There’s, of course, the United States of America itself, carved out of lands not ‘owned’ by anyone when it was occupied by Native Americans, then turned into a British colony, and ultimately an independent nation state in 1776 according to Westphalian sovereignty norms invented in 17th century Europe.
But less well known is America’s territorial losses. The Panama Canal Zone, which it acquired in 1904 from private and public Panamanian owners, was returned to Panama in 1979, formally ceding its control in 1999. In Oceania, Japan-occupied Marshall Islands, which the US occupied after WW2, got its independence in 1979. The same ‘transition’ model was followed with Federated States of Micronesia and Palau, both of which officially gained independence from US ‘trusteeship’ in 1990 and 1994, respectively.
So, yes, Trumpus Maximus can jolly well float his expansive expansionary idea, following Putin’s playbook to acquire Crimea, Donetsk, Kherson… and Xi Jinping‘s ‘One (and All) China’ policy. Trump’s suggestion to economically seduce Canada, grab Greenland by hook or by chequebook, and plans for MPCAA – Make Panama Canal American Again – inspired Trump’s son Eric to share a meme of his father purchasing these territories on Amazon. Surprisingly, the ecommerce giant doesn’t offer these items for sale. Yet.
Trump is unhappy with the US spending ‘protection money’ on Canada, not to mention with imports of Canadian cars (the country exports $51 bn in vehicles, with 93% of these going to the US), lumber, and dairy products that widen a $80.1 bn (2022) trade deficit.
In violation of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), the incoming POTUS threatened to levy a 25% tariff on Canada and Mexico. Trump has promised that if Canada joined the US, it would ‘be totally secure from the threat of the Russian and Chinese ships,’ taxes would drop significantly, and there would be no tariffs. Unsurprisingly, most Canadians are unimpressed. According to a December 2024 survey by Canadian market research firm Leger, 82% of respondents said they didn’t like the idea. Ontario premier Doug Ford joked about how Canada should purchase Minnesota, Minneapolis, and Alaska instead. Greenland is another bee in Trump’s bonnet. In 1946, when tensions between the US and the Soviet Union were at their height, Harry Truman made Denmark an offer of $100 mn in gold to purchase the Danish autonomous territory. Copenhagen saw the offer as insulting. Trump has now reaffirmed his 2019 assertion that the US has an ‘absolute necessity’ to own and control Greenland.
Trumphian colonialism, however, differs significantly from its 19th c. predecessors. It reflects geopolitical, economic, security, and strategic insight in a shifting global order. Through a Trumphian glass, of course.
As a businessman, Trump has a mercantilist perspective on geopolitics. His Greenland and Canada offers a real estate counter to the dangers posed by Chinese and Russian Arctic incursions. Also, the Arctic region is home to 13% of the world’s undiscovered oil, almost 30% of its undiscovered gas, and rare earth metals worth an estimated $1 tn. Property prices should spike if and when drilling and mining begin.
Even if the US doesn’t end up controlling these regions, Trump’s ideas represent an attempt to negotiate a larger US involvement in them. And, perhaps, more importantly, they make us relook at the tenuous strings by which the concepts of nation-state and sovereignty hang. Paradoxically, America’s great patriot Donald Trump has shaken up the rather recent concept of nationalism.