With Trump Again Talking about Greenland, Moscow Focusing on Faeroe Islands and Their Possible Independence

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Dec. 23 – Two Danish possessions in the north Atlantic, Greenland and the Faroe Islands, are attracting increasing attention in Washington, where President-elect Donald Trump has again suggested that he would like the US to acquire the former, and in Moscow, where a well-connected commentator suggests the Kremlin is now focusing on the Faeroes.  
    During his earlier term in office, Trump said he would like to acquire Greenland from Denmark. Although Copenhagen rejected the idea, Moscow focused on it as a potential threat to Russian interests (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/05/us-wants-greenland-as-second-alaska.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/05/moscow-sees-greenlands-moves-toward.html, jamestown.org/program/greenland-set-to-become-cockpit-of-controversy-between-east-and-west/ and jamestown.org/program/russia-expects-growing-conflict-with-us-over-greenland/).
    Until Trump was again elected and again spoke about acquiring Greenland, Moscow focused more on other islands in the North Atlantic and the Baltic Sea as places of Russian interest (jamestown.org/program/moscow-focusing-on-gotland-and-other-baltic-sea-islands-as-potential-targets/, jamestown.org/program/spitzbergen-a-new-hotspot-in-the-cold-north-between-russia-and-the-west/ and jamestown.org/program/moscows-first-move-against-nato-could-take-place-in-norways-svalbard-archipelago/).
    While Spitzbergen, Gotland, and the Aaland Islams received more Russian attention, Moscow occasionally focused on the Faroes, an autonomous Danish possession between Scandinavia and Iceland that has been more willing to continue to cooperate with (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/05/the-faroe-islands-autonomous-part-of.html).
    In a new article, Moscow security commentator Aleksey Chichkin says that Russia is interested in continuing its close cooperation with the autonomous Faroes because the autonomous region of 1400 square kilometers and 53,000 people wants to do so as well (stoletie.ru/rossiya_i_mir/farery_poshhochina_jes_702.htm).
    Because it is autonomous, the Faroe Islands are not part of the EU and have not gone along with the EU and Denmark in imposing sanctions on Russia after the Anschluss of Crimea and Putin’s launch of the expanded invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Instead, they have worked to expand trade and fishing rights with Russia.
    Some in Denmark, the Faroes and Russia see this as presaging an eventual move toward independence by the Faroe Islands and suggest that events during World War II set the stage for that. Not only did the two Danish territories refuse to surrender to Germany after the latter’s occupation of Denmark, but Iceland moved to acquire independence from Copenhagen.    
    Chichkin suggests that the Faroes could follow the same course now, a possibility that would likely increase if Russian assistance to the Faroes fishing industry expands and American interest in Greenland does as well. Were that to happen, it would likely give Russia expanded leverage over the North Atlantic as well as the entrance to the Northern Sea Route.
    Consequently, a place few in most of the countries of the West have ever heard of except for its salmon may now be on its way to becoming a cockpit of conflict between Russia, on the one hand, and the West, on the other, especially given the Kremlin’s current interest in expanding its position in these and other islands in the region.