Donald Trump is threatening to use force recklessly. Instead, he should offer a price. America has always remained faithful to a commercial approach in international relations, but purchases have often not gone through without disputes.

Axar.az reports that this was stated by the "Economist" publication.

According to the publication, History will not be as kind to Donald Trump if he gets Greenland from Denmark under duress.

When Thomas Jefferson bought Louisiana in 1803, doubling the size of the country, he had to set aside his zest for constitutional constructivism, which would have ruled out such bold federal action. Sixty-four years later, when William Seward, then secretary of state, purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2m ($162m today), the move was dubbed “Seward’s folly”. Now the Alaska deal is seen as a masterstroke and the Louisiana purchase was the greatest achievement of one of America’s greatest presidents. In hindsight, both look extraordinarily good value.

On January 7th the president-elect declined to rule out using military might or economic warfare in his pursuit of Greenland (and of the Panama Canal). America will lose friends if it bullies one into ceding territory. But Mr. Trump’s provocations are also foolish because an agreement to buy Greenland made freely and in good will, could indeed be another deal of the century. Such a deal would increase America’s security, and perhaps that of its NATO allies, too. Autocrats would be dispirited. And a purchase could also benefit the inhabitants of the island, who must—and surely would—have the final say.

What, then, is Greenland worth?

One starting point is the island’s annual GDP. At last count, in 2021, it was $3bn, or one seven-thousandth of America’s. Only 56,000 people live in Greenland, despite the fact it is bigger than any American state. Much of the territory’s output is the work of 43% of the labor force employed by the state (against 15% in America). Over half the government’s bills are paid by Denmark, which gives the territory $500m a year. The biggest industry is fishing. Removing the public sector, ignoring other spending commitments, assuming Greenland’s long-run growth continues and America’s federal government receives 16% of GDP in tax (the national average), as well as discounting using America’s 30-year Treasury yield, produces a valuation of $50bn, or a twentieth of America’s annual defense spending.

Yet Mr. Trump covets Greenland for its strategic and economic potential, rather than its puny output. The island sits between America and Russia in a part of the world that is becoming more navigable as Arctic ice melts.

On top of this, Greenland’s resource wealth is immense. It has known reserves of 43 of the 50 minerals deemed “critical” by America’s government, including probably the largest deposits of rare earths outside China. These are crucial to military kit and green-energy equipment. Wells off Greenland’s coast could yield 52bn barrels of oil, about 3% of the world’s proven reserves, according to an estimate in 2008 by the US Geological Survey.

Greenland’s resources have gone relatively unexploited owing to the difficulty of operating in the territory’s harsh, remote areas. Four-fifths of the island is covered by ice. There are not even roads linking settlements. And the government banned oil exploration in 2021. But as the climate warms, the minerals become both more accessible and more valuable. Already, perhaps the greatest resource rush ever seen, on a per-person basis, is underway. Firms are drilling at around 170 sites, up from 12 a decade ago.

From whom could the island be bought?

In 2009 Denmark all but granted Greenland the right to declare independence should its people choose such an option in a referendum. The island’s nationalist government would very much like to exercise this right. At the same time, Denmark granted the territory control of its own natural resources (though as its revenues go up, its block grant from Denmark goes down). Any purchase, therefore, should not be from Denmark, which really would be colonialist, but from the islanders themselves. If America offered merely our crude valuation of the flow of future taxes, it would amount to nearly $1m per inhabitant. Given the territory’s riches and importance, America could probably make every Greenlander a multimillionaire and still benefit enormously from the purchase.