Thomas we don't have to annex it we already own it. if you wish to leave some emergency rations there that's fine with us. the danish flags though make great souvenirs and we appreciate your donation of same.

Oh god, Denmark and Canada keep pouting at each other over something neither really wants or needs.

it's going to come down to a case of our eskimos can beat up your eskimos in the end. it's not the island so much as the territorial waters that are at stake. mind you we canadians have a secret weapon the danes cannot match. we just put up a picket line and their armed forces will refuse to cross it (snicker).

The real question is: 1. What instalations are under the sea. 2. The climate is changing, so what sea lanes are liable to get opened. The greenlandic eskimoes' claim of loss of property is as always bogus: It means the "nallergaq" are getting greedy for more bribes.

seems the beginning negotiating position of the canadian gov't is that there are no "sea" rights around the island. without a claim to the sea around it who actually runs up a flag on the island is pretty much irrelevant. doubt like hell the danes are going to go for that one hehe.

I think at the bottom of it is this: We are talking about the defence of the North American continent and the only hidden access to the sea under the polar cap. No doubt Thule Air Base (I've seen NAVY trucks there) and the defence hereof (and split infinitives) is involved and must be defended. If this channel is not being defended byt the Canadians, they will lose much of the prerogative for the defence of the entire arctic Canada - which again puts Canada in a weaker position in relation to the USA. (The yanks have kept very silent publicly!). The defence of Thule is generally very good - streaching over severeal hundred miles of absolute wasteland - and Denmark is probably not wanting to make an arrangement that is relatively cheap and effective in any sort of trouble. Last time I looked: It is interesting to note, that the Danish military attache in Washington has a side accreditation to Canada - considering the very small number of military attaches Denmark has totally, this is interesting.

i think thomas this unseemly little squabble has nothing to do with defense of the north american continent. i heard they were planning to shut thule afb down since with the russian menace going away pretty much it wasn't all that much use and it's bloody expensive place to operate an afb. i think this has to do with navigation rights and more importantly sea floor mineral rights. as the world warms up and the arctic ice recedes the possibility of a northern route between asia and europe looms larger. those are shallow waters and it's very possible that there is oil under some of them. again as the arctic warms it's a lot easier to look for and exploit any oil finds. as for the excited states i really doubt they see anything to be gained by sticking their nose into this. the last time they got worked up about anything up north was when they decided the nw passage ought to be an international shipping route which canada rather objected to. never did figure the rationale for that out as all that would have accomplished was giving the russians legal rights to run subs through canadian waters. someone must have figured it out after a while down there because they dropped the demands. given that even in the summer the nw passage was barely navigable the whole argument seemed pointless to me.

i think thomas this unseemly little squabble has nothing to do with defense of the north american continent. i heard they were planning to shut thule afb down since with the russian menace going away pretty much it wasn't all that much use and it's bloody expensive place to operate an afb. i think this has to do with navigation rights and more importantly sea floor mineral rights. as the world warms up and the arctic ice recedes the possibility of a northern route between asia and europe looms larger. those are shallow waters and it's very possible that there is oil under some of them. again as the arctic warms it's a lot easier to look for and exploit any oil finds. as for the excited states i really doubt they see anything to be gained by sticking their nose into this. the last time they got worked up about anything up north was when they decided the nw passage ought to be an international shipping route which canada rather objected to. never did figure the rationale for that out as all that would have accomplished was giving the russians legal rights to run subs through canadian waters. someone must have figured it out after a while down there because they dropped the demands. given that even in the summer the nw passage was barely navigable the whole argument seemed pointless to me.

I heard about thsi onthe radio the other day and wondered how long before Thomas cropped up. I understand the tradition involved trading Cnadian whiskey for aqavit?

Actually mineral rights?? They have been yapping about those minerals on Greenland for a century now - and nothing has come out of it. Greenland has about every mineral in the book, but they are to costly to mine - very much so. They have spend an obscene amount of money - ostentatiously on oil exploration - and they did find oil: Litteraly ONE PINT. Either some of the worlds biggest oil companies think it is funny to spend kings ransom - year after year - not only on dry-hole drilling; but the probability for finding oil has consistently been under 50% of the requirement for drilling at much cheaper places. OR we are told porkies. My guess is porkies. RDaNavy ship Thetis has been rebuild in her butt to cater for "oil-exploration equipment" - searching on 80 degrees north (actually 79). The seafloor is about 1000 meters down, in waters frosen solidly for more than half the year - the rest of the year with heavy drifting ice. Do me a favour. Albany Rifles: Actually the last Danish secretary for Greenland left a bottle of brandy for visitors. Ehran: Actually this might be the preliminary manoevering before a bilateral Danish-Canadian agreement about keeping the Russians out - when the climate has changed!