Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former NATO chief and Danish prime minister from 2001 to 2009, sharply criticized Trump's approach, calling the Greenland controversy "a weapon of mass distraction from the real threats" like Russia's war in Ukraine. He told the Financial Times that the world's attention is focused on "something that does not represent a threat, neither to Europe nor to the United States."
He warned: "Divisions in the West play into Russian hands. I'm sure Moscow hopes Greenland becomes the iceberg that sinks Nato. [...] Conquering Greenland would be the end of the world order as we know it." Rasmussen, who once sent Danish troops to fight with the US in Afghanistan, said: "Now we see the United States use a language that's pretty close to the gangsters that they should control in Moscow, Beijing, etc,"