At least 4 of the 2025 “Day One” executive orders from the White House have to do with natural resources: oil, gas, energy and minerals.
The US congress has a bill up suggesting changing the name Americans currently call Greenland to “Red, White and Blueland.” Apparently, in addition to energy, the current administration has taken a sudden interest in cartography, and the enthusiastic congress has embraced it like children with crayons coloring a world map shouting out the names of all the places they want to rename.
GREENLAND
Greenland is rich in natural resources that are for the most part, untapped. It is believed to have an abundance of natural resources, including zinc, copper, lead, gold, iron ore, oil and both heavy and light rare earth elements, such as neodymium, which is used in wind turbines and nuclear reactors.
*Noteworthy: Greenland is rich in Zinc and Copper which are the 2 metals in the recently banned US penny.
Brookings discusses “The Greenland Gold Rush” and says that “only a small fraction of this massive island has been properly explored.”
Greenland’s waters are part of the NorthWest passage which is important because currently Panama has Russian sanctions and they can’t use the Panama Canal. Greenland is also a strategic military location. So that’s why Greenland.
Greenland is currently part of Denmark. Greenland has been a Danish colony since 1721. According to Visit Greenland, “Greenland's Self-Government Act enacted by Denmark and Greenland in 2009.” Coincidentally by this year, Facebook had become popular globally.
According to Wikipedia:
At a press conference in early 2025, pro-independence prime minister Múte Bourup Egede said that "work has already begun on creating the framework for Greenland as an independent state" and apparently hinted that an independence referendum could take place already in April 2025, in tandem with the general elections.
I’m not sure that an alliance with the US would benefit Greenland in any way. Instead of trying to align with US, maybe learn from the US - don’t use trying to make things better as an excuse to make things worse. It’s possible that Greenland residents may be being manipulated by foreign advisers that don’t have their best interests at heart.
According to US News and World Report, Denmark ranks as best schools in the world, while US ranks, 12th and I think that’s being generous. Only 28% of Americans think that America’s education is the best in the world.
While the US accounts for 70% of the mass shootings in all developed countries, Greenland’s last mass shooting was in 1990. Best I can tell, last time a human was shot and killed in Greenland was 2019.
So that’s why Greenland is in the US political conversation.
*It should be noted that Canada blames their gun problem on being too close to the US.
PANAMA
Panama has the Panama Canal, which is the second shortest shipping route after the Northwest passage through Greenland and Canada. Currently Panama has sanctions on Russia. And I’m not really sure how Russia is shipping goods. They allegedly have a shadow fleet with limited access to some ports, but even those are getting flagged.
Not using the Panama Canal means going around the tip of South America or Cape Horn, which is called the Mount Everest of sailing. The Drake Passage is rough because it’s where the Atlantic, Pacific and Southern oceans converge. There are extreme winds, unpredictable climate and challenging underwater topography with varying depths and currents. Cape Horn is rarely used for commercial shipping because of the dangers.
But the Panama Canal is a calm series of lakes and rivers through Central America.
So that’s why Panama.
CANADA
Global warming will open up Canada for more warmer land, but global superpowers are thirsting for Canada, specifically the Northwest passage, for shipping.
Depending on where you are shipping from, the Northwest passage is around 7,000 kilometers shorter than going through Panama Canal, which could save up to 2 weeks in shipping time. However, currently this passage is only available for shipping in the summer because of ice. While there are no guarantees, this waterway is generally open for shipping July to September.
According to Natural Resources Canada:
Canada is a leading global producer of many critical minerals that are essential for today's rapidly growing clean energy technologies.
Canada is the global leader in potash production (improves crop yields) and ranks among the top five global producers of diamonds, gemstones, gold, indium, niobium, platinum group metals, titanium concentrate and uranium. Canada is also the world's fourth-largest producer of primary aluminum.
So that’s why Canada.
RUSSIA
While the US Department of Treasury pretends to be tough on Russia with press release saying, “ Treasury Intensifies Sanctions Against Russia…” Not really. The US government is trying to slap them with one hand, while quietly passing them the keys to the canal in the other.
While the economic reporting from Russian news outlets seems to be rosy and everything is fine. External news outlets show a tough economic time for Russia with shipping sanctions and the Ukraine war weighing them down.
Bloomberg claims Russia spent more in January than it had budgeted for the whole year, while The Moscow Times reports that “Russia’s Financial Flows Surge.” The Economic Times simply says “Russian authorities see rising economic risks.”
The severity of the shipping problem is for Russia is debatable, but not being able to ship abroad is definitely a problem.
In July 2024, the South China Morning Post was crap talking Russia’s shipping problem with the headline, “Why Russia is ‘significantly more motivated’ than China to develop Arctic Route.” But things changed after the 2024 US election. On November 27, 2024, Global Times reported that “China, Russia hold first meeting of subcommittee on Arctic shipping routs cooperation.”
It seems to me that if China and Russia were having a meeting about “Arctic shipping routes cooperation” they would need to loop in Canada and Greenland. But they didn’t need to, because by end of November 2024, they had access to the US’s best geopolitical wrecking ball.
