A French Affair: Arctic politics in June

France looks north, the U.S. reshuffles command structures, Russia plans ahead

Qupanuk Olsen’s YouTube channel, “Q’s Greenland”, is popular. So popular, in fact, that it has become a springboard for a career in politics. Olsen, a mining engineer from the town of Qaqortoq, started recording short clips about life in Greenland during the pandemic. Her online presence, which is followed by half a million subscribers, delves into many themes: Touristic itineraries, stunning landscapes, Greenland’s food culture, Inuit languages, and the colonial history of the island. There is one topic, however, which Olsen had long avoided: Current affairs. Until earlier this year, that is. Running on the ticket of Naleraq, a pro-independence party often described as populist, Olsen was elected as a member of the Inatsisartut, Greenland’s parliament, in a national election that was interpreted by 66° North as a referendum on independence of sorts, but which in retrospect was mostly decided on the issue of fishing permits.

As a corollary of Olsen’s new mandate, but perhaps also the challenging diplomatic environment now faced by Greenlanders, “Q’s Greenland” has slowly given up on its self-imposed politics embargo. For instance, Olsen has recently used her channel to share her views on Donald Trump and Greenlandic statehood.

1. Why did the French president visit Greenland?

On June 16, “Q’s Greenland” released a short video comment on a historic event: The first ever official visit to Greenland by a non-Danish head of state. France’s president Emmanuel Macron stopped by in Nuuk on June 15, en route to the G7 summit in Canada. According to a readout published by the Élysée, Macron met with Jens-Frederik Nielsen, Greenland’s newly-minted premier, and his Danish counterpart, Mette Frederiksen. They discussed “security in the North Atlantic and Arctic, climate change and the energy transition, and the secure supply of rare earths and minerals.” At Nuuk’s new airport, Macron received a stately welcome. During a press conference, the president announced that France would open a consulate in Nuuk and participate in more joint Arctic exercises. But Greenland’s opposition MPs widely questioned whether Macron’s visit had been planned in good faith. Naleraq’s leader Pele Broberg, for example, took offence at the presence of Danish officials at the meetings, asking for Greenland to be allowed to conduct its foreign affairs independently. In a fiery press release, Broberg addressed Mette Fredriksen directly: “Stay home, Mette. We don't need Danish espionage in [our] conversations.” Olsen also struck a critical, but on balance more careful tone in her video message, asking: “Is Macron here for the Greenlandic people or Denmark?”

Video: President Macron of France speaking in Nuuk, 15 June 2025 (Source: Élysée Palace on YouTube)

But for Greenland’s unity-oriented four-party government coalition, as well as for the government of Denmark, Macron’s visit represented a coup. The president’s stopover had been preceded by a quiet, but highly effective tour of European capitals by Vivian Motzfeldt, Greenland’s new Minister of Foreign Affairs. After visiting Brussels — where Motzfeldt met the E.U.’s HRVP Kaja Kallas and teased a rare earths partnership with the bloc — the Greenlandic delegation headed further south to Paris. There, Motzfeldt met with representatives of the Élysée, France’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, the country’s polar ambassador, and members of the local research community (including the humbled and grateful editor of 66° North).

For the Greenlandic delegation, Paris was an obvious first stop. France had been the first allied state to speak out against the annexation plans pitched by Donald Trump. In January, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs rebuffed Trump’s advances on the island, warning the U.S. against “threatening E.U. sovereign borders” (Note: Greenland is not a full member of the European Union). Later that month, president Macron met with Mette Frederiksen, and joined Germany’s former chancellor Olaf Scholz in backing the Danish position. But in the spring, Macron’s positions on Greenland were still characterised by caution, as the president attempted to placate the mercurial U.S. president through flattery and extraordinary amounts of one-on-one time. By late spring, France’s patience with the new U.S. administration seemed to have worn thinner. At the U.N. Ocean Conference hosted in Nice in early June, Macron told delegates that “Greenland [is not] up for grabs, nor are the Arctic or the high seas for sale.”

Motzfeldt used her time in Brussels and Paris to capitalise on this momentum and shore up international support for Nuuk, while also presenting Greenland’s European partners with economic opportunities. In doing so, she attempted to hit two birds with one stone: Involving E.U. partners in Greenland’s rare earth and mineral mining projects could help deliver on a central promise of the island’s new government, the delivery of economic growth as a basis for future statehood. On the other hand, European investments might also demonstrate to U.S. officials that Greenland is capable of withholding access to resources (and, apparently, even make them available to China instead). In late May, the Greenlandic government already awarded a 30-year exploitation permit to Greenland Anorthosite Mining (GAM), a Danish-French consortium.

From the point of view of Nuuk and Copenhagen, Macron’s visit delivered on several fronts. It signalled deepening European support for Greenland’s positions, and consolidated an emerging E.U. stance which will imply more muscular support for Denmark. A more united E.U. is very unlikely dislodge Trump’s ambitions. But Denmark and Greenland were, at the very least, able to convince the E.U. states not to throw Nuuk under the proverbial bus (as had been done earlier by NATO head Mark Rutte). This is especially notable in the context of Europe’s increasingly desperate pursuit of American reassurances over the mutual defence guarantee of the North Atlantic alliance. France’s motivations, on the other hand, are more difficult to decipher. Why did Macron take time out of his schedule to visit remote Greenland, a territory that has hitherto never figured in French strategic discourse?

The answer is multi-layered. One part of the explanation lies in France’s traditionally larger-than-life foreign policy ambitions. Now in the waning days of his ten-year presidency, Macron has amassed significant experience on the international stage, as well as much recognition value among foes and friends alike. Aghast at France and Germany’s failure to appease Vladimir Putin in early 2022, Macron remodelled France’s historically south-facing strategic outlook, and reoriented his country’s defence posture towards the east and the north. Slowly, but with growing determination, Paris has acknowledged Russia as the predominant security threat for Europe. Macron also sidestepped German phlegmatism to create “a nascent EU defence nucleus [with Poland and the Nordics and the Baltics, and] work on robust European security guarantees for Ukraine.” This has required Paris to engage more deeply with Warsaw, but also its partners in northern Europe.

At the same time, doubts over the U.S.’ continued commitment to NATO’s Article 5 have validated Paris’ long-standing desire for “European strategic autonomy”. Charles de Gaulle’s deep mistrust towards U.S. intentions in Europe never much abated under France’s subsequent post-war leaders. Macron first formulated his own vision for strategic independence, albeit one rooted in E.U. integration, in 2017. For a long time, the president’s vision was stonewalled by staunchly transatlantic European countries, including Germany, Denmark or Poland. But no longer: the reelection of Donald Trump has forced even hesitant European leaders to support self-sufficient defence in Europe. As the major military power of the E.U., France has been able to capitalise on this shift. This is in spite of Macron’s domestic political woes, which, paradoxically, have pushed the president to dedicate even more time to the domaine réservé, the exclusive sway held by French heads of state over foreign and defence policy.

Image: A recruitment poster for the French navy, spotted in a Parisian metro station in early 2024. The poster reads: “Getting up to see the Aurora Borealis might be hard, but it’s worth the effort.” (Source: Author, private)

The Nordic countries have thus featured prominently in France’s efforts to establish itself as a leading actor in Europe’s collective defence, to be reshaped along the historical lines of preference of its eastern and northern ‘frontline states’. Given that the European Arctic is mostly a maritime theatre, and France arguably possesses Europe’s most powerful navy, Paris has been a particularly sought-after partner for naval exercises in the region. The French Navy conducts joint NATO exercises in Arctic waters, as well as independent patrols and missions. Recent docking visits by French vessels in Norway and Iceland have been explained by reference to a need to “gain better knowledge and control of maritime zones located in northern Europe.”

Viewed through the lens of French ‘grand strategy’, Macron’s activist stance on Greenland thus makes a good amount of sense: The president’s dedication to furthering European integration, especially in the security realm, requires Paris to back its fellow E.U. member Denmark in a sovereignty dispute. ‘Strategic autonomy’, or military independence from the U.S., requires standing up to Washington in defence of European interests. And collective European deterrence against Russia requires France to redirect resources not only to eastern Europe, but also the Nordic states — and, by extension, the Arctic. This is reflected in multiple policy documents published by French ministries, including the Ministry of Defence and Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs.

Qupanuk Olsen is right, however, to question whether France’s recent engagement is rooted in considerations of Greenland’s own preferences. On balance, the French perspective on the Arctic is shaped by first-order strategic considerations, the country’s shifting network of alliances and agreements in Europe, and significant commercial interest. In this regard, France is no different from other outsider states in the Arctic. But as Arthur Amelot, an expert consultant at the European Commission, pointed out in a piece for The Conversation, Greenland has made it abundantly clear that it does not want to become a platform for extractivism and militarism. As for other friends of the island and its people, respect for this desire should be the yardstick of all French policy, both in theory as well as in practice.

2. The U.S. military reassigns Greenland from EUCOM to NORTHCOM

Meanwhile, the U.S. government reassigned responsibility for Greenland within the command structure of its military. The move was widely interpreted as a bureaucratic nod to Donald Trump’s desire to gain control over the island. On June 17, the Pentagon announced that it would shift Greenland to the US Northern Command (NORTHCOM), which is responsible for domestic defence, and away from the military’s European command (EUCOM). The command structure of the U.S. military is subdivided into eleven unified combatant commands, seven of which are designated as geographical, and four as functional. Despite its geographical location in North America, Greenland’s allocation to EUCOM had historically represented an acknowledgement on the part of the Pentagon that the island remains politically tied to Denmark, and thereby to Europe.

Image: The U.S. military’s Unified Combatant Command’s Area of Responsibility before June 17, 2025 (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

Iris Ferguson, who served as the Pentagon’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Arctic and Global Resilience under the Biden administration, commented: “Unified Command Plans don’t make foreign policy, but they do shape how strategic attention and resources are directed. So, yes—these shifts matter.” Ferguson expressed hope that the move could reaffirm Greenland’s critical role in the defence of the North American “homeland”, and “elevate Greenland’s visibility in U.S. defence planning.” At the same time, she recalled Article 1 of the NATO charter, which commits member states to refraining from the threat or use of force. Ferguson also called on the Trump administration to refrain from “sabre rattling” over Greenland and to stop marginalising Denmark, a “key Arctic and NATO ally.”

Reactions out of Denmark and Greenland were cautious, but acknowledged the on-the-nose symbolism of Trump’s decision. Denmark’s defence minister, Troels Lund Poulsen told TV2 that “how the United States divides responsibilities within its own military command structure is, of course, an American matter." Jon Rahbek-Clemmensen, a professor at the Royal Danish Defence College, told Berlingske that while the move might make “good military sense, the symbolism is hard to ignore.” And Sermitsiaq, a Greenlandic paper, commented: “On a political level, the American president has a burning desire for Greenland to come under the United States. But since that cannot happen, Trump still has the option of taking the military route to bring Greenland closer to him, which he is now doing.”

3. Patrushev’s growing clout, Ukrainian drones in Murmansk, and a charm offensive towards Chinese investors

On 9 June, the chairman of Russia’s new Maritime Collegium, Nikolay Patrushev, announced in an interview with Argumenty i fakty that Vladimir Putin had “approved the final version of the Russian Navy Development Strategy for the period up to 2050”. The aim of this new strategy document would be, according to Patrushev, to “restore Russia's position as one of the world's greatest maritime powers.” The document follows on Russia’s hawkish Naval Doctrine of 2022, which declared an “age of competition” in the Arctic and framed Western states as Russia’s main maritime adversaries. While details have not yet been published, the strategy is likely to further militarise Moscow’s outlook on the oceans, and in particular its approach to the Arctic. New construction goals for ice-going vessels and icebreakers are expected to be part of the programme — an indication for this may be the most recent order for a nuclear icebreaker placed by oil giant Rosneft’ on 18 June. In a congratulatory address on the occasion of Russia’s ‘Northern Fleet Day’, Patrushev called on mariners to “contain growing threats from unfriendly states [in the Arctic].” Since his presumably involuntary transfer to the Maritime Collegium, Patrushev has become a predominant voice on Arctic matters within the Russian regime — surpassing even president Putin in terms of visibility, according to a recent in-depth study by the NGO Arctida.io.

On Monday, June 2, Ukraine launched a highly successful, coordinated drone attack against strategic bombers parked on airfields across the entirety of the Russian Federation. Among the bases most severely hit by “Operation Spiderweb” was the Olenya air base in the oblast of Murmansk, where a number of long-range bombers and surveillance aircraft were reportedly destroyed. The attack represents the single largest ‘spillover’ incident of the war in Ukraine into a territory above the Arctic circle.

Video: Footage of Ukraine’s drone assault on Russia’s Olenya air base (Source: Forbes, YouTube)

In Norway, the Russian embassy led by the country’s former Senior Arctic Official, Nikolay Korchunov, released a slew of vitriolic statements in response to comments made by Norway’s foreign minister that Oslo would be interested in increasing NATO's military presence on its northern territories. One such proclamation by the embassy read: "The increasingly obvious deployment of NATO forces to the Norwegian North and the Arctic region is taking place to the accompaniment of empty assurances from Oslo about its alleged continuing interest in maintaining regional stability, avoiding misunderstandings and unintentional escalation.” But in a separate Telegram post on the occasion of ‘Russia Day’, Korchunov also noted that “Russia [would be] open to joint projects in the Arctic, is ready to share experience and develop cooperation in the interests of the development of the region and its residents.”

Meanwhile, major Russian outlets launched a coordinated charm offensive to attract Chinese investors to Northern Sea Route (NSR) projects. The media campaign might provide an indication that Moscow’s plan to replace fledgling Chinese investments with Indian and Emirati money has not worked out as planned, thus requiring a renewed effort to win over Beijing . On 23 May, Izvestiya ran a hopeful-sounding long-read on Chinese interests in Arctic shipping routes. Russia’s, minister for the Far East and Arctic, Alexey Chekunkov, announced “China’s growing interest in the NSR,” highlighting linkages between “Arctic security issues and the Indo-Pacific”. Various experts were interviewed by Izvestiya on the benefits China might accrue through investments in Russian Arctic projects. And although Rosatom and China's New New Shipping announced on 18 June that they join forces to construct container ships for their expanding operations on the NSR, and Yamal LNG announced its first seasonal gas shipment to China, Russia’s Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute publicly warned on June 19 that “ice conditions will continue to significantly complicate navigation along the Northern Sea Route in the coming decades.”

Russian Arctic energy projects hit another rough patch in May. Due to a shortage of LNG tankers, Novatek’s Arctic LNG 2 plant was forced to stop operations at its first production line on May 23. The company remains determined, however, to complete the plant’s planned third construction line, and to launch construction of the Murmansk LNG project by 2027. Whether it will be able to do so, however, depends on factors that lie largely outside of Novatek’s control.

Thank you for reading 66° North! Please feel free to forward this article, and consider to…