While President Trump referenced a framework agreement with NATO and toned down rhetoric on seizing Greenland before leaving the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Stella Ghervas, professor and the Eugen Weber Professor of Modern European History at UCLA, says the episode has already had serious effects. Ghervas talks about a broad shift in the U.S. approach to Europe and the rest of the world given recent actions, including the incursion into Venezuela.
Ghervas says:
"Even when subsequently softened, reframed as negotiation or presented as 'framework' agreements, President Trump's language signals an approach that treats power as the ultimate arbiter of rights, while discounting sovereignty, alliance commitments and the agency of smaller political communities. There has been a broader shift toward a spheres-of-influence mindset in which might makes right and allies are valued primarily insofar as they serve U.S. interests."
"What President Trump's Davos speech changes is the register — from imminent coercion to strategic ambiguity — which, if anything, underscores the importance of rhetoric and assumptions, even when force is not ultimately used."
"The fact that a U.S. president openly entertained coercion against a NATO ally has shaken long-standing assumptions about American reliability. As a result, European governments are accelerating discussions about strategic autonomy, deepening EU defense initiatives and hedging against future U.S. unpredictability. NATO may endure institutionally but its credibility has been weakened, and transatlantic relations are likely to remain strained for years. Throughout the episode, Danish and European leaders have been clear on one point: Greenland's future belongs to its people, not to external powers.
"Russia has publicly condemned U.S. actions in Venezuela as 'armed aggression' and a violation of international law, while using them rhetorically to underscore what it portrays as Western hypocrisy and to justify its own conduct in Ukraine. These reactions are less about Venezuela itself than about exploiting contradictions in U.S. and Western behavior."
"With regard to Greenland, Moscow would not defend Danish sovereignty, but it would quietly welcome any weakening of NATO cohesion, particularly in the strategically important Arctic region. From Russia's perspective, even rhetorical threats are valuable: They erode trust within alliances, normalize coercive politics and reinforce a vision of international order based on great-power competition rather than rules, institutions based on great-power competition rather than rules, institutions and negotiated constraints. Europeans increasingly see both Venezuela and Greenland as part of a broader drift toward unilateralism that undermines alliances and plays directly into narratives long promoted by Moscow."
Ghervas is an expert on the intellectual, international and legal history of modern Europe, with special reference to the history of peace and peacemaking, and in Russia's intellectual and maritime history.
Ghervas' latest book, "Conquering Peace: From the Enlightenment to the European Union," won the 2023 Laura Shannon Prize in Contemporary European Studies.
