HI! There was more unfolding in this Big Week of local, state, national and international issues of common concern.

We gathered in the Conference Room for Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks this morning to Manhattan at the UNCA and marveled as a substantial contingent of the diplomats exited the chamber before the state of Israel rose to speak. The rhetoric was vigorous, which was hardly unexpected in a week already overflowing with it.

We told you we would not get to the Greenland thing this morning.

And we didn’t! So here it is:

The original 1951 Defense of Greenland Agreement is the same age as some of our Boomers: 75 years old. It was negotiated by the United States and Denmark under the framework of the new North Atlantic Treaty and provided the legal structure for America’s military presence on the world’s largest island.

That arrangement evolved as Greenland itself did. A major update came with the 2004 Igaliku Agreement, which formally incorporated Greenland’s Home Rule government into consultations about American military activities.

Now the smart folks—or at least this generation of them—have updated the arrangement again.
On 22 September 2026, the United States, Denmark and Greenland signed a new agreement in New York. It preserves Danish sovereignty and Greenlanders’ right of self-determination while significantly strengthening Greenland’s role in Arctic and North Atlantic defense.

The United States can modernize and expand operations at Pituffik Space Base, formerly Thule Air Base, and establish additional defense areas at Narsarsuaq and Mestersvig. in strategic locations along the coast The agreement also establishes procedures for creating additional defense areas, if future circumstances require them.

Which is interesting., since some of the grandkids may have to go defend them!

We like and respect the Danes, and this arrangement manages to accomplish something diplomatic agreements occasionally manage to do: recognize that the world has changed without pretending geography has. Or the people.

And geography is what makes Greenland impossible to ignore.

It sits astride the Arctic approaches to North America and the North Atlantic—the same geography that made the island strategically important during World War II and the Cold War and makes it increasingly important again today.

There is another interesting provision. Should Greenland someday exercise its right of self-determination and become independent, the agreement anticipates an independent Greenland remaining within NATO and assuming the defense obligations established by this arrangement.

That brings us back to Russia and Ukraine, which in only minor differences to the conflict today about
Russia., the one with the capital “R” we have been dealing with since the flawed deal at Yalta in 1945 that recognized the sacrifice of millions by subjecting their families to generations of national imprisonment.

We are not going to jump all the way down that wormhole this afternoon. There is enough there for another Big Week.

Russia’s continuing war against Ukraine—a former Soviet republic—has made NATO’s northern flank and Arctic defenses considerably more than an academic matter.

And that brings up Article 5.

The famous provision of the North Atlantic Treaty says that an armed attack against one Ally is considered an attack against them all. Each member then agrees to assist with whatever action it considers necessary, potentially including armed force.

That distinction matters.

So does Greenland.

Seventy-five years after Washington and Copenhagen signed the original agreement, the same enormous island is still sitting exactly where it was—between North America, Europe, Russia and the Arctic.

Only the world around it has changed.

There seems to be a lot of that going around these days.

We prefer Peace, you know?

But a poll here in the Conference Room suggests it was only 9–12.

And by a separate majority, it is time for lunch! It stopped raining, so I looked at
Rocket and Splash to get something on the grill for later!

Copyright 2026 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com