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- [00:01]
Adam Fleming
Hello. Tuesday 6th January has been a big European security day. It started off with a bunch of European leaders, including Keir Starmer, issuing a very strongly worded riposte to comments from the Trump administration about getting their hands on Greenland for the usa. And then it ended with a news conference in Paris where lots more European leaders, including Keir Starmer, signed a deal about the security guarantees for Ukraine and what the UK and the European leaders would be willing to provide. And after there is a ceasefire, a big if there. So two big things for me and Chris to get our teeth into in.
- [00:39]
Chris Mason
This episode of Newscast, Newscast, Newscast from the BBC.
- [00:43]
Shashank Joshi
Fat Boy Slim and me in the.
- [00:45]
Adam Fleming
Classroom doing our violin lessons.
- [00:46]
Shashank Joshi
I was the tattletail in the classroom. Can I have an apology, please? I trust almost nobody that daddy has to sometimes use strong language.
- [00:53]
Adam Fleming
Next time in Moscow.
- [00:55]
Chris Mason (closing remarks)
I feel delulu with no Salulu.
- [00:57]
Shashank Joshi
Take me down to Downing Street.
- [00:58]
Adam Fleming
Let's go have a tour.
- [01:00]
Chris Mason
Blimey.
- [01:01]
Adam Fleming
Hello, it's Adam in the newscast studio.
- [01:03]
Chris Mason
And it is Chris at Westminster.
- [01:05]
Adam Fleming
We won't have the whole, is it too late to say Happy New Year?
- [01:08]
Chris Mason
We'll just say Happy New Year.
- [01:09]
Adam Fleming
Well, there we go, We've done it. There we go. Thereby proving who's on what side of that argument. Anyway, Chris.
- [01:14]
Chris Mason
I think we might have been on different sides, but anyway, yeah, so much.
- [01:17]
Adam Fleming
To get into today. We'll do the Greenland story second, even though that happened first. But we're recording this episode of Newscast at quarter to 8 on Tuesday evening. We've just seen this news conference in Paris hosted by Emmanuel Macron, but with the German chancellor there, Keir Starmer there, and Vladimir Zelenskyy, and intriguingly, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner representing the Trump administration. And I think as significant as what they actually discussed, which we will discuss in a second, was the presence of Witkoff and Kushner binding the Americans in to a Ukrainian peace process even further.
- [01:52]
Chris Mason
Yeah, exactly right. So it's quite something to see, really, this news conference. There was a little signing ceremony before it involving a handful of the leaders. So this coalition of the willing, so called, has been up and running for about a year and is basically the. The European powers and others who regard themselves as allies of Ukraine. This is the first time that the Americans have been at one of their meetings in person. And certainly speaking to a few folk in the last few minutes. As we record shortly after this news conference, there's a sense of real progress. Now, we should insert a caveat, and the caveat is a lot of these ideas that we'll come to discuss in a moment are reliant on getting to a peace settlement in the first place. And that is still a thing to pull off and a big thing to pull off. In fact, there was an acknowledgement, I think it was from Frederick Mertz, the German Chancellor, at one point, talking about whether this happens in six weeks or six months time. So that sense that a lot of this is about the building blocks for what will happen or what could happen the other side of a peace settlement. So big caveats there. But once we insert that caveat, quite a lot of what they're talking about is significant and does seem to amount to significant progress. And crucially, as you say, does seem to have the Americans banking blended in with a significant willingness to contribute as far as Ukraine's security is concerned, which is something that has not always been the case, to put it gently up until now.
- [03:18]
Adam Fleming
And then, in terms of the things that they have actually signed up to, there was this document that Macron, Starmer and Zelensky signed, which kind of gives us the clues about how this, how this is taking shape. So one of the things is the ceasefire monitoring mechanism. So if there is a ceasefire, how that will be monitored, that it's holding, that will be US led. But sounds like lots of members of the European coalition of the willing will contribute to that.
- [03:45]
Chris Mason
Exactly that. So that's number one on this list of components for what they are suggesting as far as a, what they describe as a solid and lasting peace in Ukraine is concerned. So a US led ceasefire monitoring and verification mechanism, a continuous, reliable ceasefire monitoring system is how they describe it, including contributions from members of the coalition of the willing. So a real sense really that all of those on that stage in the news conference, the uk, Germany, France, America, Ukraine involved in that, but also others as well within that coalition. And then as far as the UK in particular is concerned, and what we heard from Keir Starmer, who was there at a lectern, the uk, he says, will be involved alongside France in setting up these military hubs, as they're described, across Ukraine, and that will involve UK and French troops and others on the ground in Ukraine involved in maintaining peace, which is a hugely significant thing, with the prospect that this could go on for a very long time. Now, speaking to people in government, they're not yet at the stage of answering all of the kind of obvious questions that a newscaster might ask that I was asking on, on your behalf, like, well, how many, for instance, we don't know yet. That yet we're still some distance from that. And the prime Minister said, as he put it, the hard yards are still ahead. Again, that whole point of getting to the point where you could even start to action some of this stuff.
- [05:18]
Adam Fleming
And that is why lots of the headlines in Wednesday morning's newspapers will be, keir Starmer commits British boots to protect Ukraine in Ukraine.
- [05:27]
Chris Mason
Yeah, exactly that. Because that's, that is what he's committed to. That is.
- [05:32]
Adam Fleming
And he's signed a piece of paper now.
- [05:34]
Chris Mason
Exactly. And that is what will happen if we get to the point that there is a sustainable peace, that that Ukraine is. Ukraine is happy with.
- [05:43]
Adam Fleming
To you, you've, you've observed a lot of these coalition of the willing meetings because they've been happening very regularly. Quite often they're on zoom and they always say versions of the same words. How different does this feel to you now? A, because of the cast list at the podiums, ODR and B, because they have signed a piece of paper now.
- [06:03]
Chris Mason
So, yeah, I have, I have covered quite a few of these, including one which was in person, which was the French president and the British prime Minister in the UK back last, last summer. But as you say, a lot of them have happened remotely. And there's often in these things a fair amount of, you know, optimistic language that flies around and perhaps even a splash of political hyperbole. This one. And maybe there was a bit of both of these things in this one, by the way, but this in its casting in who, as you say, was there on the stage. But also, I think from the conversations I've had privately in the last couple of days, there is now a cautious optimism around the prospect that 2026 might just be the year where there is a significant breakthrough, that perhaps a deal can be done. Obviously, the elements that are not yet agreed are absolutely crucial and are clearly the most difficult, not least territory. So was references in a slightly kind of euphemistic, elliptical way to that massive remaining stumbling block in the news conference. Obviously, that is absolutely huge. That's the very integrity of Ukraine and what President Zelensky and his government can tolerate around anything around, as was described by the Americans and others, compromises that could feel like sacrifices. So, you know, that's still a massive, massive question amongst others. But with all of that sort of mentioned, this did feel like for this organization, this coalition of the willing alongside America did feel like something on a scale and of a significance that we've not seen before. And as I think Jared Kushner put it, I think it Was he who said this that in their view, you know, these are the necessary things you are going to need if you're going to get a longer term peace. You've got to get to peace first though, before this stuff kicks in.
- [07:57]
Adam Fleming
Yeah, necessary but not sufficient, as all negotiators say, these situations. I'm just thinking that I've just, I've just used a search engine while you were talking to look up the Budapest Memorandum. So this is this famous document signed in 1994 by the UK, Russia, the US and Ukraine, which allowed Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons and was the kind of the OG original security guarantee for a sovereign independent Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact and all of that stuff. And I was just thinking that was signed in 1994 and it's still quoted today, almost like it was yesterday. If everything goes to plan in the Ukraine peace building process, which as you said many times is a huge, huge caveat, then what we've seen signed today in Paris just before we recorded this episode of newscast will be the 2026 version of that.
- [08:53]
Chris Mason
Possibly. Yeah, I mean.
- [08:54]
Adam Fleming
Question mark. Yeah, I mean I should have had an Australian upward inflection at the end there.
- [08:59]
Chris Mason
You sort of wonder, you know, what iterations there might be to come depending on the nature of any peace settlement, depending on any wrangle that there might be about the scale of deployments from the uk, from France, from others, about precisely what the nature of the US commitment is. By the way, when I was asking a few people in government in the UK about the extent to which they're reassured by what they're hearing from America, they make the point that back in the summer when the President and the Prime Minister did their thing at a military base just north of London, there was lots of talk then about the necessity of the US being involved as a sort of backstop security guarantor. And I was told that given what we have seen in the signing today, you can assume that the UK is happy with what America is currently saying.
- [09:51]
Adam Fleming
Here's, here's another way of putting it though. A child who is born today, right, they may be stationed in this British operated military hub in Ukraine. If that child joins the military in like 19 years time, potentially, this is it.
- [10:08]
Chris Mason
And this is where that 94 comparison where you'd be what, 32 roughly, or heading towards 32 if you were born. If you were born then is a sort of comparator that is worth kind of keeping in mind, isn't it? And I think you know, that timeframe of the, if you like, the child born today, I think is, is the right one, is the right way to think about, is the right way to think about this. And that's when you start to think in terms of, you know, when we get to more of the details on all of this to come, if that peace deal is done, just what a long term commitment this is in a diplomatic sense, in a military sense, in a financial sense. And then where that sits with all of the future governments in Europe and America over the decades to come around that conversation that is very live at the moment about the role that America plays in European security. Obviously we look at that very much at the moment through the prison of President Trump. But where does that go in the next generation or two with the massive changes that there will be geopolitically over that time, you know, and it's in that context that these kind of conversations and these kind of beginnings of an agreement take place against the backdrop of.
- [11:25]
Adam Fleming
Then that takes us to the start of the day, which was this very strongly worded statement issued by a load of European leaders, including Keir Starmer, which was a very, very strongly worded riposte to various comments made by the Trump administration overnight and over the weekend about their intentions for Greenland, which is Danish territory, although it's a little bit more complicated than that. And Chris, just to let you know, I pre recorded a big chunky chat with two seasoned observers of the Arctic a bit earlier on today. So you don't have to do loads and loads of work for this. But just give me your take on when you saw those words coming from Paris. Madrid, Warsaw, Copenhagen and London and a few others.
- [12:09]
Chris Mason
Berlin. Have we missed any Madrid? You said Madrid, didn't you? Yeah, no. What did.
- [12:14]
Adam Fleming
I think this is like map ominous.
- [12:16]
Chris Mason
Yeah, exactly. So this was a doubling down, I think, and an emphasis on where each of those leaders pretty much, I think, had got individually in public over the last 24 hours. So I was talking to the Prime Minister on Monday and, and you know, he was pretty direct to me and to others around the UK's position on, on Greenland. And it's been, you know, slightly awkward from the Prime Minister's perspective because he's been much, much more cautious in his language when he's been asked around America's actions in Venezuela. But I think there's a, there's an absolute desire from European leaders to be unequivocal around Greenland and making the points that it would be absurd for America to keep making these noises or expressing its intents around Greenland, because Greenland and Denmark and America and those European leaders are all in NATO. So the argument is we're all on the same side as far as Arctic security is concerned. I noticed that when James Mates of ITV News in the news conference in Paris asked about Greenland, the Prime Minister stood next to the two American envoys, emphasized that he had said what he'd said and he'd signed what he'd signed, but did not seek to make the argument out loud. And I noticed that there was. It was rapidly moved on to the next question before the American duo offered any language or answers on Greenland. But, yeah, I mean, I think, you know, this is. This is where we see Europe being willing to strike out publicly and together in a very defiantly different position from Washington, I think, in the hope that. That it. That it dies down again. Because we've had this argument, haven't we, in this conversation about Greenland before? It's happened several times. I think they hope that it. Well, they absolutely hope that they can make the argument to Washington that this is. This is a. That this is just absurd.
- [14:16]
Adam Fleming
Well, and also, you can see it's the same strategy they've done with Ukraine today. It's like, oh, how can you bind the US into a common. Go on. Something that you can agree on in the case of Ukraine security guarantees which don't involve American troops being there with Greenland. It's like, oh, actually, if we both see the same problem, which is, how do you secure the Arctic from future threats, Then let's work together. So it's kind of a nice, neat kind of symmetry there.
- [14:38]
Chris Mason
Indeed.
- [14:39]
Adam Fleming
Chris. Thank you so much, Tara. Now, as promised, here's the conversation I had earlier on about what's going on in Greenland, and also lots of very interesting historic and political context about how Greenland actually fits into the rest of the world. And I had that conversation with somebody who's new to Newscast and somebody who's returning to Newscast. Well, welcome back to the podcast, Shashank Joshi, who's defence editor for the Economist. Hello, Shashank.
- [15:10]
Chris Mason
Hello. Good afternoon.
- [15:11]
Adam Fleming
And also please welcome Dr. Gabriela Grishas. Hello, Dr. Gabriela.
- [15:16]
Chris Mason
Hi.
- [15:16]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Thanks for having me.
- [15:17]
Adam Fleming
Right, you've got quite a long job title here, so I'm going to read it out from a laptop. You're a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Konstanz, senior fellow at the Arctic Institute, and a fellow of the North American and Arctic Defense and Security Network.
- [15:31]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Yep, that all sounds correct.
- [15:32]
Adam Fleming
You must have a very long business card. And also quite A lot to think about at the moment. So before we dive into a bit of history, a bit of context, a bit of kind of future gazing, Shashank, just round up the last couple of days for us. What are all the pieces of the puzzle that mean? Greenland and the fate of Greenland and Donald Trump's intentions for Greenland have shot straight to the top of the news agenda because there were a few sort of exhibits we need to look at.
- [15:59]
Shashank Joshi
Yeah, I mean, exhibit A, of course, is that extraordinary military operation itself to capture Nicolas Maduro in Caracas and whisk him away to New York. But in some ways, what is no less remarkable is that rambling press conference we heard afterwards by the president in which he suggested he would follow up with threats against a range of countries, including Cuba, Colombia, Mexico. He didn't mention Canada, although in the back of their heads, of course, they are covered by the same Monroe Doctrine of U.S. primacy in the Western Hemisphere. And notably Greenland, when he was asked about it aboard Air Force One. And then after that, I think this was on sort of January 5th, we saw Stephen Miller, who is a rather sort of strange, very hard line, hawkish, ideological MAGA character, who is deputy Chief of Staff in the White House, asked about it. And he reiterated America's claim on Greenland, said that Europe would not be able to stop America if it were to take Greenland by force, and said it rightly belonged to the United States. And essentially that has prompted a wave of concern, I would say concern bordering on perhaps panic in some European countries, prompting public statements of solidarity with Denmark, which is the controlling power in Greenland. It's a sovereign power in Greenland. And joint statements by countries who are normally very cautious about this kind of thing, including the UK which has also said, look, Greenland belongs to Denmark. This is a battle for the Danes, really making a pretty public rebuke of Donald Trump. But there's really serious concern that Trump may make rash steps around his long standing desire to absorb and annex Greenland, whether by a deal or by force.
- [17:45]
Adam Fleming
And yeah, Gabriella, that brings us on to your reading of what the Trump administration seems to want to do, because they use different words all the time, the latest one being Stephen Miller saying that it should be part of the U.S. in other words, American territory.
- [18:01]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Yeah, no, and it's, I think, completely outlandish. Let me just say that up front that the US should annex or control Greenland. In any case, it is an autonomous territory under the control of the Kingdom of Denmark, and there's no real world in which this is realistic.
- [18:20]
Adam Fleming
But in terms of what they are intending. Can you work out what their ultimate objective here is?
- [18:28]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
So, to my mind, there are two possible reasons why the US Is interested in Greenland. Both of them are legitimate. So on one hand, this really has to do with homeland, continental U.S. defense for the U.S. and for that matter, Canada. Greenland has a really important role to play in terms of aerial defense when it comes to ballistic, ballistic missiles. So the previously Thule, now Pitufik space base is a really important radar from which we can see missiles coming from over the North Pole. It also plays a really important maritime capacity here because Greenland stands on the Giuk Gap. So the Greenland, Iceland, United Kingdom gap, which is a choke point for both the Russian fleets as well as submarines to go in and out of the Arctic space. So on one hand, it's a question of traditional defense, but on the other, this is really an issue of critical minerals. And I think I've, this is what I've really thought about when I think about why Trump continues to be interested in Greenland. So for the United States, it is almost 100% import dependent on these minerals like graphite and zinc. And it sees Greenland as a way to get to these minerals and reduce dependency on China.
- [19:45]
Adam Fleming
And we'll go back to the security bit in a second. But just Gabriela, on the economics there, those critical minerals, which we've talked a lot about in the last year, especially with the US China relationship, because China has access to a lot of them around the world. How exploitable are Greenland's potential economic resources? Because at the moment, there's not a huge amount of resources easily to get there.
- [20:09]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
This is a really interesting point that you raise, and I'm glad that you brought it up because I think there's this, this misconception that, oh, Greenland could access these resources anytime they wanted to. First of all, no, it's very complicated. It's complex to deal in these mining operations. So this would not only take a lot of time to set up, but this would come at a huge environmental cost for certain parts of Greenland. This might be against the wishes of the Greenlandic people. So now we have this question of if these resources are even able to be accessed. Perhaps the indigenous population doesn't want that. So difficulty accessing it, perhaps a wish to not do so from the population. And also the long term impacts of what that would mean for climactic conditions on Greenland itself.
- [20:57]
Adam Fleming
It's not an instant gold mine.
- [20:59]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
No.
- [21:00]
Adam Fleming
And then Shashank, going back to the security points that Gabriela made there, I mean, just how strategic and Important, a spot on the map is this as far as you're concerned?
- [21:10]
Shashank Joshi
It's very important. I mean, Gabriela made her first point about the Gruk Gap, and traditionally it is through underwater sensors positioned on the seabed or underwater to track Russian submarines coming out from their Arctic bases in Murmansk out into the Atlantic, that the Gruk Gap has been so crucial. In fact, you know, if you're a fan of Tom Clancy novels, you will remember this from your reading of the Hunt for Red October, in which the Gruk Gap is a very prominent part of the plot and the storyline. So Greenland's important for that. The thing I would really emphasise, though, is that, first of all, Donald Trump's suggestion that there are Russian and Chinese ships swarming around Greenland, that's completely fictional. Of course, there's Russian and some Chinese activity, but it's not some sort of imminent threat. But much, much more important than this, the Americans themselves had a much bigger presence on Greenland in military terms 30 years ago. They shut down many bases on Green themselves. The Danes didn't make them shut them down, the Americans did. And the Danes have been essentially willing to allow America to do anything they want on Greenland by way of military presence, radars, intelligence. America can do it all. And so it really doesn't make much sense when you hear America saying, well, Denmark can't take care of its own security. It would be trivially simple for America to agree with Denmark, to say, okay, let's expand the number of bases, let's put new sensors and radars here, let's put new watching listening posts here to Hoover up Russian communications. So this is, to some degree, I really must emphasise, a manufactured controversy that I think is motivated much more by some hazy notion of minerals, as we've heard, but also more simply than this by a concept that Donald Trump introduced in his inaugural speech back in this time last year, which was the idea of manifesting destiny, the idea that under his presidency, he would like to see America become bigger on the map. And I do genuinely think that drives part of this sort of very odd and strange and quite damaging pursuit of Greenland in recent days.
- [23:16]
Adam Fleming
Yeah, Shashank, expand on that a little bit, because I'm thinking two things when you say that. I'm thinking back to that interview that Faisal did when he was presenting Newsnight last year with a kind of tech bro supporter of Donald Trump, and he was talking about the return to the frontier mentality, the fact that America is built on the ide, that Americans go out and conquer More of the land mass. And that's what makes America different from other countries. And then readers of the Financial Times today might have read a column by Edward Luce where he says, oh, lots of these big libertarian tech bros have got this concept of creating new network nations where you go into sort of, as they see it, virgin territory and create a new kind of country there. And quite a lot of them, when they're talking about this in the bar at night, mention Greenland.
- [24:04]
Shashank Joshi
Absolutely. So I think part of this is about American primacy in the Western Hemisphere. This is what in America's national security strategy, which I think we talked about a few weeks ago on this podcast.
- [24:16]
Adam Fleming
I'm glad we did.
- [24:17]
Shashank Joshi
It talks about the Trump corollary to this doctrine, and that is the idea that America should be able to exclude outside powers from the Western Hemisphere. And of course, going back to, you know, the 1930s and 40s, Greenland has been inside that definition. You know, it was occupied by America in the Second World War, as many people will know. And the idea is that you don't want the Chinese and the Russians or others. Of course, back then it was the British and European colonial powers engaged in South America, in Canada, or in Greenland. So there's a sense of keep everyone else out. But I think it's more than that. I think that exactly as you say, that frontier element, whether it's Elon Musk in Mars, whether it's, you know, sort of Donald Trump trying to say he runs Venezuela now rather than simply having a favorable government, I think there is this genuine sense that the age in which America stays stable in size is over. The idea is that, as in the 19th century, it can grow again. And by the way, if you want a symbol of this, the politician whom Donald Trump has appointed as an envoy for Greenland is a politician from Louisiana. And of course, the Louisiana Purchase in American history is a very important moment in which America acquires territory. And that symbolism was not lost on Danes, who found this appointment very, very offensive.
- [25:43]
Adam Fleming
Gabriela, can we just do a little bit of a political science lesson about the actual status of Greenland and the fact that it. It is and isn't Danish?
- [25:53]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Yes, absolutely. So I think what many people get wrong when they think about Greenland is they think of it as a colony of the Kingdom of Denmark. And this was true pre 1951. It became a province of the kingdom in 1953, but it soon passed a Home Rule act in 1979 and eventually became a form of self government in 2009. And all of those legalese terms Aside, what that means is that Greenland has developed more and more competencies in its relationship with Denmark. What that means is that it has more control over different aspects of policy, like energy policy, environment policy, health, education. But what still remains the competencies of Denmark, the Kingdom has to do with foreign policy and security. And Greenland is still reliant on Denmark for a huge amount of what it calls a block grant. And what the block grant is, is essentially a large amount of money that the Kingdom gives to Greenland to cover different aspects of welfare. And Greenland is dependent on this grant. So even though Greenlanders might wish for independence right now, there is an understanding that in order to obtain that, they need to be able to support themselves through an economic like ways in a different way. So at the moment, they are an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, so very much under the sovereignty of Denmark.
- [27:24]
Adam Fleming
And I suppose the, the conversation in, in Greenland over the last 20, 30, 40 years has been about autonomy as opposed and moving away from the control of Denmark, but not moving towards the control of anyone else. It's been about sovereignty and independence.
- [27:41]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Exactly. So there's a sense that Greenland did want to become closer to the United States over time. And this is not surprising because Greenland is geographically closer to the United States. And in fact, the Inuit population in Greenland has close ties to those in Alaska and Canada as well. But since Trump's statements in 2019, there's been a lot of hesitation of, well, we don't want to trade one colonial power for another. That might mean that Greenland might want more, you know, of a relationship with the EU or even a state like Japan, for example. And in nowhere is this clearer than actually in the recent 2025 parliament elections where the center right party won, a party which has really strongly criticized Trump, clearly showing that there is a reluctance to engage with the US that that clearly has aspirations towards obtaining it.
- [28:39]
Adam Fleming
And Shashank, when we talk about the future of NATO, why does the future of NATO, the Transatlantic Defense alliance, come into it when, when we're just discussing the fate of Greenland?
- [28:50]
Shashank Joshi
Well, we've already established that it's Denmark that is the power in Greenland, although it's not a colony, as Gabrielle has told us, Denmark is a core member of NATO. It's a vital NATO ally. In fact, just to tell you how, how important it is, about two years ago, two and half years ago, Mette Fredriksen, the Prime Minister of Denmark, who is now issuing these incredible statements warning America off Greenland, was being effectively interviewed by Donald Trump, being considered for the job of NATO Secretary General, that job eventually went, as we know, to Mark Rutte, the Prime Minister of the Netherlands. But Fredricksen was a real candidate and it's really quite remarkable to envisage the fact that you may face a threat against NATO territory by the United States. There have been instances of military tensions between NATO allies in the past, most famously in the 1970s, Turkey and Greece over Cyprus. We've also seen tensions between Turkey and France in the Mediterranean, also with Turkish ships locking radars onto the French. So this is not, in that sense completely unprecedented, but the fact that America is really the dominant power in Europe, it's the ultimate protecting force on the continent, that America is the country that should be threatening. This is what makes this so corrosive to the future of the alliance. The military leader who is effectively responsible for drawing up and implementing, if needed, the defence plans of Europe is called the supreme allied commander Europe. Sac Yor. That general for more than 80 years is, has always been and probably will be for a long time an American four star General. Alexis Grunkovich is the incumbent and he is also double hatted as the Commander of European Command, UConn. So that just gives you a sense of how central, how irreplaceable America is to NATO and therefore how traumatic this kind of threat is when it's coming from the leader of the alliance towards one of its member states. Not least the Danes would remind you, by the way, a state that per capita lost perhaps some of the most soldiers of any country involved in Afghanistan in the conflict there.
- [30:58]
Adam Fleming
Although Shashank, I'm thinking back to the reference you made to Venezuela and also that interview that Stephen Miller gave to Jake Tapper on CNN that we were talking about a second. And when he talks about what the Trump administration means when they say they are in charge in Venezuela and he talks about not a situation like Iraq under George W. Bush when there was loads of American boots on the ground, there was a sort of American viceroy and you had American officials running big government departments. He talks about a much more kind of virtual version of that where you have an American say over the economy and what goes in and out of the country, because there's a sort of naval blockade. And also the US has done something very dramatic to show that it's got the power to intervene in a quite targeted way if it wants. I wonder if that's maybe what Donald Trump is thinking about here and he's actually just dressing up more involvement for the US in Greenland, as Greenland being part of the United States. He's not talking about the Louisiana Purchase again. He's talking about a sort of, of just a set of deals that give the US more control.
- [32:03]
Shashank Joshi
Well, I will say that reminds me when you describe that arrangement in Venezuela of sort of European powers in 19th century China with concessions in places like Shanghai and gunboat diplomacy and forcible trade on the opium trade, it reminds me of that colonial era in Asia. But in terms of Greenland, first of all, I'm not so relaxed. I do think they are talking about ownership of territory. But you're right, there are a range of options here which could involve encouraging Greenland succession, they could involve purchasing Greenland, they could involve forcibly taking over Greenland. One option I think is that America would simply declare its bases, Petufic base in particular, as a sovereign base area, saying this is sovereign American territory now, tough luck, you can't do anything about it. But there are other options. Might be to say to Denmark, well, we need more of a presence, but we need to rip up all the old rules. No more restrictions on anything. We have complete sovereign latitude and what we do with the bases, we have complete people at the ports and facilities. We have a degree of sovereign status there. You have to agree to this. I think Denmark would be reluctant to do any of those things. But the fact is, if this were about more US presence on the island, then as I say, I repeat again, this is a manufactured controversy because Denmark would agree to almost any reasonable expansion of US presence on the island. They've had it before, they would have it again. If that's all that America wants, there is a deal to be done. It will be no problem. I'm afraid that isn't what America seems to be willing to stop at and its ambitions go a little bit further than that. That.
- [33:45]
Adam Fleming
Gabriela, let's end the conversation on some things that are definitely or appear to be happening in future with Greenland. And by that I mean the effects of climate change. Making that less, well, there'd be less ice there and making the whole place more accessible. What does that actually mean in practice?
- [34:03]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Well, what it means in practice is that it's a lot of, I think, emphasis that we want to think about the people when we talk about climate change. It's easy to think about ice melting in the Arctic and shipping lanes opening up and these sort of larger than life ideas of what's happening. And make no mistake, that is what's happening in the Arctic. But when we're talking about climate change on Greenland, I think it's much more important to think about how is an everyday Greenlander's life different because of climate change. So, as one example, there are some places where individuals used to be able to take a dog sled or walk across ice, and that ice was very stable. They knew the times of year that they could walk across it, and it was something that was part of their routine. Now, because of rising temperatures, this is no longer confirmed. It could be stable. It could also not be stable. This has impacts for hunting, for fishing, for all of these traditional things that we think about that individuals might live and experience in Greenland. So I think that's really what's changing from a climactic level when it comes to Greenlanders themselves. And, you know, if we're thinking a bit broader here, what's important to pay attention to and bring the conversation a bit back to traditional defense matters is when it comes to how we're looking at submarines operating as climate change is warming up water changing the way that we see and understand submarines underwater, this has a big impact on how we think about the Giuk Gap and submarines coming in and out of that space. So thinking about climate change and submarine detection is something that NATO is already doing research on, but it's something to really keep in mind when we're talking about Greenland as well.
- [35:46]
Adam Fleming
And just one last very, very basic point, Gabriela. What exact countries and territories are we talking about when we talk about the Arctic? And are there particular bits of them that are kind of more quintessentially Arctic than others?
- [36:00]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Sure. So there are eight Arctic states in total. It's the U.S. canada, Russia, Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. There are. You can also kind of subsume that area into five Arctic coastal states, which are states that have direct coastline in the Arctic. But this is not used as much. But when we're talking about what is Arctic, what's not Arctic, it's actually a really interesting open question, because on one hand, you could just look at a line on the map, the 66 parallel, and say if you're in the circle, you're Arctic, and if you're not, you're not. But a lot of states have an Arctic identity, or they're interested in being part of the Arctic in different ways. Of course, we have to think about China, which in 2018 came out with a white paper where they called themselves a Near Arctic power, although, of course, they are nowhere near the Arctic Circle, but they have really big interest in being involved in that space. Some parts of the Arctic are, of course, much more difficult to access than others. So the central Arctic Ocean is mostly covered by sea ice. So there's no real way to pass through. And certain parts of the Arctic are not necessarily contested, but they present really interesting questions of sovereignty. Like Svalbard, for example, which is a Norwegian archipelago, which is under Norwegian sovereignty based under a 1920s Svalbard treaty. But any state that has acceded to that treaty can send researchers there. And Russia, for example, has a very large presence on that island. So there are different parts of the region that are, again, not contested, but perhaps present really interesting questions for how we can think about this space that are more seriously impacted by climate change and geopolitical competition than others.
- [37:49]
Adam Fleming
And also, this is just one of those conversations where I wish I had a globe in the studio, because looking at the Mercator map projection flat on my laptop on that Morocco looks closer to Greenland and the Arctic than China does. But I know full well that actually that flat map is no way of comparing whether China is closer to the Arctic or Morocco is closer to the Arctic, because it's not true.
- [38:13]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Yes.
- [38:15]
Adam Fleming
Gabriela, thank you very much.
- [38:17]
Dr. Gabriela Grishas
Thank you.
- [38:17]
Adam Fleming
And Shashank, thanks to you, too.
- [38:19]
Shashank Joshi
No problem. Thanks so much for having me.
- [38:26]
Adam Fleming
And that's all for this episode of Newscast. Thanks to everyone who's been on it and thank you to you for listening. We'll be back with another one very soon. Bye bye.
- [38:34]
Chris Mason
Newscast, Newscast from the BBC.
- [38:36]
Chris Mason (closing remarks)
From one newscaster to another, thank you so much for making it to the end of this episode. You clearly do, in the words of Chris Mason, ooze stamina. Can I also gently encourage you to subscribe to us on BBC Signs? Tell everyone you know. And don't forget, you can email us anytime@newscastbc.co.uk or if you're that way inclined, send us a WhatsApp on +4403301239480. Be assured, I promise we listen to everyone.