time.. I think it's hard to overstate how much more hostile people look at the US the last few years. So much soft power has been lost.
- fortyseven 7mo ago
  > I think it's hard to overstate how much more hostile people look at the US the last few years. True both outside AND inside the country.
- nxm 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - matsemann 7mo ago
    This is very reductive. European countries pay a lot into their defense, especially the last few years. It's not as black&white as a certain person likes to claim.
  - thibran 7mo ago
    You forget that you got a say for that money in a lot of parts of the world, which is one of the primary reasons the US is so wealthy. Europe took the deal that the US "handels the war stuff in the world" for some influence. If we handle the "war stuff", the US influence will be gone in Europe.
  - Imustaskforhelp 7mo ago
    While at it, let's finally remove American Dollar as the de-facto currency all around the world because part of the agreement between EU and America was that American dollars would become the global currency and EU would get defense security in return which was mutually benefitial to both. To be honest, EU will invest in its own defense in coming years. The cat is out of the box, US proved to be an unstable partner/even an enemy for a country like denmark that you had to prepare to fight full scare war against.
silvestrov 7mo ago
> * The Danish public broadcaster DR reports ...* This is the source article (in Danish) for the bluesky posts: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...
Trasmatta 7mo ago
The US president wanted to start a full on war with Europe over Greenland of all places. And he still might. And some people will still claim I just have "TDS".
- breakyerself 7mo ago
  TDS is an apt description for anyone supporting this senile, psychopath.
  - Trasmatta 7mo ago
    Yes. The only TDS is the one exhibited by those that are so brainwashed by his cult of personality.
crispyambulance 7mo ago
There's a difference between "posturing" for show and actually "preparing for war". They're wise to the fact that "the Stable Genius" isn't going to try anything violent with Denmark/Greenland, but they still want to prevent him thinking about just stealing territory "peacefully."
- Trasmatta 7mo ago
  This is the type of thinking that convinced people that Trump would never be stupid enough to start a full on war with Iran. And yet here we are.
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  Trust me, Denmark wasn't posturing. The assumption was - and still is - that the USA wasn't posturing either. We (and I realize I obviously don't speak for all of Europe but I have my finger on the pulse in many places here) are also not assuming that when Trump is gone the USA will go back to normal.
  - Insanity 7mo ago
    And even if they did go back to normal for the next presidency - why trust it? Their entire political system is set up so that the winds can change entirely every 4 years. If the people voted Trump in to office twice, it’ll happen again. It’s a divided country where propaganda has a strong hold.
    - dspillett 7mo ago
      Useful stability can be achieved again, either “back to normal” as mentioned elsewhere in this thread or “forward to something different but better (and not crap like it is now)”, but it is going to take at least a few terms, maybe several. Even if it did happen more quickly, it will take that long for those of us on the outside to trust it, reputational damage like this can not be undone quickly.
    - deleted 7mo ago
      [deleted]
SideburnsOfDoom 7mo ago
Si vis pacem, para bellum.
smcin 7mo ago
Source cited by @chriso-wiki.bsky.social is this article on DR.dk, the Danish public broadcaster: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...
seydor 7mo ago
You mean, they are not anymore?
- Havoc 7mo ago
  The goldfish prez seems to have moved on to Cuba now
wewewedxfgdf 7mo ago
What else would they be doing, watching TV?
fergie 7mo ago
Thats probably what this was all about then (use Google Translate) -> https://www.nrk.no/norge/gradert-sak-behandlet-i-ekstraordinaert-statsrad-1.17815309 https://www.nrk.no/norge/gradert-sak-behandlet-i-ekstraordin...
- mailund 7mo ago
  I don't think it's very likely that the emergency meeting in the Norwegian government yesterday was called because of the security situation in Denmark 3 months ago. Not unlikely that it is related to US-Europe/NATO relations ofc (although there are plenty of other things that would cause an emergency meeting as well, king has been hospitalized plenty of times lately, wife of the next in line is deep in drama due to both being revealed to have been close with Epstein and having a son that is currently in court for some pretty serious allegations, and sharing a border Russia that is currently waging hybrid warfare across europe) Just for some additional context, these meetings are held every week, but this caused headlines because there was held an additional one outside of the normal schedule due to some classified time sensitive case, i.e. not something that happened in another country many months ago.
kelipso 7mo ago
Lol there is posturing and there is whatever this is.
polotics 7mo ago
Tu as le droit de perdre, mais tu n'as pas le droit de te faire surprendre. (You have the right to lose, but you do not have the right to be caught off guard.)
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
- ctdinjeu3 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - deleted 7mo ago
    [deleted]
emmelaich 7mo ago
The idea that the US would attempt to take Greenland by force is utterly ludicrous.
- bell-cot 7mo ago
  Unfortunately, that adjective applies to many things which the US has attempted, often "successfully", recently.
- 1over137 7mo ago
  Lots of what Trump says is utterly ludicrous. But he does lots of what he says (though not everything), so the rest of the world is right to prepare.
- vrganj 7mo ago
  So is the idea that the US would start bombing Iran without a plan, goal, or any thought to the consequences, yet here we are...
  - Jensson 7mo ago
    There is a difference, basically the entire world hates the Iranian regime and wants them gone, USA bombing the Iranian regime wont get that much pushback from the world even if the war was started in an underhanded way. It is entirely different if USA starts attacking NATO allies such as Denmark which isn't a threat or problem to anyone, that is not something anybody would expect and it would ruin American diplomacy completely.
    - dcpit 7mo ago
      Does US care about diplomacy anymore ?
      - Jensson 7mo ago
        Yeah, otherwise why would Trump only attack hated countries? He would have already started bombing Canada since its the closest.
hermannj314 7mo ago
France offering support to little ententes to prevent facist revanchism. Seems familiar. World tension continues to increase.
shablulman 7mo ago
[dead]
KaiMagnus 7mo ago
And this is, in my opinion, why support at Hormuz shouldn’t even be on the table. How can you possibly hold joint patrols when you were just months ago planning full scale war between each other?
- verelo 7mo ago
  Also, the "was" in this title feels misleading. If they're not still, they're crazy.
  - freehorse 7mo ago
    The original title is better translated as "prepared". The tweeting reposter translated to continuous past tense somewhat erroneously imo, because it sounds as if the preparation was interrupted by something.
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      Preparation is an ongoing thing. And not just in Denmark.
- lm28469 7mo ago
  > And this is, in my opinion, why support at Hormuz shouldn’t even be on the table Shouldn't? it's not on the table at all lol
  - freehorse 7mo ago
    Well it is on the table but only trump is sitting on that table.
  - Jensson 7mo ago
    It is on the table, why are you spouting bullshit? People are discussing this right now. Or do you mean Denmark wont help at Hormuz, but I doubt Denmark would help there anyway, but other countries are discussing that. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-military-iran-war-strait-hormuz-oil-prices-b2941629.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-military-i...
rishabhaiover 7mo ago
[flagged]
- Trasmatta 7mo ago
  The US threatening to invade European territory, and Europe preparing to fight a war against the US, is absolutely "some interesting new phenomenon".
  - pembrook 7mo ago
    [flagged]
    - Jensson 7mo ago
      Denmark is a part of NATO, attacking them would mean the entirety of NATO would go against USA, not just Denmark. It is reasonable to assume the entirety of NATO would put up enough resistance that USA had to withdraw from that war without getting Greenland, because Trump would get removed from office by being so hated by the people before the rest of NATO gave up.
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      The choice to possibly go to war was not Denmark's. An invasion of territory is a war.
- pembrook 7mo ago
  [flagged]
- __bjoernd 7mo ago
  No one forces you to be that guy :)
- mirekrusin 7mo ago
  Top class comedy is allowed though.
- originalvichy 7mo ago
krona 7mo ago
I live very close to one of the USAF's largest European airbases. While Trump was trolling European leaders about their security posture (by threatening to relieve them of sovereign territory which the US already has extensive access to) the USAF was already moving assets in the opposite direction to the middle east (this was mid-january). It's fairly easy to work out what's happening if you ignore the orange man and listen to what serious people are saying, what they've briefed on, how they contradict one another, and where the assets are moving. Obviously European leaders have to pretend to take the orange man seriously, but the reaction in the media was bordering on hysterical.
- enoint 7mo ago
  This is exactly right. The liar who lies to control the narrative is lying again. The chance he’s lying is high but as adults the (likelihood * hazard) of an invasion is worth preparing for. The narrative he wanted to control was about Epstein. Denmark could have simultaneously prepared for that, but it wouldn’t be on OSInt Twitter.
  - InsideOutSanta 7mo ago
    The problem is that his "lies" and "jokes" sometimes suddenly turned out to be not lies and jokes.
    - enoint 7mo ago
      More precisely, propaganda is always fake. After verification it’s possibly true, but it still began fake. Trump could try supporting his utterances with fact, but he doesn’t. It’s rational to prepare for his propaganda to sometimes accidentally turn out true. Hence this relatively modest response. But the narrative most reliably supported by fact is that Trump hasn’t kept his story straight about Epstein.
- techterrier 7mo ago
  > It's fairly easy to work out what's happening off you go then, what is it?
0xcb0 7mo ago
The United States are not longer an allie nor a friend to to EU. Under Trump, they have turned into a Terror regiem, ignoring international law, human rights. They have to be international isolated together with Israel. They are the enemy of a free and civilized world!
- Ekaros 7mo ago
  I think that started with Bush and continued with Obama. Who with his financial donators still walk free after committing mass murders.
ZeroGravitas 7mo ago
The billionaire oligarch who put that (stupid) idea in Trump's head is still out there. His son-in-law will probably be the next head of the Federal Reserve. If the oligarchs don't feel any pushback they'll continue to wreck the US and Europe.
andrewclunn 7mo ago
[flagged]
ctdinjeu3 7mo ago
[flagged]
vrganj 7mo ago
> As a source puts it, the French said: "Would you like more soldiers? You could have them. Would you like more naval support? You could have that. Would you like more air support? You could have that too." Thank God for the French. I long thought their strong Gaullist stance on sovereignty was a bit silly in today's world, but turns out they were right along. Europe can't trust any outside powers. Any external dependency can and will be used against us. We used to be wide-eyed believers in international corporation and global alliances, but those are, as it turns out, always a risk and a liability. I sure as hell am glad the French kept being stubborn enough to build most capabilities in-house, so now we have our own nuclear deterrent, aircraft carrier and fighter jet programs. Imagine if we had gone all-in on American weapons tech! They'd have us, excuse my French, by the balls!
- mamonster 7mo ago
  >I long thought their strong Gaullist stance on sovereignty was a bit silly in today's world, but turns out they were right along. Every single French president since Mitterand (with a brief exception for Iraq that was more than made up by Libya) spent a large part of their time liquidating Gaullism.
- terminalshort 7mo ago
  History shows that Europe can't trust any inside powers either...
  - vrganj 7mo ago
    pre-EU history shows that, which is why we founded the EU in the first place. To quote one of our founding fathers, Robert Schuman, the point of tightly interweaving our economies this way is to "make war not only unthinkable, but materially impossible"
    - deleted 7mo ago
      [deleted]
    - terminalshort 7mo ago
deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
beanjuiceII 7mo ago
lol Denmark yea i'm sure no one was concerned
bryanlarsen 7mo ago
Keep in mind that militaries are always preparing for war. They have to. A military exists in large part to always be prepared for the unthinkable. And in the case of countries like Denmark who have few realistic enemy choices, that means they must be prepared for unrealistic invasions, even if the US isn't threatening to invade. Yes the Danes probably spend most of their time preparing to fight the Russians, but always wargaming the same thing leaves them unprepared for different enemies or unexpected approaches from expected enemies. Yes, the actions in the links are more than just wargaming, but a large part of it is stuff the military should be doing anyways.
- halJordan 7mo ago
  No thats not what this was. These are the actions that the Russians did before invading Ukraine and were the specific actions that the military pointed out and said "these aren't normal actions everyone is always doing"
- estearum 7mo ago
  Hot take: Preparing to defend your country from an ally invading you is actually very bad and indicative of inexcusable behavior from your "ally." > that means they must be prepared for unrealistic invasions, even if the US isn't threatening to invade. It's not unrealistic to think the US would invade Greenland. We've now had 10+ years of this "it's a joke... no it's a bargaining chip... well it's overstated... okay it's temporary... ahh yes well this is Good, Actually."
- magicalhippo 7mo ago
  > Keep in mind that militaries are always preparing for war. There's preparing and there's preparing. They sent soldiers to Greenland with orders to resist an invasion, packing live ammunition, explosives to destroy runways and blood bags to treat wounded. That's more than a bit of wargaming.
jeroenhd 7mo ago
Every week, the USA finds a new way to lose credibility as a serious nation. If it weren't for the observably fair elections, you'd almost think America was being taken over from the inside by foreign infiltrators. It's ludicrous to see the USA threaten to invade a well-connected European country, invade a South American country weeks after, and then now, three months later, beg its European allies to help with the invasion of Iran because ostensibly American leadership couldn't foresee that war in the Middle East might impact fuel prices. I still think it's a ruse to distract the European military by sending the navy to the Middle East but who knows with the current idiot in charge. I hope the country will recover some normalcy in post-Trump decade(s), but I fear we're witnessing the slow collapse of a world power. Regardless of anyone's feelings on grip the East/West dichotomy has had over the world in the past 90 or so years, such shifts in world power rarely go calmly and peacefully.
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  > If it weren't for the observably fair elections Hehe, that's a good one.
pogue 7mo ago
The source of this post is this article from a site called dr.dk. Maybe someone can double check the validity of it. Danmark forberedte sig på muligt angreb fra USA [Danish language - no native translation] https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered... Google translated URL: https://www-dr-dk.translate.goog/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp&_x_tr_hist=true https://www-dr-dk.translate.goog/nyheder/indland/groenland/d...
- hagbarth 7mo ago
  Danish public broadcaster. Probably the best reputation in the world on Danish news.
- fasterik 7mo ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_(broadcaster) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_(broadcaster) >DR is a Danish public-service radio and television broadcasting company. Founded in 1925 as a public-service organization, it is Denmark's oldest and largest electronic media enterprise.
the_af 7mo ago
I have no doubts they took US threats seriously; anyone who doesn't these days is a fool (of course, this doesn't mean Trump will do anything he claims, but he's dangerous enough you can never tell for sure). What I find harder to believe is that they were preparing for "full-scale war". That makes no sense. Using F-35, American made and very likely with kill switches or otherwise susceptible to American interference? And where would they get their American made parts and supplies? And Denmark stands no chance at all against US military might, with or without assistance from France. I'm sure they were prepared to engage in token resistance, and also more serious diplomatic and economic struggles, but "full-scale war" is hyperbole.
apexalpha 7mo ago
We all were... they wouldn't speak it but reading between the lines you could see the leaders were very nervous Trump would unilaterally decide to just 'try it' like in Venezuela and now Iran.
torginus 7mo ago
The F-35 is mentioned in the article as being readied for the defense of Greenland. I wonder what the 'easter-eggs' Danes would've found out about it if they went up against the US. (I think I know, it has to do with how its 'stealth' works.)
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  In a way that would be great. Then we could grow up a little bit faster.
  - 1718627440 7mo ago
    Yeah at some point we need to know.
- throwawayfour 7mo ago
  Well if that were to happen, that would be the end of a lot of defense business that the US does with many countries around the world.
  - torginus 7mo ago
    I mean it has already happened. The F-35 relies on very thick (10cm+) layer of radar absorbing structures with special internal geometries (don't wanna go into detail regarding this). Unfortunately if the precise construction of said structures is known, it becomes vulnerable to specially crafted radar pulses which make it generate strong returns. So it's paramount that the exact layout be kept secret (and likely there's some variation between manufacturing batches, but this is just conjecture). Needless to say, the US very likely has this info on every jet it sold, and a sufficiently motivated and sophisticated adversary can likely figure this out if the plane spends a long enough time in front of their radars. That's why the US has been extremely careful about where and how the F-35 gets to fly.
nickdothutton 7mo ago
I think there is a pretty good chance US is in the late empire phase. This is not about a single President or party, or even single geopolitical event/development.
- iso1631 7mo ago
  > This is not about a single President or party I've seen roughly two types of American commentators over the last year. The ones that cheer this stuff going on, which HN has plenty of, and the ones that think "come the midterms/2028/impeachment everything will go back to normal" The latter are massively mistaken, it would take decades for the US to rebuild its standing in the eyes of the world, and there is no evidence that it even wants to. Trump is a symptom of what America truly is, not the cause.
  - tartuffe78 7mo ago
    He is also a singular political figure. I don't think things will go back to normal, but they won't stay the way there are now.
    - iso1631 7mo ago
      If it wasn't Trump it would be someone else. There are very few people in history that are that pivotal individually. Had Franz Ferdinand not been shot, something else would have sparked WW1. Had Hitler not existed, then someone else would have emerged. Maybe Churchill was more of a pivot than most, had the UK gone for Hastings after Chamberlain then perhaps the UK would have sued for peace, allowing Germany to fully concentrate on Russia, but it's still a stretch to have Germany ultimately prevailing over Stalin. Had the US not won independence in 1776 (which is unlikely to be the sole cause of a single person), it would have been gained anyway, just like the other new world colonies from Canada to Brazil. The conditions that exist are far bigger than one man
  - rntksi 7mo ago
    I think Naval is right when he was making the observation that history has alternated by being determined by either individuals (think Genghis Khan, Napoleon) or larger forces at play (think socio-economic reasoning to many historical events). In this, I would say Trump is Trump (the individual) making his moves that very much go against the larger forces at play that was "business as usual". So equating him to a symptom of America is true in the sense that sooner or later America was bound to have someone like him deviate the course of history, and I also believe post-Trump America is not going to reverse course.
simonsarris 7mo ago
Where was this kind of movement when Russia invaded Europe in 2022? I think Europe's inaction in 2022 will go down as the greatest moral failing of the century. You can't say "they didn't act because Russia is a nuclear power" - the same is true here.
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  Not everybody can be painted with the 'inaction' label, there are plenty of people that are doing a lot of good work.
- tim333 7mo ago
  I think most people in Europe figured the US would oppose Russia invading as that's mostly what has happened for decades. In the Denmark case I don't know if they can count on the US opposing the US invading. It wasn't until that thing with Trump and Vance shouting at Zelensky in the oval office that Europe figured the US had kind of flipped and it was on us to support Ukraine.
- FpUser 7mo ago
  >"Where was this kind of movement when Russia invaded Europe in 2022" Russia has invaded Ukraine. There is no political entity called Europe. And if you're talking geography than good chunk of Russia is in Europe.
Mr_Eri_Atlov 7mo ago
You would not trust a bridge that reeked of wood rot. Why should they trust a country that smells of corruption and lashes out at random like a shambling corpse?
ChrisArchitect 7mo ago
Source: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...
Protostome 7mo ago
Fake report, ignore, move on
- AnimalMuppet 7mo ago
  Bare assertions don't count for much. What is your evidence that it is fake?
dismalaf 7mo ago
[flagged]
ax3726 7mo ago
[dead]
keybored 7mo ago
Breaking: country that a head of state threatened to invade was preparing for invasion. > The Danish public broadcaster DR reports that officials in Denmark, France and Germany say that Donald Trump's threats to seize Greenland were taken so seriously that wide-ranging preparations were made to forcibly resist a US invasion of the Danish island. Breaking (2): small country was preparing to forcibly resist (?) an invasion. That was threatened.
doublediamond21 7mo ago
[dead]
burnt-resistor 7mo ago
Other side-effects of Trump's unwise, anti-strategic hastening the downfall of hard and soft American power and respect for ego and personal gain: alternative defense pacts and nuclear proliferation. Kratocracies only respect North Korea because it has the bomb and an absurd amount of hardware pointed right at Seoul so Ukraine, Cuba, Taiwan, and Iran best get their underground tests on pronto if each desires survival.
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  I wonder how many countries have - reluctantly - decided to pursue nuclear bombs after many years of holding off the boat. The next decade will be a complete disaster for non-proliferation.
jeffbee 7mo ago
They'd win it, too. An alliance of Denmark, Canada, Mexico, and Iran should sack Florida and plow all the golf courses under.
AmberPromptai38 7mo ago
[dead]
AntonOtaner39 7mo ago
[dead]
giardini 7mo ago
If the article is correct (a big if) then many in the Danish government and many Danish people, along with a bunch of people/officials in other countries, may not be as stable mentally as I once thought they were. Critics never miss a chance to sit around and bitch about orange man.
banyaknyamuk827 7mo ago
[dead]
1dontnkow_ 7mo ago
This makes me think of a thought I had the last weeks and months with the geopolitical chaos currently in the world: While understanding the danger of dictators and technical mistakes and the chaos that would ensue, besides that, what would happen if just every or even just most countries had nukes? Just give them to everybody, and I'm really not convinced we would end up in a Fallout situation but maybe quite a peaceful one? No expert in that but tbh when you think about it most of the countries getting fucked don't have them and the aggressor always seems to do. I realize this is very simplified and many things I'm probably not seeing but I'm open to learn.

417 points by mariuz 7mo ago

Those Danes should study the Falklands war. Using F35 in this situation is like brining in a billion dollar paperweight to the battle.s

jacquesm 7mo ago
That doesn't matter. It is not so much about whether the USA could do this and expect to win, of course they can. Nobody has any doubt about that. It is about gross miscalculation of consequences. Attack Greenland ->attack Denmark, attack Denmark -> Attack the EU. So you don't attack Greenland. Because that would be wrong. Unless all that stuff about shining cities on hills was nonsense. Instead of making America great again the US has ceded power to China.
- ericmay 7mo ago
  The US wouldn’t even need to “attack” Greenland. What is there to even attack? 50 Danish soldiers? They could just say “that’s ours”, ignore whatever Europe says, and start doing whatever they wanted to do and instead force the EU to attack American forces or civilian business interests. I’m not suggesting this is a good idea or anything but there’s a ton of other ways that something like this could play out which involves more difficult ways to counter than you might think. > Instead of making America great again the US has ceded power to China. What power has the US ceded?
  - ta20240528 7mo ago
    The UK only had to send a single officer to Greenland to stop Trump's previous attempt to annex Greenland. That was a signal, thankfully there are still adults in the USA who recognised it.
    - ericmay 7mo ago
      [flagged]
      - ta20240528 7mo ago
        You clearly don't know British understatement. Firing on one British officer would be as bad a firing on 10000. It's about lines.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        This kind of stuff masked you feel good to say but the UK isn’t going to stop the US if it (somewhat foolishly in my opinion) decided that it was going to take Greenland. Neither is the EU.
        ta20240528 7mo ago
        You are mistaking the battle for the war: Denmark / EU would no doubt lose the BATTLE for Greenland. Within hours. But the sun would rise the next day and the USA won't like the 'non-kinetic' consequences. Too many to enumerate. Eventually the adults in USA would just return it.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        No it would be a point of no return. But the "non-kinetic" consequences would go both ways. It's not an exercise we should entertain, though the EU needs to step up in a very serious way and spend billions of Euros adding new equipment to Greenland to beef up detection and defense.
        Jensson 7mo ago
        EU has more arctic warfare equipment than USA does, USA doesn't do much arctic warfare so the war would likely be much more expensive for USA than EU. Most regular equipment doesn't work in -40C temperatures, to take Greenland USA would need to develop more arctic enabled weaponry just for that.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    > What power has the US ceded? Seriously? You live in a multi-polar world, there are three major power blocks and Europe isn't one of them, though that may change now (we're sick of war, but we're also sick of the threat of war, which one of the two will win out is up for grabs). There is - or rather, was, by now - Russia, China and the USA. Russia is unacceptable for many reasons, China is too clever for its own good in the longer term and the United States was historically our ally. The United States has thrown away 80 years or so of very carefully and very expensively built up soft power because someone didn't understand the concept (apparently just like you). That doesn't translate into ownership and it doesn't in any way give you control but it ensures that things will, at least most of the times, go your way because of momentum and because it makes sense by default. Just like you may disagree on some stuff with your friends but you're not going to rob their homes, just because you can (and maybe just because they gave you the key to the back door). You throw that away at your peril and because Russia is in no way capable of capitalizing on that the Chinese are. I wouldn't be surprised at all if in a decade or two the US$ is no longer the reserve currency. It could happen a lot faster than that. The US economy is teetering on the edge of the abyss and if you think that your ability to project power isn't diminished then maybe by the end of the Iran war you'll get it. The US maximized its post-war power on the 10th of September 2001. Since then it has gone down hill very steadily and the fall rapidly accelerated with Trump. I see no reason to believe this will change, all institutions that were supposed to provide checks and balances have failed. And all China has to do is to look sane in comparison, that's not super hard.
    - ericmay 7mo ago
      > You live in a multi-polar world, there are three major power blocks and Europe isn't one of them, though that may change now (we're sick of war, but we're also sick of the threat of war, which one of the two will win out is up for grabs). There is - or rather, was, by now - Russia, China and the USA. Russia is unacceptable for many reasons, China is too clever for its own good in the longer term and the United States was historically our ally. We live in a multi-polar world. Sure. But I disagree with your assertion that there are three major power blocks. The US and China are the only two. Europe has a decent sized and advanced economy but it lacks military power and is politically fragmented and always will be. China is building military power but lacks the ability and will to project that power. Manufacturing and economic powerhouse rivaling the United States. No doubt about that. Russia isn't a pole in this world. As President Obama said back in the 2010s I believe "Russia is a nuclear armed gas station". That was true then, and it's still true today. > The United States has thrown away 80 years or so of very carefully and very expensively built up soft power because someone didn't understand the concept (apparently just like you). Well, I don't think this is true for one. And secondly if it takes just a year or so to throw away that power then it was just a matter of time until the EU got mad at the US for doing something and threw it away anyways. > You throw that away at your peril and because Russia is in no way capable of capitalizing on that the Chinese are. What soft power is the Chinese capitalizing on? Is it their support for Russia and supplying money, weapons, and equipment for their war in Ukraine? Or is it the soft power they had in Venezuela, Cuba, and Iran that they have just lost because of US military action? > I wouldn't be surprised at all if in a decade or two the US$ is no longer the reserve currency. It could happen a lot faster than that. The US economy is teetering on the edge of the abyss and if you think that your ability to project power isn't diminished then maybe by the end of the Iran war you'll get it. The US ability to project power isn't being diminished by the Iran war, only being exercised. Talking heads for some reason think that when you launch an aerial assault against a country that is amassing ballistic missiles, drones (which they build and sell to Russia to go bomb innocent Ukrainians), and more that it should be over within 24 hours and that the enemy shouldn't be able to fight back. It's unrealistic. Nevermind Iran launching these missiles at civilian targets in countries throughout the Middle East. I get the argument that if you hose a US military base that the base is a target, but there's no excuse for attacking civilian apartment complexes and such. It also misses the fact that, we've seen this movie before with North Korea. Except if Iran gets a nuclear weapon they also have control over your oil supply and it would kick off a nuclear arms race in the region because Saudi Arabia and others certainly aren't going to let Iran be the only one with nuclear weapons. These are tough problems to deal with, and from the sidelines it's easy to think about how simple the solution is or point out all the mistakes, but the alternative headline here is the US does nothing, all of these Middle Eastern countries get nuclear bombs, Iran loads up on ballistic missiles, and then who knows exactly what will happen? Do they nuke Israel and Israel nukes them back? Do they extract a toll on oil passing through the Straight of Hormuz like they are as of today declaring they will do?
  - enoint 7mo ago
    It wasn’t even about Greenland, but a distraction from the extent of Trump’s knowledge of Epstein. Anyway, there’s actually an index for soft power. Eliminating USAID halved that index. China built the highways, hospitals and water treatment instead.
  - Eupolemos 7mo ago
    What power? Economic power (US will no longer be the world reserve currency). The power of allies (see Trump begging for help in Hormuz). All the soft power it ever had.
    - ericmay 7mo ago
      > Economic power (US will no longer be the world reserve currency). As a reminder, reserve currencies are just currencies that are held in large amounts by national banks and other important institutions. The USD, like the Euro, Yen, Pound, and others are all reserve currencies. The USD is the dominant currency, in part because the US is in the Middle East right now doing exactly what it is doing by using the military to enforce trade for oil in USD. But if the US loses that "status" it just.... reverts to being more like the EU? Doesn't seem so bad to me. There's also pros/cons with being "the reserve currency". > The power of allies (see Trump begging for help in Hormuz). See Europe begging for help in Ukraine. I don't think this is a good argument. If 4 years of Trump being mean was all it took to erase all soft power the US ever had, then it never had it in the first place and it wasn't worth caring about.
      - saulapremium 7mo ago
        >If 4 years of Trump being mean was all it took to erase all soft power the US ever had, then it never had it in the first place and it wasn't worth caring about That's a weird statement. Like all it was were some empty words. The current system, which you don't think is worth caring about, has been exceptionally good for the US. The US is the wealthiest nation in the world. Do you think this is simply because Americans are superior human beings? Also, >See Europe begging for help in Ukraine ..what, exactly, are you trying to say here? Other than yes, the US does in fact seem to be siding with Putin in spite of a few attempts at acting neutral.
        ericmay 7mo ago
        > That's a weird statement. What do you find weird about it? > The current system, which you don't think is worth caring about, has been exceptionally good for the US. I'm not against the current system, generally speaking. Critical of it, at times, absolutely. But not against it. Apologies if I gave you the wrong impression there. > The US is the wealthiest nation in the world. Do you think this is simply because Americans are superior human beings? I think our culture and policies were superior, and then toss in a gigantic country with access to both oceans, incredible natural resources, and well protected and you have a recipe for an economic and military super power. So it's a combination of things really. I wouldn't be quick to dismiss the cultural attributes though. > ..what, exactly, are you trying to say here? Idk, people are making fun of the US "begging for help" against Iran. I'm going to make fun of the EU begging for US help against Ukraine. > Other than yes, the US does in fact seem to be siding with Putin in spite of a few attempts at acting neutral. US isn't siding with Putin. China and Iran are though. Or have you forgotten that Iran [1] is building and selling drones to Russia who is using those drones to bomb innocent civilians in Ukraine? Or have you also forgotten that China is supplying Russia with equipment and weaponry, often times under cover to evade sanctions? But sure, saulapremium, it's the US who is siding with Putin and we certainly didn't give Ukraine tens of billions of dollars in support, we certainly didn't rush missiles to Ukraine to help them fight against Russia, nor did we sanction Russia to hell, stop Venezuela from skirting those sanctions, and we can't possibly still providing intelligence and targeting support to Ukraine. This is what I'm talking about. If all it takes are a few mean words from our idiot president and now all of a sudden it's the US who is siding with Russia, then what are we even doing here? Why should Americans even bother caring about our allies? You need a recalibration in your understanding of who is doing what here and who the bad guys are. [1] Iran is also funding militias in the Middle East to try and start wars, today is hanging people for peacefully protesting, killed an estimated 30,000 of its own citizens this year over protests, and when the US attacked its military instead of just targeting military bases, or even the oil infrastructure, Iran is lobbying missiles at apartment complexes, threatening to kill people at amusement parks worldwide, and more.
  - KaiserPro 7mo ago
    > What power has the US ceded? Before this, we (large multinational infra company) were happily using AWS, microsoft and a bunch of other US based companies. Now we are beginning the migration away, not because its cheaper or better, but because we just don't think that we can trust the contracts we have with them any more. This isn't a sudden thing, we are not going to do it over night. But we are not renewing multi-million dollar contracts in the coming years for stuff that would have been a no brainer last year.
    - traceroute66 7mo ago
      > not because its cheaper or better Actually, in a number of cases EU cloud is cheaper and better. In terms of "better", spec wise it is not uncommon to get more bang for your buck in the EU cloud, especially around compute. In terms of "cheaper", that too. AWS, Azure etc. will happily sit there all day nickle and diming you through obscure pricing structures with all sorts of small-print. Good luck, for example, figuring out if you're going to go over your "provisioned IOPS-month" on AWS EBS, whatever the hell that is. And have fun with all the nickle-and-diming on AWS S3. Meanwhile on EU providers a lot of stuff is free that the US providers nickle and dime you for, and the stuff that is charged is done in a manner where you actually CAN forecast your spend. And then of course there is the real EU sovereignty. Not the fake US-cloud-in-Europe which despite what the US providers salesdroids try to tell you is still subject to CLOUD, PATRIOT and everything else.
    - ericmay 7mo ago
      It’s interesting how these conversations always start and end with “my company isn’t buying XYZ American cloud provider services” while ignoring other incredibly important products and services that you can’t or are unwilling to boycott. Are you turning in your MacBook Pro and iPhone, or are you putting a bumper sticker on it saying you bought it before you knew America was crazy? Similarly, while it's great to take a principled stand here (it's yet again interesting how it's always a principled stand against American companies but never others), while you are busy spending time and money migrating away from AWS to a competing product that has worse features and is more expensive as you said, you should hope your competitors are too because if not, they're going to be delivering features faster and more cheaply. Something worth thinking about there. I don't think Microsoft losing some European contracts is an example of the US ceding power.
- petterroea 7mo ago
  Living in Japan, I meet and talk to Chinese when out drinking. Many of them are almost literally ROFLing about how the US practically just gave away everything they had to China. It's as if the US is playing poker with their cards facing up on the table. Chinese already consider themselves the defacto superpower. If mainstream media in the US showed this, I bet the politics would look different.
  - steinvakt2 7mo ago
    Seems weird. China is definitely falling behind. India is not.
    - petterroea 7mo ago
      They are pretty happy with having superiority on high tech manufacturing and robotics. You basically cannot manufacture something without using China - even if you try. I don't think they consider the TSMC EUV monopoly a long term threat. Doing good on AI as well, you bet the OSS chinese models causing stock panic in the US makes them laugh. On the topic of manufacturing outside China, the YouTuber "Smarter Every day" (Destin Sandlin) has a series on manufacturing and feels strongly about manufacturing having moved out of the country. As an experiment he tried to manufacture something without China, but was unable to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZTGwcHQfLY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZTGwcHQfLY
      - jacquesm 7mo ago
        I have some friends who are doing things 'China free' and it is possible but it comes at a very substantial premium.
        petterroea 7mo ago
        I think the most interesting takeaway from this video in question is that he tried to buy material from an Indian seller, who promised it was Indian. When the box arrived, it had the name of a Chinese factory on it.
- 1over137 7mo ago
  >It is not so much about whether the USA could do this and expect to win, of course they can. Nobody has any doubt about that. Um, lots of us have doubts about that. The USA couldn't win against Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq; why do you think it could win against Greenland? Greenlanders actually have a lot of guns; and likely most of Europe and Canada would also go to war against the USA.
  - Quothling 7mo ago
    I'm Danish. There are 56k people in Greenland and almost half of them live in Nuuk. The USA could frankly "take" greenland simply by putting a warship there and saying it was theirs. Not really sure why it was ever on the table though. The USA has basically free reign to expand it's military bases there, aside from the ban on nuclear weapons. Sure it would need approval by both Greenland and Denmark, but up until recently we were frankly more allied with the USA than the EU, and I doubt we've ever really said no before. We even bought the damn f35's despite them being so much more expensive than the alternatives, primarily because our history with the F16's. Which would probably have been a possiblity considering we're now debating whether or not to have french nuclear weapon carrying planes stationed on Danish soil in the fallout of the USA no longer being a trusty NATO ally. If it was because of resources, then American companies are frankly free to extract them as long as they reach deals with Greenland about it. If the USA had waited a few years for Greenland to gain more independence then it would have been even easier.
  - gregw2 7mo ago
    Not the parent poster but, while I acknowledge your point on Canada and Europe entering the conflict (and I'd add that the highly motivated Dutch punch well above their weight in intelligence and economic spheres and this whole scenario of US invasion is a Putin dream), when you ask "why do you think it could win...", the 50k population of Greenland is smaller than Granada (100k) and three orders of magnitude smaller than Vietnam/Afghanistan/Iraq (~40m). So I find its insurgency potential hard to compare to those examples you give.
  - iso1631 7mo ago
    Doesn't need to. America can just leave the towns alone and do whatever it wants elsewhere. It will cost a fortune, but nobody is going to go 500 miles over an ice pack to raid a US mining settlement.
- eunos 7mo ago
  > Attack Greenland ->attack Denmark, attack Denmark -> Attack the EU. Rhetoric and public support aside, I honestly very much doubt that there will be a solid EU military response. For many countries like Baltic, Eastern Europe and Nordic countries (ironically DK included). US military support means life or death of their countries. I imagine they'd stall response like what Hungary did and hope that Greenland annexed become fait accompli.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    > US military support means life or death of their countries. Meant. They have begun to realize that this has changed and realize that if this were put to the test that the US military would likely not hold up their end of NATO. What you wrote would have made good sense in 2015, but today it makes a lot less sense and with every passing day that gap is widening. The Baltics have become the voice of reason and ethics in Europe, Poland is much stronger than parties outside of Europe seem to realize, France is always going to be a force to be reckoned with and we have no doubt about where the UK stands, then there are Finland, Sweden and Norway who all are automatically on the side of anything that Denmark is involved in and I wouldn't be surprised at all if Canada would become part of it, because they too have a lot to lose. There is a good reason why Putin has not risked engaging the EU and that's not just because the United States is still formally part of NATO.
- fulafel 7mo ago
  From military consequences pov, EU isn't a military alliance but it would of course also be attacking NATO.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    The EU absolutely is a military alliance as well.
    - fulafel 7mo ago
      That's a heterodox interpretation. Something akin to it was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_European_Union but it's no more.
      - jacquesm 7mo ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_and_defense_pacts_of_the_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_and_defense_pacts_of_... https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/glossary/collective-defence.html https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/glossary/collecti...
        fulafel 7mo ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_alliances https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_alliances The EU treaty has a clause that calls for assistance for part of the members (who are not neutral) but there's no military structure outside NATO. There's also a perpatual public debate about whether EU should become a military alliance. eg https://theloop.ecpr.eu/can-the-eu-form-an-autonomous-military-alliance/ https://theloop.ecpr.eu/can-the-eu-form-an-autonomous-milita... In practical terms, in event of a invasion, only NATO has a organisation set up for coordinated response.
        jacquesm 7mo ago
        You are really completely clueless, I have no idea why you keep posting comments that contradict your own comments but fine, whatever. There are four different mutual defense pacts in Europe and there is an umbrella one and they all operate independently of NATO. And then there is NATO, with or without the USA.
WinstonSmith84 7mo ago
Argentina didn't lose the war because they came with fighter jets, but because their fighter jets were throwing scrap metal at British boats. Had these detonated, the outcome would have been different, and expensive for UK. I don't doubt that F35 are working very well in comparison to the junk Argentina was using.
- throwa356262 7mo ago
  Wasn't there a kill switch in the missiles? Didn't UK get really really annoyed with France in the one instance their kill switch Didn't work?
  - zelos 7mo ago
    Argentina only had 6 Exocets. I think the parent is referring to the failure of the fuses in the bombs the Argentinian pilots dropped on British ships.
KaiserPro 7mo ago
They did study the falklands war, thats why they were planning to blow up the runway should shit go wrong. The idea was to make it as difficult as possible to invade, not to stop it, because that’s largely impossible.
IAmBroom 7mo ago
I'm sure they'd be grateful for your expert analysis. Maybe you could offer to teach at their war college?
tim333 7mo ago
I'm not sure what lesson they are supposed to learn from the Falklands. It was somewhat swung when we sank the Belgrano using a nuclear sub. Sometimes these billion dollar high tech things work.

jacquesm 7mo ago

Of course they were. The United States has never before damaged its own reputation in Europe as much as they did in the last 12 months. And the same goes for Canada, possibly worse. You don't go around threatening your allies unless you really have plans and that's why you don't elect senile old guys to positions of power.

equilibrium 7mo ago
Europe and the rest of the world.
philipallstar 7mo ago
> that's why you don't elect senile old guys to positions of power. Anyone of principle would have been saying this before 2025, and far louder.
- jacquesm 7mo ago
  Note that this is from a country that wouldn't exist if not for the allied countries and that the US has somehow managed to all but erase that reputation. We recognize our debt, we also recognize that this is to a country that no longer exists in a meaningful way. All we have now is multiple variations of the mob.
  - jjtwixman 7mo ago
    Yeah the US we knew is gone. I think about this sometimes when I am listening to American music from the 20th century, how much soft power they had, how great they made America sound either directly or indirectly. That America that we all looked up to and admired is gone. Pity.
    - butILoveLife 7mo ago
      [flagged]
      - 7mo ago

Planktonne 7mo ago

That is a very reasonable response to the threats they faced.

butILoveLife 7mo ago
[flagged]
- ta20240528 7mo ago
  Nah mate, Rich powerful countries could also keep slaves and no one would be able to stop it by force. But they don't. Civilisation advances.
  - philipallstar 7mo ago
    They don't because the west banned slavery on moral grounds, and enforced it on the rest of the world. That advance is actually just western power in effect.
    - mcv 7mo ago
      That ban on slavery is not being enforced on the rest of the world. The west had no problem playing football in Qatar in stadiums built by slave labour.
      - philipallstar 7mo ago
        Well, not any more! This was hundreds of years ago. The British Empire isn't exactly around any more.
        mcv 7mo ago
        What was hundreds of years ago? Several western countries still allowed slavery well into the second half of the 19th century.
    - 7mo ago

matsemann 7mo ago

Russia's invasion ironically strengthened NATO, with more countries joining or feeling the usefulness of it. Somehow the US managed to break down all that good will in such a short amount of time.. I think it's hard to overstate how much more hostile people look at the US the last few years. So much soft power has been lost.

fortyseven 7mo ago
> I think it's hard to overstate how much more hostile people look at the US the last few years. True both outside AND inside the country.
nxm 7mo ago
[flagged]
- matsemann 7mo ago
  This is very reductive. European countries pay a lot into their defense, especially the last few years. It's not as black&white as a certain person likes to claim.
- thibran 7mo ago
  You forget that you got a say for that money in a lot of parts of the world, which is one of the primary reasons the US is so wealthy. Europe took the deal that the US "handels the war stuff in the world" for some influence. If we handle the "war stuff", the US influence will be gone in Europe.
- Imustaskforhelp 7mo ago
  While at it, let's finally remove American Dollar as the de-facto currency all around the world because part of the agreement between EU and America was that American dollars would become the global currency and EU would get defense security in return which was mutually benefitial to both. To be honest, EU will invest in its own defense in coming years. The cat is out of the box, US proved to be an unstable partner/even an enemy for a country like denmark that you had to prepare to fight full scare war against.

silvestrov 7mo ago

> * The Danish public broadcaster DR reports ...* This is the source article (in Danish) for the bluesky posts: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...

Trasmatta 7mo ago

The US president wanted to start a full on war with Europe over Greenland of all places. And he still might. And some people will still claim I just have "TDS".

breakyerself 7mo ago
TDS is an apt description for anyone supporting this senile, psychopath.
- Trasmatta 7mo ago
  Yes. The only TDS is the one exhibited by those that are so brainwashed by his cult of personality.

crispyambulance 7mo ago

There's a difference between "posturing" for show and actually "preparing for war". They're wise to the fact that "the Stable Genius" isn't going to try anything violent with Denmark/Greenland, but they still want to prevent him thinking about just stealing territory "peacefully."

Trasmatta 7mo ago
This is the type of thinking that convinced people that Trump would never be stupid enough to start a full on war with Iran. And yet here we are.
jacquesm 7mo ago
Trust me, Denmark wasn't posturing. The assumption was - and still is - that the USA wasn't posturing either. We (and I realize I obviously don't speak for all of Europe but I have my finger on the pulse in many places here) are also not assuming that when Trump is gone the USA will go back to normal.
- Insanity 7mo ago
  And even if they did go back to normal for the next presidency - why trust it? Their entire political system is set up so that the winds can change entirely every 4 years. If the people voted Trump in to office twice, it’ll happen again. It’s a divided country where propaganda has a strong hold.
  - dspillett 7mo ago
    Useful stability can be achieved again, either “back to normal” as mentioned elsewhere in this thread or “forward to something different but better (and not crap like it is now)”, but it is going to take at least a few terms, maybe several. Even if it did happen more quickly, it will take that long for those of us on the outside to trust it, reputational damage like this can not be undone quickly.
  - deleted 7mo ago
    [deleted]

SideburnsOfDoom 7mo ago

Si vis pacem, para bellum.

smcin 7mo ago

Source cited by @chriso-wiki.bsky.social is this article on DR.dk, the Danish public broadcaster: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...

seydor 7mo ago

You mean, they are not anymore?

Havoc 7mo ago
The goldfish prez seems to have moved on to Cuba now

wewewedxfgdf 7mo ago

What else would they be doing, watching TV?

fergie 7mo ago

Thats probably what this was all about then (use Google Translate) -> https://www.nrk.no/norge/gradert-sak-behandlet-i-ekstraordinaert-statsrad-1.17815309 https://www.nrk.no/norge/gradert-sak-behandlet-i-ekstraordin...

mailund 7mo ago
I don't think it's very likely that the emergency meeting in the Norwegian government yesterday was called because of the security situation in Denmark 3 months ago. Not unlikely that it is related to US-Europe/NATO relations ofc (although there are plenty of other things that would cause an emergency meeting as well, king has been hospitalized plenty of times lately, wife of the next in line is deep in drama due to both being revealed to have been close with Epstein and having a son that is currently in court for some pretty serious allegations, and sharing a border Russia that is currently waging hybrid warfare across europe) Just for some additional context, these meetings are held every week, but this caused headlines because there was held an additional one outside of the normal schedule due to some classified time sensitive case, i.e. not something that happened in another country many months ago.

kelipso 7mo ago

Lol there is posturing and there is whatever this is.

polotics 7mo ago

Tu as le droit de perdre, mais tu n'as pas le droit de te faire surprendre. (You have the right to lose, but you do not have the right to be caught off guard.)

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
ctdinjeu3 7mo ago
[flagged]
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]

emmelaich 7mo ago

The idea that the US would attempt to take Greenland by force is utterly ludicrous.

bell-cot 7mo ago
Unfortunately, that adjective applies to many things which the US has attempted, often "successfully", recently.
1over137 7mo ago
Lots of what Trump says is utterly ludicrous. But he does lots of what he says (though not everything), so the rest of the world is right to prepare.
vrganj 7mo ago
So is the idea that the US would start bombing Iran without a plan, goal, or any thought to the consequences, yet here we are...
- Jensson 7mo ago
  There is a difference, basically the entire world hates the Iranian regime and wants them gone, USA bombing the Iranian regime wont get that much pushback from the world even if the war was started in an underhanded way. It is entirely different if USA starts attacking NATO allies such as Denmark which isn't a threat or problem to anyone, that is not something anybody would expect and it would ruin American diplomacy completely.
  - dcpit 7mo ago
    Does US care about diplomacy anymore ?
    - Jensson 7mo ago
      Yeah, otherwise why would Trump only attack hated countries? He would have already started bombing Canada since its the closest.

hermannj314 7mo ago

France offering support to little ententes to prevent facist revanchism. Seems familiar. World tension continues to increase.

shablulman 7mo ago

[dead]

KaiMagnus 7mo ago

And this is, in my opinion, why support at Hormuz shouldn’t even be on the table. How can you possibly hold joint patrols when you were just months ago planning full scale war between each other?

verelo 7mo ago
Also, the "was" in this title feels misleading. If they're not still, they're crazy.
- freehorse 7mo ago
  The original title is better translated as "prepared". The tweeting reposter translated to continuous past tense somewhat erroneously imo, because it sounds as if the preparation was interrupted by something.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    Preparation is an ongoing thing. And not just in Denmark.
lm28469 7mo ago
> And this is, in my opinion, why support at Hormuz shouldn’t even be on the table Shouldn't? it's not on the table at all lol
- freehorse 7mo ago
  Well it is on the table but only trump is sitting on that table.
- Jensson 7mo ago
  It is on the table, why are you spouting bullshit? People are discussing this right now. Or do you mean Denmark wont help at Hormuz, but I doubt Denmark would help there anyway, but other countries are discussing that. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-military-iran-war-strait-hormuz-oil-prices-b2941629.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-military-i...

rishabhaiover 7mo ago

[flagged]

Trasmatta 7mo ago
The US threatening to invade European territory, and Europe preparing to fight a war against the US, is absolutely "some interesting new phenomenon".
- pembrook 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - Jensson 7mo ago
    Denmark is a part of NATO, attacking them would mean the entirety of NATO would go against USA, not just Denmark. It is reasonable to assume the entirety of NATO would put up enough resistance that USA had to withdraw from that war without getting Greenland, because Trump would get removed from office by being so hated by the people before the rest of NATO gave up.
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    The choice to possibly go to war was not Denmark's. An invasion of territory is a war.
pembrook 7mo ago
[flagged]
__bjoernd 7mo ago
No one forces you to be that guy :)
mirekrusin 7mo ago
Top class comedy is allowed though.
originalvichy 7mo ago

krona 7mo ago

I live very close to one of the USAF's largest European airbases. While Trump was trolling European leaders about their security posture (by threatening to relieve them of sovereign territory which the US already has extensive access to) the USAF was already moving assets in the opposite direction to the middle east (this was mid-january). It's fairly easy to work out what's happening if you ignore the orange man and listen to what serious people are saying, what they've briefed on, how they contradict one another, and where the assets are moving. Obviously European leaders have to pretend to take the orange man seriously, but the reaction in the media was bordering on hysterical.

enoint 7mo ago
This is exactly right. The liar who lies to control the narrative is lying again. The chance he’s lying is high but as adults the (likelihood * hazard) of an invasion is worth preparing for. The narrative he wanted to control was about Epstein. Denmark could have simultaneously prepared for that, but it wouldn’t be on OSInt Twitter.
- InsideOutSanta 7mo ago
  The problem is that his "lies" and "jokes" sometimes suddenly turned out to be not lies and jokes.
  - enoint 7mo ago
    More precisely, propaganda is always fake. After verification it’s possibly true, but it still began fake. Trump could try supporting his utterances with fact, but he doesn’t. It’s rational to prepare for his propaganda to sometimes accidentally turn out true. Hence this relatively modest response. But the narrative most reliably supported by fact is that Trump hasn’t kept his story straight about Epstein.
techterrier 7mo ago
> It's fairly easy to work out what's happening off you go then, what is it?

0xcb0 7mo ago

The United States are not longer an allie nor a friend to to EU. Under Trump, they have turned into a Terror regiem, ignoring international law, human rights. They have to be international isolated together with Israel. They are the enemy of a free and civilized world!

Ekaros 7mo ago
I think that started with Bush and continued with Obama. Who with his financial donators still walk free after committing mass murders.

ZeroGravitas 7mo ago

The billionaire oligarch who put that (stupid) idea in Trump's head is still out there. His son-in-law will probably be the next head of the Federal Reserve. If the oligarchs don't feel any pushback they'll continue to wreck the US and Europe.

andrewclunn 7mo ago

[flagged]

ctdinjeu3 7mo ago

[flagged]

vrganj 7mo ago

> As a source puts it, the French said: "Would you like more soldiers? You could have them. Would you like more naval support? You could have that. Would you like more air support? You could have that too." Thank God for the French. I long thought their strong Gaullist stance on sovereignty was a bit silly in today's world, but turns out they were right along. Europe can't trust any outside powers. Any external dependency can and will be used against us. We used to be wide-eyed believers in international corporation and global alliances, but those are, as it turns out, always a risk and a liability. I sure as hell am glad the French kept being stubborn enough to build most capabilities in-house, so now we have our own nuclear deterrent, aircraft carrier and fighter jet programs. Imagine if we had gone all-in on American weapons tech! They'd have us, excuse my French, by the balls!

mamonster 7mo ago
>I long thought their strong Gaullist stance on sovereignty was a bit silly in today's world, but turns out they were right along. Every single French president since Mitterand (with a brief exception for Iraq that was more than made up by Libya) spent a large part of their time liquidating Gaullism.
terminalshort 7mo ago
History shows that Europe can't trust any inside powers either...
- vrganj 7mo ago
  pre-EU history shows that, which is why we founded the EU in the first place. To quote one of our founding fathers, Robert Schuman, the point of tightly interweaving our economies this way is to "make war not only unthinkable, but materially impossible"
  - deleted 7mo ago
    [deleted]
  - terminalshort 7mo ago

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

beanjuiceII 7mo ago

lol Denmark yea i'm sure no one was concerned

bryanlarsen 7mo ago

Keep in mind that militaries are always preparing for war. They have to. A military exists in large part to always be prepared for the unthinkable. And in the case of countries like Denmark who have few realistic enemy choices, that means they must be prepared for unrealistic invasions, even if the US isn't threatening to invade. Yes the Danes probably spend most of their time preparing to fight the Russians, but always wargaming the same thing leaves them unprepared for different enemies or unexpected approaches from expected enemies. Yes, the actions in the links are more than just wargaming, but a large part of it is stuff the military should be doing anyways.

halJordan 7mo ago
No thats not what this was. These are the actions that the Russians did before invading Ukraine and were the specific actions that the military pointed out and said "these aren't normal actions everyone is always doing"
estearum 7mo ago
Hot take: Preparing to defend your country from an ally invading you is actually very bad and indicative of inexcusable behavior from your "ally." > that means they must be prepared for unrealistic invasions, even if the US isn't threatening to invade. It's not unrealistic to think the US would invade Greenland. We've now had 10+ years of this "it's a joke... no it's a bargaining chip... well it's overstated... okay it's temporary... ahh yes well this is Good, Actually."
magicalhippo 7mo ago
> Keep in mind that militaries are always preparing for war. There's preparing and there's preparing. They sent soldiers to Greenland with orders to resist an invasion, packing live ammunition, explosives to destroy runways and blood bags to treat wounded. That's more than a bit of wargaming.

jeroenhd 7mo ago

Every week, the USA finds a new way to lose credibility as a serious nation. If it weren't for the observably fair elections, you'd almost think America was being taken over from the inside by foreign infiltrators. It's ludicrous to see the USA threaten to invade a well-connected European country, invade a South American country weeks after, and then now, three months later, beg its European allies to help with the invasion of Iran because ostensibly American leadership couldn't foresee that war in the Middle East might impact fuel prices. I still think it's a ruse to distract the European military by sending the navy to the Middle East but who knows with the current idiot in charge. I hope the country will recover some normalcy in post-Trump decade(s), but I fear we're witnessing the slow collapse of a world power. Regardless of anyone's feelings on grip the East/West dichotomy has had over the world in the past 90 or so years, such shifts in world power rarely go calmly and peacefully.

jacquesm 7mo ago
> If it weren't for the observably fair elections Hehe, that's a good one.

pogue 7mo ago

The source of this post is this article from a site called dr.dk. Maybe someone can double check the validity of it. Danmark forberedte sig på muligt angreb fra USA [Danish language - no native translation] https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered... Google translated URL: https://www-dr-dk.translate.goog/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp&_x_tr_hist=true https://www-dr-dk.translate.goog/nyheder/indland/groenland/d...

hagbarth 7mo ago
Danish public broadcaster. Probably the best reputation in the world on Danish news.
fasterik 7mo ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_(broadcaster) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DR_(broadcaster) >DR is a Danish public-service radio and television broadcasting company. Founded in 1925 as a public-service organization, it is Denmark's oldest and largest electronic media enterprise.

the_af 7mo ago

I have no doubts they took US threats seriously; anyone who doesn't these days is a fool (of course, this doesn't mean Trump will do anything he claims, but he's dangerous enough you can never tell for sure). What I find harder to believe is that they were preparing for "full-scale war". That makes no sense. Using F-35, American made and very likely with kill switches or otherwise susceptible to American interference? And where would they get their American made parts and supplies? And Denmark stands no chance at all against US military might, with or without assistance from France. I'm sure they were prepared to engage in token resistance, and also more serious diplomatic and economic struggles, but "full-scale war" is hyperbole.

apexalpha 7mo ago

We all were... they wouldn't speak it but reading between the lines you could see the leaders were very nervous Trump would unilaterally decide to just 'try it' like in Venezuela and now Iran.

torginus 7mo ago

The F-35 is mentioned in the article as being readied for the defense of Greenland. I wonder what the 'easter-eggs' Danes would've found out about it if they went up against the US. (I think I know, it has to do with how its 'stealth' works.)

jacquesm 7mo ago
In a way that would be great. Then we could grow up a little bit faster.
- 1718627440 7mo ago
  Yeah at some point we need to know.
throwawayfour 7mo ago
Well if that were to happen, that would be the end of a lot of defense business that the US does with many countries around the world.
- torginus 7mo ago
  I mean it has already happened. The F-35 relies on very thick (10cm+) layer of radar absorbing structures with special internal geometries (don't wanna go into detail regarding this). Unfortunately if the precise construction of said structures is known, it becomes vulnerable to specially crafted radar pulses which make it generate strong returns. So it's paramount that the exact layout be kept secret (and likely there's some variation between manufacturing batches, but this is just conjecture). Needless to say, the US very likely has this info on every jet it sold, and a sufficiently motivated and sophisticated adversary can likely figure this out if the plane spends a long enough time in front of their radars. That's why the US has been extremely careful about where and how the F-35 gets to fly.

nickdothutton 7mo ago

I think there is a pretty good chance US is in the late empire phase. This is not about a single President or party, or even single geopolitical event/development.

iso1631 7mo ago
> This is not about a single President or party I've seen roughly two types of American commentators over the last year. The ones that cheer this stuff going on, which HN has plenty of, and the ones that think "come the midterms/2028/impeachment everything will go back to normal" The latter are massively mistaken, it would take decades for the US to rebuild its standing in the eyes of the world, and there is no evidence that it even wants to. Trump is a symptom of what America truly is, not the cause.
- tartuffe78 7mo ago
  He is also a singular political figure. I don't think things will go back to normal, but they won't stay the way there are now.
  - iso1631 7mo ago
    If it wasn't Trump it would be someone else. There are very few people in history that are that pivotal individually. Had Franz Ferdinand not been shot, something else would have sparked WW1. Had Hitler not existed, then someone else would have emerged. Maybe Churchill was more of a pivot than most, had the UK gone for Hastings after Chamberlain then perhaps the UK would have sued for peace, allowing Germany to fully concentrate on Russia, but it's still a stretch to have Germany ultimately prevailing over Stalin. Had the US not won independence in 1776 (which is unlikely to be the sole cause of a single person), it would have been gained anyway, just like the other new world colonies from Canada to Brazil. The conditions that exist are far bigger than one man
- rntksi 7mo ago
  I think Naval is right when he was making the observation that history has alternated by being determined by either individuals (think Genghis Khan, Napoleon) or larger forces at play (think socio-economic reasoning to many historical events). In this, I would say Trump is Trump (the individual) making his moves that very much go against the larger forces at play that was "business as usual". So equating him to a symptom of America is true in the sense that sooner or later America was bound to have someone like him deviate the course of history, and I also believe post-Trump America is not going to reverse course.

simonsarris 7mo ago

Where was this kind of movement when Russia invaded Europe in 2022? I think Europe's inaction in 2022 will go down as the greatest moral failing of the century. You can't say "they didn't act because Russia is a nuclear power" - the same is true here.

jacquesm 7mo ago
Not everybody can be painted with the 'inaction' label, there are plenty of people that are doing a lot of good work.
tim333 7mo ago
I think most people in Europe figured the US would oppose Russia invading as that's mostly what has happened for decades. In the Denmark case I don't know if they can count on the US opposing the US invading. It wasn't until that thing with Trump and Vance shouting at Zelensky in the oval office that Europe figured the US had kind of flipped and it was on us to support Ukraine.
FpUser 7mo ago
>"Where was this kind of movement when Russia invaded Europe in 2022" Russia has invaded Ukraine. There is no political entity called Europe. And if you're talking geography than good chunk of Russia is in Europe.

Mr_Eri_Atlov 7mo ago

You would not trust a bridge that reeked of wood rot. Why should they trust a country that smells of corruption and lashes out at random like a shambling corpse?

ChrisArchitect 7mo ago

Source: https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forberedte-sig-paa-muligt-angreb-fra-usa-floej-poser-med-blod-til-groenland-og-gjorde-klar https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/groenland/danmark-forbered...

Protostome 7mo ago

Fake report, ignore, move on

AnimalMuppet 7mo ago
Bare assertions don't count for much. What is your evidence that it is fake?

dismalaf 7mo ago

[flagged]

ax3726 7mo ago

[dead]

keybored 7mo ago

Breaking: country that a head of state threatened to invade was preparing for invasion. > The Danish public broadcaster DR reports that officials in Denmark, France and Germany say that Donald Trump's threats to seize Greenland were taken so seriously that wide-ranging preparations were made to forcibly resist a US invasion of the Danish island. Breaking (2): small country was preparing to forcibly resist (?) an invasion. That was threatened.

doublediamond21 7mo ago

[dead]

burnt-resistor 7mo ago

Other side-effects of Trump's unwise, anti-strategic hastening the downfall of hard and soft American power and respect for ego and personal gain: alternative defense pacts and nuclear proliferation. Kratocracies only respect North Korea because it has the bomb and an absurd amount of hardware pointed right at Seoul so Ukraine, Cuba, Taiwan, and Iran best get their underground tests on pronto if each desires survival.

jacquesm 7mo ago
I wonder how many countries have - reluctantly - decided to pursue nuclear bombs after many years of holding off the boat. The next decade will be a complete disaster for non-proliferation.

jeffbee 7mo ago

They'd win it, too. An alliance of Denmark, Canada, Mexico, and Iran should sack Florida and plow all the golf courses under.

AmberPromptai38 7mo ago

[dead]

AntonOtaner39 7mo ago

[dead]

giardini 7mo ago

If the article is correct (a big if) then many in the Danish government and many Danish people, along with a bunch of people/officials in other countries, may not be as stable mentally as I once thought they were. Critics never miss a chance to sit around and bitch about orange man.

banyaknyamuk827 7mo ago

[dead]

1dontnkow_ 7mo ago

This makes me think of a thought I had the last weeks and months with the geopolitical chaos currently in the world: While understanding the danger of dictators and technical mistakes and the chaos that would ensue, besides that, what would happen if just every or even just most countries had nukes? Just give them to everybody, and I'm really not convinced we would end up in a Fallout situation but maybe quite a peaceful one? No expert in that but tbh when you think about it most of the countries getting fucked don't have them and the aggressor always seems to do. I realize this is very simplified and many things I'm probably not seeing but I'm open to learn.