By Todd Davis
Editor’s note: The opinions expressed here are those of the authors. View more opinions on ScoonTV
Hearts of Iron is a game produced by Paradox Interactive that lets the player take control of any nation in the world and replay history starting in 1936. Originally designed to allow the refighting of World War II, the game has evolved through expansions into a simulation where players can take an endless variety of historical what-if choices. Many of these choices entail gamers painting the map in their chosen country’s colors as they acquire territory on their way to global domination.
President Donald Trump’s foreign policy often feels like he’s engaging in a game of Hearts of Iron. Frenetic, capricious, and willing to go against alliances and traditions that have dictated geopolitics for generations, Trump goes by his gut. His lifetime of success has given him the impression that he knows more than “experts.” Without making a moral comparison, this decision-making style echoes figures like Napoleon Bonaparte, who frequently overrode his marshals and ministers, trusting his own strategic instinct above institutional caution, and Andrew Jackson, who openly disregarded judicial, diplomatic, and military restraint when he believed national interest or personal will demanded it. In each case, intuition, confidence, and a belief in personal destiny replaced consensus and process as the driving force behind policy.
Trump, too, has little respect for his generals, especially in his first term, calling General Jim Mattis “the world’s most overrated general”. During a Pentagon meeting in 2017, he called a collection of senior generals “You’re a bunch of dopes and babies.” Trump’s recent, spectacular success in Venezuela, where he captured Nicolas Maduro in an impressive high-tech lightning raid, will only embolden the President when making future decisions. Venezuela proved that power still answers to will.
His position and confidence were recently revealed in a New York Times article when he was asked if anything limits his power, if not International law, Trump responded,
“Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
History is full of the errors of men who thought along these lines. But it was also that kind of fire from heaven thinking that led to Alexander conquering Asia. Asia might be on the menu for later, but after a Venezuelan amuse-bouche, the next course appears to be Greenland.
Empires are not built by committees, but by men who believe history bends to their will.
Empires are never born in comfort. They are claimed in cold places, at the edge of the map, where distance tests resolve, and silence exposes doubt. They are not sustained by applause, but by the willingness to stand watch when no one is looking, to hold ground long before it is profitable, and to accept the burden that comes with possession. Power, once taken, demands to be used or it withers, and invites others to test its absence.
Empires do not ask permission; they ask whether the cost will be paid.
In Hearts of Iron, the player learns this quickly. The game does not punish ambition; it punishes hesitation. Territory can be taken, held, or lost, but only if the player is willing to absorb the cost in manpower, industry, and attention. The map does not care about opinion, process, or outrage. It records only who was willing to act, and who was not.
Why Greenland Matters
I wrote about the significance of Greenland last year in The Next Great Game, detailing its strategic location as a gateway to the Arctic and all the mineral riches it holds, along with the players, namely China and Russia, who are potential adversaries in the region. Trump has not forgotten about Greenland. On the contrary, he is emboldened by his success in Venezuela, and it appears he is dead serious about adding the island not only to the American sphere of influence, which it is already under, but also owning the island itself. The strategic and material case for Greenland has been addressed in that article; what we are discussing here concerns something less tangible, more ephemeral: the return of imperial will.
What is the difference between having the ability to put US bases on Greenland while Denmark controls it, and actually having Greenland as part of the United States? I could give you logical reasons, viable reasons, such as Denmark being an insignificant military power that can’t defend the island even if it is under the NATO umbrella. The real reason goes back to Hearts of Iron. Trump wants Greenland to paint the map blue and add a huge chunk of territory to the United States.
Do you ever wonder why some rulers have “the Great” tacked onto their name? Alexander. Alfred. Catherine. Frederick. Peter. The common denominator is that they took land and expanded their country. They painted the world map in their national colors. For better or worse, you don’t get labeled great by passing healthcare reform.
In America, our mass territorial acquisitions haven’t been tied to individual presidents recognizing their greatness, due to our historical rejection of kingship. That doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. Jefferson doubled the size of the country with the Louisiana Purchase. Madison and Monroe added Florida. Polk added Oregon in a peaceful deal with Britain, then added California, Nevada, Utah, most of Arizona and New Mexico, parts of Colorado and Wyoming after the Mexican-American War. Fillmore purchased Southern Arizona and New Mexico from Mexico for a railroad. Johnson bought Alaska. McKinley took Hawaii, then added Guam, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico after the Spanish-American War. And of particular note, Woodrow Wilson bought the US Virgin Islands in 1917 from Denmark for Caribbean security during World War I.
Notice what many of these land acquisitions have in common? They were purchases. A common refrain currently is “Greenland is not for sale!” Do you think the US Virgin Islands were put on eBay in 1917, open to the world for bids? The US identified a strategic need and made a deal. There is plenty of precedent for a Greenland purchase.
European Petulance
Europe, a meandering mess of nations advocating for World War III with Russia, as long as the Americans fight it, has gone into full hysteria mode, making bold, bombastic, and frankly, ridiculous claims about the “defense” of Greenland. Several European nations sent a token number of soldiers to Greenland. Europe has become a political entity obsessed with optics and the cosplay of power, mistaking visibility for force. What purpose did they serve? If it was to irritate Trump, they quickly backpedaled.
Germany has already withdrawn the soldiers it sent to Greenland. The episode had the unmistakable character of a late Habsburg mobilization, orders issued, uniforms displayed, statements circulated without the political will or institutional capacity to sustain action once reality intruded.
Denmark cannot defend Greenland. That doesn’t matter to the Europeans. Europe is more interested in optics. The entire continent wants to pretend that it still holds power, even as military and economic events in the last five years have shown it doesn’t. The world is coalescing into great power spheres. America, China, and Russia are determining global events. Europe is running around trying to maintain the rules-based order that allowed it to sit on the United Nations Security Council, pretending this is still 1947.
Restraint of American power is key to this. Europe needs America to act like a slightly annoyed father, not enforcing its will while bankrolling European freedom to experiment with social engineering. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Meet the Press that the United States has spent $22 trillion on NATO since 1980. That’s why Americans don’t have Universal Healthcare and Europeans do.
Predictably, President Trump has pushed back immediately on European resistance to his Greenland purchase. The Europeans quickly found out how serious Trump is when he announced punitive tariffs on the eight European countries: England, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Finland, the Netherlands, and Germany, which have been most vocal in blocking his plan. The plan will entail 10% tariffs going into effect on those nations on February 1st, escalating to 25% on June 1st if they still haven’t backed down.
Trump’s negotiation tactics are working. Officials from Greenland and Denmark are meeting with the administration, trying to come up with a deal. The tariffs are only one of the pressure points that Trump can apply. What happens if he threatens to withdraw from Ukraine in retaliation? What happens to NATO? Many pundits claim America needs NATO, but America did fine without it before 1941. Who were America’s allies in 1938? Yes, nations need allies, but allies are easy to find when wars start. European leadership, particularly the EU, needs NATO far more than Americans do.
European leadership, however, will never allow this to happen. NATO is as necessary to them as food and water. They understand they are effectively vassals of the United States but want to continue pretending they are partners. Abandoning that is unthinkable. And so they will attempt to stall, procrastinate, and obstruct to get through the Trump years as intact as possible, hoping the next president America elects is a pro-globalist who will allow Europe to continue its charade of importance while squandering American power in places like Yemen instead of acting in the interest of Americans.
What do Americans get?
What do Americans, besides Trump, get out of Greenland? Greenland, for Trump, is a legacy-defining moment. He’s already dominated the American political stage for the last decade. Adding Greenland to America would cement him as the most significant president since Ronald Reagan. Neocon presidents like George W. Bush and his neoliberal equivalents in Barack Obama and Joe Biden would be completely eclipsed, their administrations defined as the decline of America halted by an expansionist, blatantly pro-American era that Trump reinvigorated. Every school child for decades to come will learn that Trump added Greenland to the United States.
For Steve in Peoria, the benefit is spiritual. He’s never going to vacation in Greenland. He’s never going to benefit from the raw materials extracted from there decades from now. Arctic politics and icebreakers are never going to affect his life. Yes, he indirectly benefits from a “Golden Dome” type of missile defense that Greenland is an integral part of, but the odds of it ever coming into play during his life are slim.
Steve gets something else. He experiences the greatness of an American Empire. For over a decade, the suffocating narrative pushed on Steve has been that America was built on stolen land and is an evil place. He’s been hearing Marxist propaganda about America in his schools, from the media, from Democrats, and in movies for years now. The conquest of Greenland returns him to a world of Top Gun, Armageddon, and Rocky IV. He will witness America ascendant. America is powerful. America is willing and able to unapologetically use that power.
What did the English Steve in 1875 get from the British Empire? He had the glory of being an Englishman and the thrill of making the world England. He had the core belief that anything was possible because he was English. He had the unshakeable confidence that his culture and lineage were superior to that of the rest of the world because the sun never set on Britannia.
Americans will have the chance to bask in that never-setting sun. The acquisition of Greenland represents a bold, unabashedly aggressive statement to the rest of the world. America is back. America is intent on winning this Hearts of Iron game unfolding. America doesn’t intend to surrender meekly to China, Russia, or whomever. America is not declining, but in fact, expanding. The map is still unfinished.
And so the question is not whether it can be done, but whether we still dare.
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