The Danish media is now busy covering the upcoming visit of second lady Usha Vance, the Department of Energy's secretary, and the Security Advisor to Greenland to watch its yearly National Dogsled Race or Avannaata Qimussersua taking place on March 29th.

According to www.visitgreenland.com:

The race brings together approximately 37 mushers and their 444 dogs from across Greenland, competing in a challenging event that highlights the bond between humans and their dogs. It rotates between different towns and routes in northern Greenland, celebrating the dog sledding tradition as a vital part of the country’s cultural heritage.

Vance put out this friendly video:

Unfortunately, the media here in Denmark, and certain Danish parliamentarians, are viewing the visit as a provocation and American propaganda while Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said she is looking at the visit "seriously."

One member of the Danish parliament (the Folketing) representing Greenland called the private visit an effort by the U.S. to "meddle in internal affairs of the Greenland election."

To my knowledge, private visits by highly-placed Americans have never before been characterized as meddling, but times have apparently changed now that Donald Trump has been elected and expressed a keen interest in buying Greenland.

Fact: The United States and Denmark and many other European countries have a bilateral agreement to allow each other's citizens to visit without a visa … or an invitation.

This "visa waiver program" covers all citizens of the participating countries which includes the visits of official representatives of those countries' like parliamentarians and congressional representatives, cabinet level officials and ordinary government employees.

That said, this "inconvenient truth" has not been mentioned by the Danish media which continues to put its thumb on the scale of the "boycott America" bandwagon and has tried to avoid presenting the U.S.'s side of the Danes' boycott ambitions.

As of today, nearly 80,000 Danes have expressed their support for boycotting American products on Facebook. So far, the American Chamber of Commerce here and American friendship organizations have kept deadly silent on the ongoing attacks on the U.S. and its products, which makes one wonder why they even exist if they are going to refuse to defend American industry and the long-standing U.S.-Danish bilateral trade relationship.

American expats are also under pressure, and while I would stop short of calling them persona non grata, I can relate a personal story that will help describe the prevailing atmosphere:

I was invited to participate in a Danish radio broadcast that had tariffs and trade wars as the topic. We were three on the panel. As we filed into the studio and found our places and organized our papers, I rose from my chair and gave the female debate participant my business card. She thanked me and put it in her purse. Then, I gave my card to the other male participant, a 40ish serious-looking man who was a member of the largest Danish political party, the Social Democrats, and was a former candidate from that party to the European Parliament (he was unsuccessful in his campaign).

I introduced myself and gave him my Danish language business card. He looked at it for two seconds and then abruptly pushed it across the desk, back to me and said: (in Danish, translated here) "I don't need this. I will never use it. I know all I need to know about the U.S.A. and am married to an American."

This took me by surprise because I had never before experienced such bad behavior from a Dane. I took a breath and vowed not to let it rattle me or affect my civility as I prepared myself to thrust and parry with him on the air. Things went fairly well, but it was clear to me, if not to listeners, that I was sitting across from an America-hater.

After the program, he rose, didn't look at me, didn't shake my hand and didn't offer even the most essential of Danish pleasantries, "tak for i dag" (thanks for today). He just took off his headphones, gathered his papers, stood up, put on his coat, said goodbye to the Danish female participant, ignoring me completely, and left the studio.

Times are indeed changing here.

In addition to the Facebook protests, Danish universities like the one in the northern Jutland city of Aarhus are now getting revved up to protest America and President Trump.

I suspect that the upcoming visit of Mrs. Vance and company will ratchet up the anger even more.

I never thought in my wildest dreams that the normally well-behaved, cool-headed Danes would be willing to jettison 80-plus years of good relations with the United States by demanding that any U.S. visitors receive an engraved invitation to their pearl of the Arctic, but I guess that anything is now possible now that we find ourselves in the first phase of "dog-sled-gate."

Stephen Helgesen is a retired career U.S. diplomat specializing in international trade who lived and worked in 30 countries for 25 years during the Reagan, G.H.W. Bush, Clinton, and G.W. Bush Administrations. He is the author of fourteen books, seven on American politics, and has written over 1,500 articles on politics, economics and social trends. He now lives in Denmark and is a frequent political commentator on Danish media. He can be reached at: stephenhelgesen@gmail.com.
 
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