Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Location: Burger Moe’s

And through the drifts the snowy clifts
Did send a dismal sheen:
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—
The ice was all between.    - Samuel Taylor Coleridge

IS THE SPIRIT OF THE PIONEERS DEAD WITHIN US? Have we imprisoned our manifest destiny too hastily? The binding of the seas across the continent was only the beginning, and we Americans have many more lands to conquer. The prophetic minds among our statesmen see in Greenland a strategic necessity in the Arctic arena, a land of extraordinary mystery and riches, cauterized under a political situation of waste and stasis. For the sake of the enterprising spirit that is native to us all, let us take on the spirits of our Scandinavian rover-fathers and brave the haunting enigmas of Greenland from the other side. Let the world take note that the icy margins of the island glacier are the next “shining sea” of American enterprise.

Greenland is truly a tract of “infinite riches in a large room,” a land of natural abundance that may be the source of America’s economic freedom from the world. The Danes have been bad stewards. They rely on claims of “colonialism” and “exploitation” to mask the fact that the life of Greelanders has been a nightmare under their auspices. One can respect the traditions of the native people while acknowledging that the life of chronic suicide, economic stagnation and mass depression need not be the fate of the inhabitants. The economic interest of the hegemon can be balanced with dedication to improvement of life quality. If this has too many undertones of colonialism, the Danes should give up their claims entirely, and let the Greenlanders join the pantheon of nations. They know this won’t happen, because the Greenlanders depend on the West for subsidies and investment. Why not place the land under hegemonic American management, and allow for development in a condition of real mutual advantage? America has just claim to Greenland under the Monroe Doctrine, and the half-baked sincerity of the Danes cannot hold up in the face of the deleterious consequences of their own “occupation.” Greenland will be great when it joins the American project, for this will allow the tundra to blossom into a land of abundance and opportunity. In the heroic tradition of our Viking forbearers, the “conquest” of Greenland will be the great saga of the 21st century.

ON THE OTHER HAND: Greenland is a land of darkness and treacherous vista, and its very name is false propaganda concocted by Erik the Red to lure unsuspecting Viking settlers. Why are we always enamored with foreign lands when our own fertile continental expanse persists under economic oppression and meddling bureaucratic restriction? What about Alaska, which we “own” but which still retains untapped mysteries? Greenland is an international “MacGuffin,” a misguided shiny object of glacial wilderness, and the cost of acquisition is not worth the speculative upside. Even if we scoff at the murmurings of the “international community” we must at least take into account how things look to outsiders. Are we not bullies to impress our claims on tiny Denmark and the sparse Greenlanders for unknown gains? After all, America had no problem utilizing Greenland in the Second World War with the happy permission of the Danish government-in-exile. If we start taking territories from our allies, the cost to our goodwill in the world may nullify the strategic and economic advantages we might derive. Acquisition for its own sake is a hallmark of rampant greed, and the zeal for adventure cannot arouse bad conscience. To ever seek for novel blessings is to lose the blessings we scarcely know we have.

The CHAIRMAN, piloting a long boat trapped in the ice of northern reaches, wonders if his grand adventure will come to nought, and beacons to the idle navigators to settle the question.

RESOLVED: Make Greenland Great Again!