What a U.S.-Greenland COFA solution might mean

A Compact of Free Association (COFA) between the United States and Greenland has now surfaced as one of the options being considered – quietly but seriously – inside the White House for redefining Washington’s relationship with Greenland. It sits alongside the far more headline-grabbing and politically blunt idea of buying the island from Denmark.

The sheer contrast between the two options is instructive. One option treats Greenland as an object of transaction; the other opens a menu of political futures. Understanding what a COFA might entail is therefore less about predicting outcomes than about mapping the choices now in play — for Greenland, for Denmark and for the U.S.

A COFA is not an annexation or a real-estate purchase, and it is not a throwback to nineteenth-century territorial deals either. It would be a modern, negotiated framework for partnership in a rapidly changing Arctic – an international agreement that would establish and govern a relationship of free association between the U.S. and Greenland.

A COFA is a negotiated partnership between a sovereign state and a smaller polity that chooses to delegate specific responsibilities — typically defence and security — while retaining internal autonomy and international personality. The key word is choice. Free association exists only so long as both parties consent. Thus far, the three smaller polities with which the U.S. has such compacts are also sovereign states.

The question for Greenland, as it mulls over its options, is not simply whether a COFA is “good” or “bad”, but also which version — if any — best advances its long-term interests.

A model that already exists

With a COFA with the U.S., Greenland will not be stepping into unknown legal territory. The U.S. already maintains COFAs with three Pacific sovereign states — the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau — often referred to collectively as the Freely Associated States (FAS).

These agreements combine strategic rights in and material support for the FAS. Washington receives unilateral and exclusive military access to their land, water and airspace, and the authority to deny access to third-country militaries. In return, it provides multi-year financial assistance and access to U.S. programs that cover education, healthcare, social security, disaster relief, humanitarian assistance and even investment in infrastructure and connectivity. It also offers a credible security guarantee as the U.S. is legally responsible for their defence.

The COFAs are central to U.S. military strategy in the Indo-Pacific. They are also deemed vital to regional security and stability by Pacific allies such as Australia and New Zealand in the face of growing Chinese influence in the region.

A distinctive feature of these COFAS is mobility. Citizens of the FAS can generally enter, live, work and study in the U.S. without visas and have broad access to federal social services and public benefits.

The strengths of this model are clear — for the smaller state, credible security guarantees, predictable funding and access to opportunity; for Washington, unrivalled and enduring strategic access and influence without the burdens of formal territorial control.

The disadvantages are equally real. Dependence on U.S. appropriations can turn sovereignty into budget-cycle anxiety and recurring budget negotiation, out-migration can strain small societies and the security provisions can spark domestic concern that foreign policy priorities are being quietly outsourced, tilting too heavily toward Washington’s priorities or becoming too enmeshed with defence.

Any U.S.-Greenland COFA would inevitably be negotiated in the shadow of these precedents.

What would a U.S.-Greenland COFA entail?

If the U.S. and Greenland pursued such a compact, Greenland would remain self-governing, with its own parliament and government, language policy, cultural institutions and control over most domestic affairs. The compact would instead clarify which powers Greenland might delegate to Washington — and at what price.

Security first, always

The most obvious pillar would be defence. Greenland sits astride the North Atlantic and the Arctic approaches to North America. A COFA would formalise U.S. responsibility for Greenland’s external defence, airspace monitoring and maritime surveillance. The U.S. is likely to demand long-term, treaty-based unilateral and exclusive military access to Greenland’s land, territorial waters and airspace, going one step further than the nearly unlimited access for defence purposes it already enjoys through the 1951 Greenland Defence Agreement with the Kingdom of Denmark.

In essence, it would render Denmark so redundant as to be removed from the equation as a non-hemispheric power, while consolidating U.S. supremacy over the affairs of the northern reaches of the Western Hemisphere.

A COFA with Greenland would not be charity on the part of the U.S. It is a play for power – but that would offer a credible security guarantee and potentially generous rewards in exchange. But for Washington, while defence commitments cost money and attention, a compact could be cheaper, more politically sustainable and more strategically important than ad-hoc basing agreements, especially as Arctic competition intensifies.

Money, mobility and mutual obligations

The second pillar would be economic. A U.S.-Greenland COFA would likely include multi-year financial transfers, with funding provided for education, healthcare, economic development, infrastructure, connectivity, disaster relief and climate resilience.

If Greenland were to consider this option, it could seek predictable, multi-year funding streams to replace or supplement existing external support, providing stability for long-term development.

One would expect that any funding offered by the U.S. would have to far surpass the annual block grant that Greenland receives from Denmark, the significant financial support it receives from the EU and the sporadic grants that it has received thus far from the U.S. for a COFA to exist as an option.

Even then, let’s be clear: no amount of funding can make this an option if Greenland is not interested in pursuing or just exploring the prospect of a COFA. Consent is key. As is respect.

In any COFA negotiation, migration and labour mobility would also be on the table. Greenlanders could gain the right to live, work or study in the U.S. without visas and have broad access to federal social services and public benefits, while Americans could invest and work in Greenland under agreed rules.

This would be transformative for a small population facing workforce shortages — but also culturally and politically sensitive, requiring safeguards against economic displacement and potential demographic changes that could be dramatically asymmetrical in scale.

The risk, as the Pacific cases show, is demographic imbalance: opportunity abroad can drain small societies of their youngest and most skilled citizens.

And there is also the risk of Americans making their way to Greenland in much higher numbers to acquire real estate or set up businesses, which might overwhelm the local population, increase pressure on local services in the short term and have lasting changes on the political, cultural, linguistic and economic landscape.

This is not an insurmountable problem if the U.S. would be willing to accept a cap on numbers that Greenland, as the much smaller polity, might feel the need to impose unilaterally.

Resources: control, not surrender

Perhaps the most politically charged issue would be natural resources. A compact would not automatically give the U.S. ownership or control over Greenland’s minerals, fisheries or energy reserves.

Greenland would certainly insist on explicit guarantees affirming its regulatory authority over resource licensing and environmental and social safeguards.

That said, preferential access, joint ventures or strategic supply agreements — especially for critical minerals — could be part of the bargain.

The line between partnership and exploitation would need to be drawn carefully.

The first challenge would be ensuring that development benefits local communities rather than turning Greenland into a raw-materials appendage of a larger power.

The second challenge would be ensuring the U.S. does not extend its security privileges, such as unlimited or exclusive military access and the authority to deny access to third-country militaries, to restricting or denying access also to investors and businesses from allies and partners seeking to invest or operate in Greenland.

It would be one thing for the U.S. to introduce a strict foreign direct investment screening regime to control foreign investment where it might pose a risk to national security, critical infrastructure and public order.

But it would be another matter altogether if the U.S. blocked even safe and clean investment from like-minded countries on the pretext of national security because it tacitly sought exclusive economic access or complete control over economic development as well.

Exit is the ultimate guarantee

What ultimately distinguishes free association from dependency is the exit clause. Any credible compact would include a clear, democratic mechanism for review, amendment or termination.

Greenland would retain the right to walk away.

That single provision would discipline the relationship, shape every other negotiation and remind both sides that the arrangement must remain mutually beneficial.

The big question: Does Greenland have to be sovereign first?

Here, the soft romance of free association collides with hard constitutional plumbing.

The existing COFAs are international agreements with three sovereign states in the Pacific — the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau — so prevailing assumptions would suggest that a party would have to be a sovereign state to enter into a COFA with the U.S.

However, Greenland today is not a sovereign state in the same way.

It is the Kingdom of Denmark that constitutes the unified sovereign state within which Greenland is one of the three self-governing autonomous countries.

The 2009 Self-Government framework recognises the people of Greenland as a people with the right of self-determination under international law and transfers to Greenland nearly complete autonomy over its internal affairs, while Denmark retains responsibility for foreign affairs and defence.

Although Greenland may negotiate and conclude agreements with foreign states on matters which exclusively concern Greenland and relate to fields of responsibility taken over, matters that concern defence and security and that affect the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Kingdom would need to involve Denmark.

This matters because Washington cannot cleanly compact with a sub-state entity as though it were a separate subject of international law — at minimum, Denmark would have to be at the table, or Greenland would have to become independent first.

In a more geopolitical reading, that legal reality tempts a strategic shortcut.

If the U.S. wants to negotiate directly and exclusively with Greenland — without Denmark in the room — it would be implicitly pushing toward Greenlandic independence and then the rapid recognition of Greenland as a sovereign state as the gateway to a COFA, removing Denmark from the equation altogether.

This path would be highly disruptive.

In this sense, a COFA option is not neutral — it reshapes the independence debate whether it intends to or not and all signs from the Trump Administration thus far point to the gambit being intentional.

Whether that would be wise diplomacy or a massively risky and entirely unnecessary fight with an old ally is a question worth asking.

Either way, the future of Greenland in relation to the Kingdom of Denmark must remain a question for Greenland and Denmark to work out themselves, on their own terms and at a time they see fit and not in response to external interference or pressure — by friend or foe.

Any adventurism by the U.S. in this regard threatens its longstanding alliance with Denmark, presents an existential risk to NATO and severely undermines transatlantic security.

At best, Trump would have achieved a pyrrhic victory: a small symbolic gain in the Arctic at the much greater cost of its respect and influence across the Western alliance.

Can the U.S. and Greenland negotiate a bespoke COFA?

To return to the question of sovereignty, precedents shaped in and by the past ought not to be read as signage for the road ahead.

Nothing says the U.S.-Greenland COFA must be a carbon copy of a Pacific template and preclude creative thinking.

Free association is a family resemblance, not a single standardised form.

The U.S. typically wants clarity and primacy on security access — because that’s the strategic point of the bargain.

But if that could be agreed at the outset, there is nothing stopping Greenland from jumping into the driver’s seat and going for a drive along different roads to see where they might lead.

Greenland’s circumstances, after all, are different from the Pacific island states and invite a different design.

It already sits geographically at the heart of the Western alliance, with strong ties to Europe and North America and is part of NATO and associated with, even if not a member of, the EU through its relationship with Denmark.

More befitting, hence, might be a bespoke compact or compact-like arrangement with Denmark’s interests acknowledged and with Greenland firmly in the driver’s seat.

An agreement that doesn’t read as unilateral and exclusive military access for the U.S., but potentially as unlimited military access and authority for the U.S. that it would share with Denmark, while not sharing sovereignty that would remain with Denmark.

As the U.S. already enjoys virtually unlimited access to Greenland for defence purposes under the 1951 Greenland Defence Agreement, one could counter that the COFA is entirely unnecessary and would deliver change more in form rather than substance.

But even if we were to disregard and debunk the disinformation that Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships that is currently being bandied about to illustrate why the U.S. needs Greenland, we can still acknowledge that Greenland is vital to North American security and the U.S. – like its European allies – does have legitimate security concerns and interests there.

An arrangement, hence, that empowers the U.S. one step further without disrespecting Greenland or Denmark or undermining the longstanding U.S.-Denmark alliance and NATO might just be the next best option to the status quo – and certainly more palatable than annexation or acquisition.

For Greenland, the real debate, thus, is not legal but political.

Would such a compact enhance Greenlandic self-determination or would it subtly constrain it?

Would it expedite the journey to independence or would it delay it?

Would U.S. involvement bring stability and investment to Greenland — or overwhelm a small society with external priorities?

Will the compact serve as Greenland’s gateway to the world or will it isolate Greenland from all its traditional linkages and keep it attached only to America’s hip?

Will the COFA truly respect the aspirations of the people of Greenland and genuinely make Greenland safer and more secure than it already is or will it merely provide American tech billionaires with what they see as a frozen wasteland in which they can fulfil their tech-driven state- or city-building fantasies?

For the U.S., the question is equally stark.

Is Washington prepared to treat a small Arctic partner as a sovereign equal and not merely as a strategic asset with ice on top and a flag attached?

A U.S. COFA with Greenland would not be a shortcut to control of the Arctic.

Done right, it would be a case study in whether modern great-power politics can coexist with genuine consent, shared interests and respect for small nations.

Done poorly, it would simply repackage old hierarchies in new legal language.

The choice — if it ever comes — would have to be made with eyes wide open.

As Greenland might wish to have a stronger relationship with the U.S. without severing its ties to Europe, it might also wish to consider two potential scenarios that would allow it make the best of both worlds — one in which it remains non-sovereign within the Kingdom of Denmark and another in which it constitutes sovereign state upon independence.

A trilateral COFA framework: Best of both worlds for a non-sovereign Greenland?

If Denmark were to retain sovereignty over Greenland, a bespoke COFA could entail a trilateral framework in which Greenland remains an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark while receiving credible security guarantees, predictable payments and investment from both Washington and Copenhagen in exchange for agreed access and capabilities.

In other words, a U.S.-Greenland COFA that relates to the U.S. relationship with Greenland, but that is negotiated by the U.S. with both Greenland and Denmark at the table and that does not undermine the sovereignty of the Kingdom of Denmark or the right to self-determination of the people of Greenland.

It would be an arrangement where the U.S. and the Kingdom of Denmark share access and authority in Greenland for defence and security, but not sovereignty which will rest only with the Kingdom of Denmark — that is, until Greenland and Denmark resolve among themselves and without any external interference any change to the status of Greenland in the future.

Should Greenland become independent and sovereign in the future, then Greenland can either take over the roles and responsibilities of the Kingdom of Denmark or agree a parallel COFA with Denmark, so Washington and Copenhagen continue to share military access and authority, with only Greenland holding sovereignty.

For the U.S., this would be a step up from the existing arrangement.

While the U.S. already enjoys virtually unlimited access to Greenland for defence purposes through its 1951 Agreement with the Kingdom of Denmark, the U.S. would now enjoy unlimited military access and potentially preferential economic access through the COFA that would grant the U.S. authority and legitimacy in Greenland that it would share with, but without being dependent on, Denmark.

For Greenland and Denmark, the U.S. would be back – larger and stronger than ever – but as a burden-sharing partner, not a burden-inflicting threat.

The U.S. would be incentivised to stay clear from any interference that could undermine the Kingdom’s sovereignty and Greenland’s self-determination so as to not upset the new status quo upon which the stability of its interests in Greenland rest.

The challenge in the trilateral negotiations is that they would require to be handled with the greatest delicacy.

The more the COFA arrangement looks like a sovereign-to-sovereign compact, the more it pulls Greenland toward independence.

The more it tries to preserve Greenland’s current status, the more it becomes a U.S.-Denmark agreement about Greenland, with Greenland’s consent and benefit negotiated politically rather than guaranteed by sovereignty.

Furthermore, there could also be tensions around authority and access.

If, say, the U.S. might wish to deny military access to North American and European allies and partners – or NATO and the EU – to whom Denmark and Greenland might wish to grant access.

The trilateral negotiations can only work if the U.S., Denmark and Greenland operate with mutual respect.

The U.S. and Denmark must let Greenland sit in the driver’s seat as much as possible and at no time should it ever be dispatched to the back seat.

Nothing about Greenland without Greenland.

For the U.S.-Greenland COFA to be fit for purpose in this sense, it ought to enshrine these safeguards as clauses.

One clause should relate to mutual respect and consent.

A second clause could relate to ensuring the U.S. does not exercise the joint authority it would share with Denmark for defence to undermine or weaken the cooperation and access that other Western allies and bodies such as NATO and the EU currently have with Greenland.

Another clause should establish in no uncertain terms that the U.S. recognises the sovereignty of the Kingdom of Denmark over Greenland, that it will recognise the sovereignty of Greenland if and when Greenland secures independence and that the U.S. will not interfere in municipal or national elections in Greenland or Denmark or in any negotiations between Greenland and Denmark about their future relationship.

A fourth clause could require both the U.S. and Denmark to commit to have the Government of Greenland, where possible, be the lead actor on all matters pertaining to the COFA.

It should make clear that no decision about Greenland should be reached or considered binding without adequately consulting and receiving the consent of the Government of Greenland.

Negotiating bilateral COFAs with the U.S. and Denmark: Best of both worlds for an independent Greenland?

If the cleanest legal path to a U.S.-Greenland COFA runs through sovereignty, Greenland’s real strategic challenge becomes how to be independent without being isolated from its traditional partners.

One answer is institutional pluralism — belonging, by choice, to more than one community at once.

The Commonwealth of Nations that emerged from the British Empire offers a suggestive analogy.

The Commonwealth today is a voluntary association of 56 independent and equal countries that have come together to advance shared goals such as development, democracy and peace.

While most Commonwealth member states share a common heritage and language as part of the British Empire, many also sit inside other cultural or political associations, often for historic reasons.

For instance, Canada, Cameroon, Seychelles, Mauritius, Dominica, Saint Lucia and Vanuatu are members of both the Commonwealth and the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.

Their cases illustrate how states can draw benefits from overlapping networks of belonging rather than choosing alliances based only on one identity or patron.

Translate that logic northward and you can sketch a plausible Arctic future.

An independent Greenland could enter a COFA with the U.S. to lock in security guarantees, mobility, access to economic opportunities and long-term investment — structured to protect Greenlandic agency and to avoid turning the island into a mere platform.

At the same time, an independent Greenland could negotiate a similar bilateral COFA with Denmark that lets Denmark continue to share military access and authority with the U.S. while recognising that sovereignty lies only with independent Greenland.

After all, even the U.S. has three COFAs currently in place, so it cannot demand from Greenland an exclusivity that it cannot reciprocate.

Furthermore, an independent Greenland could help steer a transition within today’s Kingdom of Denmark toward a looser, voluntary association — designed along the lines of the Commonwealth of Nations — in which Greenland, the Faroe Islands and Denmark cooperate freely as three sovereign, equal states.

They could cooperate on issues ranging from education and health care to foreign affairs and trade, to research, culture and environmental protection and perhaps some shared services.

Not because they constitutionally have to, but because they choose to.

In this scenario, Greenland gets the strategic assurance of close U.S. ties, the historical continuity and people-to-people links of a Danish-centred association and the economic and political ballast of deep relations with Europe.

And why stop there?

It could cultivate an assemblage of special relationships within the Western Alliance where values and interests align.

That would be the real promise of this scenario — and the real tightrope.

What else could a bespoke U.S.-Greenland COFA entail?

At the multilateral level, Trump could seize the opportunity the COFA presents to establish an economic NATO that brings together allies and partners to provide joint financing for strategic projects in geopolitical hotspots such as Greenland and the Indo-Pacific.

It would offer companies and governments therein access to deeper pools of capital on friendlier terms and thereby disincentivise them from ever turning to China.

Such an economic NATO would be independent from the COFA but could sit well alongside it.

It would also allow the U.S. to demonstrate that it has no intention of using its privileged status in Greenland to weaken the relationships and cooperation that allies and partners share with Greenland.

In addition, at the bilateral level, Trump could introduce his own version of the Marshall Plan.

Through it, he could secure and strengthen U.S. influence and cooperation in the abovementioned geopolitical hotspots.

The Trump Plan would entail setting up a fund that directs its resources towards the economic development of Greenland.

It would catalyse innovation, facilitate economic diversification, reduce trade restrictions, modernise industry, improve economic and technological competitiveness and invest in infrastructure.

One might call it The Trump Fund for the Development of Greenland.

This Trump Fund could form a central pillar of the U.S.-Greenland COFA but be given a distinct personality so one can outlive the other should either be terminated in the future.

Choosing among futures

Seen this way, a compact of free association is not a single destination but a fork in the road.

It can be a capstone to independence, a bridge toward it or a pressure point that forces hard constitutional decisions sooner than expected.

It can replicate existing models or innovate beyond them.

It can narrow Greenland’s options — or expand them.

The most consequential choice therefore is not whether Greenland enters a COFA, but which version of Greenland and what future for Greenland such an agreement would presume and produce.

The best version of free association for Greenland would not present it with a binary choice between Washington and Copenhagen or between America and Europe.

It would be a framework that lets Greenland say we are not for sale, we have the right to freely determine for ourselves our political status and our destiny and we can belong to multiple partnerships at once — on our terms.

Any opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Arctic Today.

Dr. Dwayne Menezes is a historian, foreign policy expert, and social entrepreneur specializing in the Commonwealth and Polar Regions. He is the founder of the Polar Research and Policy Initiative, a London-based international think-tank dedicated to Arctic, Nordic and Antarctic affairs.

With a PhD from the University of Cambridge, Dr. Menezes has held academic and policy roles, including advising the Commonwealth and the UK Parliament. He is also a published author and associate producer of award-winning films.