While President Donald Trump’s offer to buy Greenland may have faded from the public’s attention amid other news since he took office, he brought it up again this week. Renewed interest in Greenland is also highlighting an interesting fact: many of us have been looking at inaccurate depictions of its size.
Why are maps wrong about Greenland?
USA Today dove into the reason why this week.
“Centuries of flawed maps have led to a misconception about Greenland’s size, which is nowhere near as big as it looks on the familiar flat world map,” the outlet explained. On these maps, the island looks almost the same size as the continent of Africa, and that’s because of issues with trying to depict a round planet as a map on flat pieces of paper.
In 1569, Flemish geographer Gerardus Mercator drew such a world map, using what has become known as the Mercator projection, according to USA Today.
Although this approach included fairly accurate depictions of countries’ shapes, excellent illustrations of ocean sailing courses and a reasonably good depiction of Europe, closer to the North Pole and South Pole got distorted. So, Antarctica, Greenland and Russia, look far larger in the Mercator projection.
Many of the maps we use today are still based on that projection. However, USA Today noted that other projections that fix this problem likely “look odd and convoluted,” to people who grew up looking at Mercator maps.
How big is Greenland, then?
In reality, Greenland is around 836,330 square kilometers, which USA Today said is around three times the size of Texas. It is actually the largest island on the globe, but it is still not close to being the same size as Africa – it’s actually 14 times smaller.
Around 80% of Greenland is ice, and per the Central Intelligence Agency, it has an arctic to subarctic climate with cool summers and cold winters. Its total population is just 57,751 people, smaller than the population of Cheyenne, Wyoming.
Though Greenland is mostly ice, its not all ice. According to the CIA, it has several natural resources, including coal, iron ore, lead, zinc, molybdenum, diamonds, gold, platinum, niobium, tantalite, uranium, fish, seals, whales and hydropower as well as possible oil and gas.
Trump’s interest in Greenland
“We strongly support your right to determine your own future, and, if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America,” Trump said Tuesday during his address to Congress in a message aimed at the people of Greenland.
The president added that: “We need Greenland for national security and even international security, and we’re working with everybody involved to try and get it. But we need it, really, for international world security. And I think we’re going to get it. One way or the other, we’re going to get it.”
After Danish colonization of the island began in the 18th century, Greenland became part of the Kingdom of Denmark in 1953. Although it joined the European Community (now the EU) with Denmark in 1973, it withdrew in 1985 “over a dispute centered on stringent fishing quotas,” said the CIA. Today, it has a parliamentary democracy, with King Frederick X of Denmark serving as chief of state, represented by High Commissioner Julie Praest Wilche since May 2022. Premier Mute B. Egede has served as head of government.
In early January, even before Trump was inaugurated for his second term, poll results from Rasmussen Reports found that more than two-thirds of Republican voters supported his suggestion to buy the country. Previously, President Harry Truman unsuccessfully tried to purchase Greenland in 1946 and Trump floated the idea in 2019, during his first term in office.
While Trump seems determined to fold Greenland into the U.S., its premier did not seem enthusiastic about the idea this week.
“Americans and their leader need to understand this,” said Egege in a Wednesday Facebook post. “We’re not for sale and can’t just be taken. Our future is decided by us in Greenland.”