Is Trump’s Greenland Deal a Foreign Policy Victory?

Mike Warren is joined by Kevin Williamson and Mike Nelson to examine President Trump’s deal with Denmark on U.S. military presence in Greenland and discuss the reporting by the Washington Post that the Pentagon may be underreporting deaths from the conflict with Iran. The Agenda: —Is this the art of the deal? —Trump’s biggest foreign policy victory? —Will Hegseth be fired after the midterms? Michael Warren is politics editor at The Dispatch and is based in Washington, D.C. A former on-air reporter at CNN and a senior writer at The Weekly Standard, he has spent more than 15 years covering lawmakers on Capitol Hill, the White House and the executive branch, the conservative movement, and political campaigns. When Mike is not reporting, writing, editing, and podcasting, he is probably spending time with his wife and three sons. Mike Nelson is a retired Army Special Forces officer and a member of the Atlantic Council’s Counterterrorism Project. He is formerly of the Institute for the Study of War and the National Security Institute. You can find him on x.com at @mikenelson586. Kevin D. Williamson is national correspondent at The Dispatch and is based in Virginia. Prior to joining the company in 2022, he spent 15 years as a writer and editor at National Review, worked as the theater critic at the New Criterion, and had a long career in local newspapers. He is also a writer in residence at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. When Kevin is not reporting on the world outside Washington for his Wanderland newsletter, you can find him at the rifle range or reading a book about literally almost anything other than politics. The podcast transcription below was generated using artificial intelligence and may include occasional errors or misspellings. Mike Warren 0:00 [intro music] Welcome to the Dispatch Podcast. I'm Mike Warren. On today's roundtable, we examine President Trump's deal with Denmark to strengthen America's military presence in Greenland. Is this a walkback? Then we discuss reporting by the Washington Post that suggests more US troops have died during the Iran war than the Pentagon has publicly acknowledged. We talk about some problems with the Department of Defense and transparency as well. And finally, for Not Worth Your Time, evil lairs and the Arc de Trump, the plan for Washington, DC. I'm joined today by Dispatch national correspondent Kevin Williamson and Dispatch contributor and retired Special Forces officer Mike Nelson. Let's dive in. [instrumental music] All right, gentlemen, some late breaking news. Late last week, Donald Trump, the President of the United States, posted this on Truth Social. "Breaking news. I am pleased to announce that the United States of America has entered into an agreement with the Kingdom of Denmark and Greenland that gives the United States permanent control over security and all other needs in Greenland, completely addressing all of our many US concerns. There will be no cost to the United States. At my direction, we worked with representatives of Denmark and Greenland to guarantee that the United States will forever have the complete ability to do what is necessary in Greenland in order to secure and defend the security of Greenland," et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I won't go on and read the entire post, but this seems to not just be a late Friday afternoon rambling from the President. There appears to be an agreement that is going to be signed at some point in the near future on this. This sort of seems, in, in the words of the President, to have ended his now nearly, I guess, a year and a half long quest to have something happen with the United States' relationship with Greenland. I don't know if this is a fulfillment of the original plan to annex Greenland and make it a part of the United States, but nevertheless, this agreement has happened. Kevin, I wanna start with you because I think it's very interesting that it was a year and a half ago, actually just before the inauguration, when the initial rumblings about Trump's interest in Greenland were sort of kicking back up, you know, reigniting after some teasing during the first term. You wrote this as Trump was talking about, uh, annexing or somehow getting control of Greenland. You wrote, quote, "If the Trump administration were serious about Greenland and the strategic issues associated with it, which are real, Trump himself would be doing the opposite of what he has been doing since forever and work to fortify US leadership in NATO and to build up the credibility and capabilities of the alliance itself." Mike Warren 3:14 Okay, we now have this [chuckles] apparent agreement. NATO is involved, the Danish are involved, everybody seems happy. So, Kevin, can you take credit now for this great achievement of diplomacy by the Trump administration? I'm sure the President was reading what you wrote for us at the Dispatch on this and took notes and said, "We're gonna end up here where Kevin Williamson said." So take your victory lap here. Is this the fulfillment of your, your great diplomatic mind? Kevin Williamson 3:42 Well, one thing we know for sure is that all sentences that begin with "President Trump was reading" are false. Mike Warren 3:49 [laughing] Kevin Williamson 3:49 So that is not what happened. Interactive transcripts are available to Premium members. Join to follow along with the audio. Join Now More We Think You’d Like