President Trump said Wednesday that he had reached the framework of a deal with NATO over Greenland’s future, hours after alliance officials separately discussed the possibility of the United States obtaining sovereignty over land for military bases, according to three senior officials familiar with the talks.
Mr. Trump’s announcement was among a series of moves on Wednesday that appeared to draw the United States back from the possibility of military and economic conflict with his allies over Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark.
Mr. Trump also withdrew the threat of additional tariffs for European allies that had resisted his insistence on owning Greenland, and said he would not use force to assert American ownership.
Mr. Trump capped those concessions on Wednesday evening with an announcement on Truth Social that he and Mark Rutte, the NATO secretary general, had “formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region,” without offering any details about that framework. He added: “This solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the United States of America, and all NATO Nations.”
Mr. Trump’s announcement came after officials discussed the possibility of a territorial compromise during meetings on Wednesday in Brussels among top military officers from NATO’s member states, according to the senior Western officials familiar with the talks.
The officials said that Mr. Rutte had been pursuing a compromise this week, but they did not know if the concept of the United States having some sovereignty over small pockets of Greenland for military bases was part of the framework announced by Mr. Trump.
One of the officials, who attended the meetings, compared the concept to the United Kingdom’s bases in Cyprus, which are regarded as British territory. A second official who was briefed on the discussions also confirmed that the idea for Greenland was modeled after the sovereign British bases in Cyprus.
Asked for details of the framework that Mr. Trump announced, NATO said in a statement that “negotiations between Denmark, Greenland and the United States will go forward aimed at ensuring that Russia and China never gain a foothold — economically or militarily — in Greenland.”
Mr. Rutte did not release details of the possible framework. Allison Hart, a spokeswoman for Mr. Rutte, said that he “did not propose any compromise to sovereignty during his meeting with the president in Davos.”
The Danish prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Aaja Chemnitz, a Greenlandic member of the Danish parliament, rejected what Mr. Trump said about his potential deal with NATO.
“What we are witnessing these days in statements from Trump is completely absurd. NATO has absolutely no mandate to negotiate anything whatsoever without us in Greenland,” she said in a post on social media.
“Nothing about us, without us,” she added, saying, “There is total confusion being created.”
News of the possible framework came hours after Mr. Trump told European leaders in Davos, Switzerland, that he would not settle for anything less than the United States taking ownership of Greenland. Mr. Trump had promised dire economic and security consequences for Europe if he did not get his way.
Addressing a room full of heads of state, billionaires and other world leaders, Mr. Trump said repeatedly that the United States needed Greenland for national security purposes. He said that only the United States was strong enough to defend Greenland from external threats, and that defending it made sense only if the United States owned it.
He called for “immediate negotiations” to discuss transferring ownership of the semiautonomous island to the United States from Denmark and derided European countries as dependent on the United States. “Without us, most of the countries don’t even work,” Mr. Trump said.
The day encapsulated Mr. Trump’s second-term approach to global power and policymaking: alternating between coercing and humiliating once-close allies in the pursuit of a goal that he appears to see as a critical piece of his legacy.
“We probably won’t get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force where we would be, frankly, unstoppable,” Mr. Trump said. “But I won’t do that. That’s probably the biggest statement, because people thought I would use force. I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force. All the United States is asking for is a place called Greenland.”
A few breaths later, though, Mr. Trump issued explicit and implicit threats to European leaders if they did not grant his wishes. He reminded the audience that he had unilaterally taxed imports to the United States from countries across Europe and beyond, having already threatened to increase tariffs on Denmark and several European countries that expressed solidarity with Denmark and Greenland.
As is often the case in their delicate dealings with Mr. Trump, some European leaders reacted to what they saw as the most positive note in the remarks — his pledge not to deploy troops — and expressed hope that they might reach a compromise over Greenland’s future.
Rasmus Jarlov, chairman of the defense committee in Denmark’s Parliament, said in an interview that “we’ve heard a lot worse” from Mr. Trump.
“I’m glad he’s ruling out military force,” Mr. Jarlov said. “I didn’t see in his remarks today an escalation. He insists he wants Greenland, but that’s not new. Of course, we still insist that we are not handing over Greenland.”
Mr. Trump left little room for compromise in his speech, however. Many European leaders have maintained that they cannot countenance ceding ownership of Greenland to the United States, but they also say they would be open to almost any other arrangement that expands America’s presence there. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump said, again, that would not suffice.
“You need the ownership to defend it,” Mr. Trump said. A moment later, he added: “Who the hell wants to defend a license agreement or a lease?”
Michael Schwirtz, Maya Tekeli and Jeffrey Gettleman contributed reporting.
Lara Jakes, a Times reporter based in Rome, reports on conflict and diplomacy, with a focus on weapons and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. She has been a journalist for more than 30 years.
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