How a melting Greenland went from universal wonder to imperial prize

When President Trump threatened to annex Greenland earlier this year, the vast Arctic island with a population slightly larger than Burlington was dragged from the periphery of world affairs to the center. The threat that the U.S. might forcibly take Greenland, which is an autonomous territory of Denmark, threatened to unravel the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO.How did Greenland become a geopolitical flash point? What is the experience of traveling through its frozen landscape? And what may be next for the island's peoples?On this Vermont Conversation, I talked with two people with first-hand experience in Greenland. Vermont journalist Adam Federman has traveled and reported on Greenland for The New Republic and In These Times. Federman, who lives near Middlebury, is Reporting Fellow with Type Investigations. Rob Reynolds is a Los Angeles-based artist who has travelled extensively with scientists in the Arctic gathering images that are currently part of an exhibit called Zero Celsius at Mad River Valley Arts. Reynolds will participate in a public conversation with author Bill McKibben in Waitsfield on March 14.The Arctic is warming faster than any place else on Earth, and some projections indicate that the Arctic Ocean could have ice-free summers as early as 2030. This will have global ramifications as sea levels rise and inundate low-lying population centers, and new shipping corridors open up.These climate-driven changes could lead to “the prospect of open military conflict in a part of the world that has been spared. I find that terrifying,” said Federman. The race to exploit natural resources in previously inaccessible landscapes “has tremendously dangerous implications for the people who live in that part of the world.”For Rob Reynolds, Greenland is “a place of wonder. It's a place of awe. It's a place unlike any other that I've ever been to.”“The thing that that is most staggering to me about Trump's almost provocative light hearted threat to take Greenland by force … is that people live there. And the great lesson that Greenland has to teach us is that conservation is something that we should be thinking about. We shouldn't be thinking about taking it. We should be thinking about keeping it frozen.”Federman said that Trump’s Greenland provocations are “a new form of imperialism.” That has unexpectedly led to “greater indigenous power in this part of the world.” Greenland’s parliament “has clearly rejected the notion that the United States could somehow come in and take over.”“It's taken many, many years, but Greenland does now have a seat at the table and cannot be ignored.”