HISTORICAL CONTEXT: FROM COLD WAR OUTPOST TO 21ST CENTURY PIVOT

The United States has viewed Greenland as a strategic necessity since World War II. In 1946, the Truman administration offered Denmark $100 million in gold for the island—a proposal declined but followed by the 1951 Defense of Greenland Agreement, which established Pituffik (pronounced: pee-TOO-feek) Space Base.