Second lady Usha Vance and one of her sons were supposed to attend Greenland’s big dogsled race this weekend in what some called a “charm offensive” to further President Donald Trump’s ambition to pry the territory from Denmark.
But charm turned to smarm when the White House announced that she would instead be joining her husband in visiting an American military facility there on Friday.
“The Vice President and Second Lady are embarking on a historic expedition with their visit to Greenland, where the Vice President will emphasize the importance of bolstering [Arctic] security in places like Pituffik Space Base,” a senior White House official told the New York Post.
The official added, “Unfortunately, Danish leaders have spent decades mistreating the Greenlandic people, treating them like second class citizens and allowing infrastructure on the island to fall into disrepair. Expect the Vice President to emphasize these points as well.”
However true or false that may be, a recent poll commissioned by the Danish newspaper Berlingske and Greenlandic daily Sermitsiaq, according to Reuters, showed that 85 percent of Greenlanders do not wish their semi-autonomous territory to become part of the United States. Only 6 percent did. Just under half said they view Trump as a threat, an opinion that could only have been reinforced by something Vance said two months ago on Fox News Sunday regarding the same facility he is visiting Friday.
“We don’t have to use military force,” he said. “The thing that people always ignore is we already have troops in Greenland.
He added, “Greenland is really important for America strategically.”
On top of that, Vance arrives with Usha at the U.S. Space Force Base in Pituffik on Friday having recently called Denmark a “bad ally.” He has also complained that our European friends are mooching off America. And he further affirmed that view in the Signal chat that famously included Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic.
“I just hate bailing Europe out again,” Vance messaged to the group discussing a pending attack on the Houthis to secure shipping lanes.
“I fully share your loathing of European freeloading. It’s PATHETIC,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth replied.
The now-infamous chat was started by National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, who is expected to also join what started out as just a trip to Greenland for Usha and her child.
Whoever goes, there is another woman who should be remembered when it comes to anything involving the U.S. and Denmark, most particularly when it comes to questions of who is a good ally and which country is in the other’s debt.
Private Sophia “Bellis” Bruun was one of 18,000 Danish soldiers deployed to Afghanistan between 2002 and 2021, arriving shortly after the Americans went in and leaving shortly before they withdrew. She was 12 on 9/11 and 22 in 2010, when she arrived in Afghanistan. She and her fellow Danes asked nothing of America other than to join 32 other nations in what they viewed as a fight against terrorism and for freedom. Her former commanding officer, Roni Holm Hansen, later posted in Danish that Bruun had ”a big smile, a twinkle in her eye and a will to make a difference.”
“That’s what made her go to Afghanistan…what made her train hard and fight bravely,” Hansen wrote. “She gave of herself to help others. “
Hansen added, “She had the principle of respect and truth in her heart… Everyone who knew her or met her could feel that she was a strong woman, and for us a dedicated soldier.” “
He recalled that she was quick with “a cheeky remark… but also with empathy, a soothing hand on the shoulder and an invitation for deeper conversation.”
Bruun volunteered to serve with a battle-battered unit at Patrol Base Clifton in Helmand Province. She proved her mettle in May of that year, simultaneously holding off an attack with a machine gun and delivering first aid to the wounded.
On June 1, she offered to help out on a patrol that needed an extra hand. At midday, she was serving as a gunner on a Piranha armored patrol vehicle four miles north-east of Girishk, the site of a major battle between the British and local tribesmen in 1841. Her vehicle was hit by a massive roadside IED and she became the first female Danish soldier ever killed in combat.
“That day, a small part of her many soldier comrades died,” Hansen later wrote.
She had already written what she wanted inscribed on her tombstone in the event of her death.
“Sophia - wanted to make the world a better place,” it read in Danish.
All told, 43 Danish soldiers died in Afghanistan, 37 in actual combat. At 7.82 deaths per million, it was the highest casualty rate compared to population in the coalition other than the 7.96 per million of the United States.
Eight Danish soldiers died in Iraq after the US. invaded there on the pretext of securing non-existent weapons of mass destruction.
JD Vance served in Iraq as a U.S. Marine, as did Hegseth with the U.S. Army.
Hegseth also served in Afghanistan in 2011, but in relative safety as an instructor at the Counter-insurgency Training Center in Kabul rather than in Helmand Province, where Bruun died the year before.
Waltz served multiple tours with the U.S. Army Special Forces in Afghanistan, the Middle East, and Africa. He was awarded four Bronze Star, including two for valor.
You would think that their roles in what was called the “War on Terror” would leave Vance, Waltz, and Hegseth some respect for the ally that sacrificed quite nearly as much as America in Afghanistan. The Danes suffered only .14 deaths per million fewer deaths than the U.S. did when they could have just sat it out. But in return, the U.S. vice president has called them a bad ally and part of a group of free-loaders.
In flying into Greenland with Usha and Waltz on Friday, JD Vance is treating Denmark as a foe to be pressured into giving up Greenland. He would do better to honor the sacrifice that Denmark made without asking anything in return. The U.S. and Denmark might then be able to join together in the way of good allies and make an agreement that Greenland can welcome.
On the remote chance that could happen, Private Sophia Bunn will have continued to make the world a better place.
The Vances are expected to have departed Greenland by Saturday, when three dozen entrants and more than 400 pups commence the annual Avannaata Qimussersua (“The Great Race of the North”). Maybe next year Usha and one of the kiddos can attend the start with no smarm, just genuine charm, absent of agenda.
But the way things are going, don’t count on it.
