If geopolitics had a thermometer, the mercury would have dropped by a couple of degrees over the past 48 hours. At the start of the week, European leaders were outraged to be facing increased tariffs—again—from their trading partner and ally, the U.S., if they did not comply with demands from the White House for the purchase of Greenland.
A framework of a deal has now supposedly been agreed upon between the White House and NATO, which would step up U.S. defense systems in the Arctic. Details of the agreement are still thin, especially on the issue of how much control the U.S. military will get over the NATO territory that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark.
In turn, Trump de-escalated his threats of new duties on a host of European nations, and European threats of retaliation cooled as a result.
While the deal takes some of the panic out of negotiations, it doesn’t address the steady drift between the U.S. and the partners it once regarded as allies.
