Direct payouts, between $10,000 and $100,000. The Trump administration also has a plan to “buy” the Greenlanders “piecemeal”

US officials have discussed the option of sending lump sum payments to Greenlanders as part of an attempt to persuade them to secede from Denmark and join the United States, four sources familiar with the matter told the Reuters news agency on Thursday.

While the exact dollar amount and logistics of any payment are unclear, US officials, including White House advisers, have discussed sums between $10,000 and $100,000 for each person, said two of the sources, who requested anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The idea of ​​giving money directly to residents of Greenland, an overseas territory of Denmark, offers an explanation of how the US could try to “buy” the island of 57,000 people, despite the insistence of authorities in Copenhagen and the capital Nuuk that Greenland is not for sale.

The tactic is among various plans discussed by the White House to acquire Greenland, including the potential use of the US military. But this option risks appearing excessively transactional and even degrading for a population that has long debated its own independence and economic dependence on Denmark.

“Enough… No more annexation fantasies,” Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen wrote in a Facebook post on Sunday after US President Donald Trump again told reporters that the US must acquire the Arctic island.

European leaders, common front

Leaders in Copenhagen and across Europe have reacted with disdain to comments by Trump and other White House officials who have asserted their claims to Greenland in recent days, especially given that the US and Denmark are NATO members bound by a mutual defense agreement.

On Tuesday, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, Britain and Denmark issued a joint statement saying that only Greenland and Denmark can decide on matters related to their relations.

Asked to comment on discussions about the purchase of the island, including the possibility of direct payments to the Greenlanders, the White House referred Reuters to statements on Wednesday from spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

At a news conference, Leavitt acknowledged that Trump and his national security advisers are “looking at what a potential acquisition would look like.” Rubio said he would meet with his Danish counterpart next week in Washington to discuss Greenland.

The Danish embassy declined to comment, and Greenland's mission in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

More and more serious discussions

Trump has long argued that the US should acquire Greenland for several reasons, including that it is rich in minerals needed for advanced military applications. He also said that the Western Hemisphere must be largely under Washington's geopolitical influence.

Although internal deliberations on how to take over Greenland have been going on among Trump's advisers since before he took office a year ago, they took on an urgency after the US government captured Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in a daring operation in Caracas over the weekend, according to sources familiar with the internal deliberations.

According to one of the sources, White House advisers were eager to take advantage of the momentum given by the Maduro operation to achieve other long-standing geopolitical goals of Trump.

“We need Greenland from a national security point of view, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday. “She's so strategic,” he added.

One of the sources familiar with the White House deliberations said that internal discussions about lump sum payments are not necessarily new. However, the person said they had become more serious in recent days and advisers were considering higher sums, with a payout of $100,000 per person — which would result in a total payout of nearly $6 billion — a real possibility.

Many details of the potential payments were unclear, such as when and how they would be distributed if the Trump administration followed suit, or what it would expect from the Greenlanders in return. The White House has said military intervention is possible, although officials have also said the US prefers to buy the island or acquire it through diplomatic means.

Free association agreement

Among the possibilities considered by Trump's advisers, a White House official said on Tuesday, is the attempt to conclude an agreement with the island, called the “Agreement of Free Association” (COFA).

The precise details of the COFA agreements – which have only been extended to the small island nations of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Palau – vary by signatory. But the US government usually provides many essential services, such as mail delivery and military protection. In contrast, the US military operates freely in COFA countries, and trade with the US is largely duty-free.

COFA agreements have previously been signed with independent countries, and Greenland would probably have to secede from Denmark for such a plan to be implemented.

In theory, the payments could be used to get Greenlanders to vote for their independence or sign a COFA agreement after such a vote.

Although polls show an overwhelming majority of Greenlanders want independence, concerns about the economic costs of breaking away from Denmark — among other issues — have prevented most Greenlandic lawmakers from calling for a referendum on independence.

Polls also show that most Greenlanders, while open to separating from Denmark, do not want to be part of the US.