Ben Shapiro on Greenland Crisis

Ben Shapiro / Greenland Crisis / 2025-01-22

Position

“I don't understand why we are attempting to make Greenland our 51st state. It seems to me we already have defense agreements. I think that's silly. Trump is not trying to grab Greenland because it is necessary for us to up our military presence there.”

Contributing sources

[article] Ben Shapiro: Trump is "not trying to grab Greenland because it is necessary for us" to up "our military presence" — 2025-01-22

Position from 2025-01-22

existing-agreements-sufficientHigh

Existing defense agreements and alliance structures already address the strategic interests that territorial expansion claims to serve

Their wording: “We already have defense agreements - the strategic case for acquisition doesn't hold up when we already have the access we need”

Shapiro holds this from a rationalist cost-benefit framework: if the stated goal is military access and rare earth security, and existing agreements already provide that, the acquisition is a solution in search of a problem

Also held by (2)

Joe Biden — Biden treats the existing defense infrastructure in Greenland as evidence that territorial acquisition is unnecessary. The 1951 defense agreement, the 2023 expanded cooperation agreement, and NATO coverage provide the military access, early warning capability, and strategic positioning that acquisition proponents claim to seek.Jon Stewart — Stewart uses sarcasm to expose that the strategic rationale for acquisition is undermined by the existence of the very alliance the acquisition would destroy - NATO already provides the Arctic security framework Trump claims to need

Incompatible with (2)

“US control of Greenland is a strategic necessity for Arctic security and rare earth mineral access”Low

held by Marco Rubio, Donald Trump

“Great powers have the right to expand territory when strategic interests demand it”Low

held by John Mearsheimer, Marco Rubio, Ben Shapiro, Donald Trump

domestic-over-foreignMed

Domestic priorities should take precedence over foreign military commitments and financial aid

Their wording: “This is a distraction from real domestic policy priorities that actually matter to American citizens”

Shapiro holds this more selectively than populist nationalists - he supports some foreign commitments (Israel) but views Greenland acquisition as falling outside the category of genuine strategic necessity

Also held by (14)

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — AOC connects Ukraine spending to domestic priorities not to oppose aid entirely but to demand that foreign commitments don't crowd out investments in working families Tucker Carlson — Carlson frames intervention against a socially conservative country as antithetical to his audience's values, arguing the US is replacing conservative governance with progressive-friendly alternatives Jimmy Dore — Dore's populism centers the domestic cost of foreign intervention - money spent abroad is money stolen from American workers. This resonates with his working-class audience and ties his anti-war position to economic populism Nick Fuentes — Fuentes connects the intervention to his core immigration agenda - regime change creates the conditions for mass deportation Ana Kasparian — Kasparian's political evolution from progressive to independent has sharpened her domestic-first framing. She uses the contrast between foreign military spending and domestic neglect as her primary rhetorical device, making the argument personal and tangible rather than geopolitical Candace Owens — Owens holds this from personal experience - fired from Daily Wire for questioning Israel policy, which she presents as evidence of the suppression she describes Hasan Piker — Piker frames the intervention as a distraction from domestic failures - affordability crisis ignored in favor of foreign military action Joe Rogan — Rogan holds this from a gut-level populist perspective - he sees the contrast between domestic neglect and foreign spending as self-evidently absurd, not through any ideological framework but through common-sense outrage Dave Rubin — Rubin adopts the America First spending argument wholesale, framing foreign aid as directly competing with domestic needs. The 'bankrupting ourselves' hyperbole serves his audience's populist instincts and mirrors the MAGA movement's fiscal nationalism rhetoric Carl Benjamin (Sargon of Akkad) — Benjamin frames the Ukraine commitment as a diversion of resources from domestic needs - billions spent on weapons with no endgame while Western citizens face economic hardship.Donald Trump — Trump holds this premise across conflicts, consistently framing foreign military spending as competing with domestic priorities. This is the same analytical lens he applies to NATO burden-sharing and foreign aid broadly, though he suspends it selectively for Israel Cenk Uygur — Uygur explicitly frames foreign spending as competing with domestic needs - infrastructure crumbling while billions go abroad JD Vance — REUSED from Iran position (vance-iran-selective). Vance holds this from the SAME tech-libertarian realism (Thiel influence) - American resources should be invested domestically rather than in foreign military adventures. In Iran he framed this as 'no blank checks'; here he extends it to 'Europe should be defending Europe', adding a burden-shifting dimension absent from his Iran position Matt Walsh — Walsh does NOT reuse his Iran premises (civilizational-struggle, moral-obligation-israel) for Ukraine. This is the key split in the conservative movement - unconditional support for Israel based on civilizational solidarity, but conditional/skeptical support for Ukraine based on domestic priorities. The inconsistency is analytically significant: if civilizational-struggle applies to Iran (Islam vs the West), why does it not apply to Russia (authoritarian revisionism vs the democratic West)? The answer reveals that Walsh's civilizational framework is specifically Judeo-Christian, not broadly Western-democratic

Incompatible with (4)

“The US-Israel alliance carries mutual obligations that the US should honor”Low

held by Stephen Colbert, Destiny (Steven Bonnell), Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Piers Morgan

“The Iran-Israel conflict is a civilizational struggle between Western democratic values and theocratic barbarism”Low

held by Stephen Colbert, Jordan Peterson, Dave Rubin, Marco Rubio, Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh

“Failure to support Israel is a moral failure, not merely a strategic disagreement”Low

held by Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, Piers Morgan, Jordan Peterson, Dave Rubin, Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh

“Defending territorial integrity against aggression is essential to maintaining the rules-based international order”Med

held by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Aaron Bastani, Joe Biden, Stephen Colbert, Destiny (Steven Bonnell), Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Jimmy Kimmel, Piers Morgan, John Oliver, Jordan Peterson, Marco Rubio, Bernie Sanders, Richard Spencer, Jon Stewart

territorial-expansion-rightLow

Great powers have the right to expand territory when strategic interests demand it

Their wording: “Territorial expansion for strategic reasons is unnecessary when defense agreements already serve those interests”

Shapiro implicitly rejects this premise by calling the acquisition 'silly' - he does not argue it is immoral, but rather that it is strategically unnecessary and therefore a waste of political capital

Also held by (3)

John Mearsheimer — Mearsheimer does not endorse this normatively but describes it as how great powers behave: the structural opportunity (massive power asymmetry, minimal resistance cost) predicts the action regardless of international law Marco Rubio — Rubio employs a more diplomatic version of Trump's territorial expansion argument, emphasizing precedent and security necessity rather than raw transactional acquisition. However, the underlying premise is the same: great powers have the right to extend their strategic control when they determine it serves their interests Donald Trump — Trump explicitly invokes historical territorial acquisitions as precedent, treating sovereignty as transactional rather than inviolable. This premise directly contradicts the sovereignty norms he invokes when opposing international constraints on US domestic policy

Incompatible with (3)

“Defending territorial integrity against aggression is essential to maintaining the rules-based international order”Med

“Ukraine has the sovereign right to choose its own alliances including NATO membership”Med

held by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Joe Biden, Stephen Colbert, Destiny (Steven Bonnell), Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Ana Kasparian, Jimmy Kimmel, Konstantin Kisin, Piers Morgan, John Oliver, Jordan Peterson, Marco Rubio, Bernie Sanders, Richard Spencer, Jon Stewart, Cenk Uygur

“Existing defense agreements and alliance structures already address the strategic interests that territorial expansion claims to serve”High

held by Joe Biden, Ben Shapiro, Jon Stewart