Shocking amount Greenland could cost the US if Trump bought the island

Taking over Greenland could end up costing America more than just its reputation on the world stage, academics and former administration officials have warned, after they added up the gargantuan cost of annexation.

Trump's efforts to acquire the vast ice-capped island showed no sign of stopping this week, despite officials from Denmark and Greenland met with Vice President JD Vance to reassert the territory's independence from US interests.

The meeting ended with both sides continuing to have 'fundamental disagreements' over the future of Greenland, which has belonged to Denmark for over 300 years and has just 56,000 citizens.

European allies have even started deploying small military detachments to the Arctic territory amid the threats from their NATO ally, a move that caused President Trump to fire back that 'there's not a thing' they can do to stop him and he will take it 'one way or the other'.

JD Vance visited Greenland in March, 2025, spending time with troops at the US' only base on the island (Jim Watson - Pool/Getty Images)

While the administration has cited 'national security' and Russia's presence in the Arctic Circle as the main reason to acquire the world's largest island as US territory, this week, the true cost of invasion was revealed to NBC News.

They estimated it would cost as much as $700bn to annex the 800,000 square-mile island, while carrying out hypothetical modeling of an American takeover for the White House. This is more than half the annual budget of the Department of Defense.

“Greenland does not want to be owned by, governed by or part of the United States,” the territory's foreign minister Vivian Motzfeldt said as they arrived in Washington on Wednesday for the failed talks, where both sides 'agreed to disagree'.

“We choose the Greenland we know today — as part of the Kingdom of Denmark.”

European powers have deployed additional forces to Greenland (RAMPAZZO / AFP via Getty Images)

But officials believe the landmass is key to America's future strategic interests, as Greenland occupies a key area of the Arctic which climate change has made an increasingly accessible region for Russian assets.

With President Trump keen to reshape America's geopolitical positioning and projection of power around the world, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has stated that acquiring Greenland is a 'high priority' for his second term.

However, a US official speaking anonymously to NBC has questioned the strategic justification of conquering Greenland, which has had an agreement with the US to allow for an escalation of military assets on the island since the Cold War.

Currently, there is just one large US base on the northwest end of Greenland, Pituffik Space Base, which used to be called Thule Air Base and forms a key part of North America's early warning system for intercontinental ballistic missiles

As American troops are already treading Greenland's ice and treaties already allow for a military build-up, the official asked: “Why invade the cow when they’ll sell you the milk at relatively good prices?”