U.S. President Donald Trump’s push to accumulate Greenland has made the problem of Canada’s own Arctic sovereignty and security “far more complicated,” experts say, raising questions on whether the U.S. can proceed to be a reliable partner in bilateral defence partnerships like NORAD.
Yet lots of those self same experts warn it might be unwise for Canada to desert those partnerships and check out to go it alone within the Far North — each due to sheer cost in replacing American military might and the long-term damage that might do to collective North American security.
For now, they are saying, Canada’s most suitable choice could also be to only wait out Trump’s presidency.
“I believe Canada can take good faith steps to reveal [to the U.S.] that it’s a unbroken and reliable partner, but there’s this massive wild card in the shape of the president who has his sights on Greenland and never yet, it seems, the Canadian Arctic,” said Timothy Sayle, a history professor on the University of Toronto whose research focuses on NATO and Arctic security.
NORAD said on Monday that it was sending aircraft to the U.S. Pituffik Space Base in northern Greenland, where American- and Canadian-based forces will support “long-planned” activities meant to strengthen defence ties between North America and Denmark.
A NORAD mission dubbed Operation Noble Defender focused on Greenland and North American security was launched in 2018, a 12 months before Trump first publicly expressed his desire to buy Greenland from Denmark.
Trump has sharply escalated his rhetoric about acquiring the territory this 12 months, threatening U.S. military motion if a diplomatic deal isn’t reached. He has repeatedly insisted Denmark can’t defend Greenland and that a U.S. takeover is vital for American national security, including the long run “Golden Dome” missile defence system, which Trump has said Canada may also profit from.
The threats have further underscored Trump’s desire, specified by his national security strategy, for U.S. dominance over the Western Hemisphere — putting Canada in a sensitive spot.
Overnight Tuesday, Trump posted on social media what gave the impression to be a synthetic intelligence-created image of a map with the American flag imposed over the U.S., Canada, Greenland and Venezuela.
And Canadians haven’t forgotten Trump’s repeated threats to make Canada the “51st state.”
While that rhetoric has faded in recent months, Trump told the World Economic Forum in a speech on Wednesday that “Canada lives due to the USA,” addressing Prime Minister Mark Carney directly by adding: “Keep in mind that, Mark.”
NBC News reported over the weekend that Trump has been privately complaining about Canada’s “vulnerability” within the Arctic, although the report said Trump was not publicizing those concerns as long as he views ongoing security negotiations between Canada and the U.S. as “productive.”
Those reported conversations come as Trump pushes for enhanced Arctic security as a part of an unprecedented US$1.5-trillion U.S. defence budget, which incorporates recent icebreakers he has said will patrol the waters within the Far North.
“The problem isn’t that the USA just isn’t going to defend the Canadian Arctic,” Sayle said. “The problem is [whether] the U.S. goes to be those defending the Canadian Arctic with none Canadian input or say-so.
“Anything that Canada can do to extend its capabilities and reveal a commitment there may also help lessen the argument that the Americans must help defend Canada or be liable for that territory, and possibly postpone any of those really difficult claims about sovereignty. But once the president gets an idea in his head, you never understand how long it’s going to remain there.”
Chatting with the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday, Carney said Canada “calls for focused talks to realize our shared objectives of security and prosperity within the Arctic,” including partnerships with Baltic and Nordic allies in NATO.
He told reporters in Doha, Qatar on Sunday that Canada was doing its part.
“I had conversations with the NATO secretary-general in Paris 10 days ago … about how we’re going to further enhance that security umbrella [in the Arctic]. It’s something that Canada is working on already,” he said.
Carney said Tuesday that Canada is on course to double its overall defence spending by the tip of the last decade, with “unprecedented” investments in Arctic security, including “boots on the ice.”
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The prime minister has highlighted recent strategic security partnerships signed with European and Indo-Pacific nations, including joining the EU’s SAFE defence procurement program, while also prioritizing domestic procurement and manufacturing in a bid to spice up Canada’s defence industrial sector — all in an effort to maneuver away from U.S. dependency.
But Richard Shimooka, a senior fellow on the Macdonald-Laurier Institute who studies defence policy, warned Carney needs to recollect the continued necessity to proceed partnering with the U.S. in certain areas, particularly on NORAD.
“There isn’t any getting out of this relationship,” he said.
“Lots of these items [Canada is doing on Arctic security enhancement] can be extremely difficult to the purpose of just not being possible to get done outside of NORAD, or the bilateral type of security continuum that exists. That’s just the amount of cash that the U.S. government pours into signals intelligence, let’s say, or long-range radars. All those systems, we’ll never have the opportunity to copy and supply for an adequate security on our own.”
Even when Canada desired to extricate itself from NORAD, experts say, it might take over a decade no less than and billions of additional dollars to adequately shore up its defences within the Arctic.
“There isn’t any scenario under which we, Canada alone, can defend our portion of North American aerospace domain by ourselves with the prevailing capabilities that we’ve,” said Balkan Devlen, director of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute’s Transatlantic Program.
“Never mind five per cent [of GDP],” he added, referring to the brand new NATO defence spending goal — pushed by Trump — that Canada has pledged to fulfill. “We’ll probably must go like seven, eight, nine per cent on defence spending to have the opportunity to do anything of that kind.”
An example of how long it has taken for Canada to update its NORAD capabilities was recently revealed in government documents tabled in Parliament last 12 months on a brand new Arctic military satellite communication network generally known as the Enhanced Satellite Communications Project — Polar (ESCP-P).
The network is an element of the nearly $40-billion NORAD modernization plan Ottawa announced in 2022. The 20-year plan includes recent over-the-horizon radar systems to detect approaching threats, enhanced communication networks and recent defensive capabilities equivalent to fighter jets and submarines.
Documents tabled in Parliament last month state the present scheduled date for the ESCP-P to return online is 2037. Full operational capability is anticipated in 2041, the documents said, although the Department of National Defence has been trying to find ways to hurry up the project.
National Defence documents tabled in September say $7.6 million was spent on the project as of May 2025. The federal government last month signed a strategic partnership with the Canadian firms Telesat and MDA Space to develop the network.
Many of the NORAD modernization projects are still of their early stages, however the department said 15 might be “costed, prioritized and accelerated as vital” by the tip of this 12 months.
Ottawa, meanwhile, has yet to announce the outcomes of a review into its $19-billion deal to purchase as much as 88 F-35 stealth fighters from U.S.-based Lockheed Martin.
The review was announced shortly after Carney took office in March and was spurred by Trump’s tariff and sovereignty threats against Canada, prompting bids from European firms like Saab to offer the needed jets as a substitute.
Shimooka said sticking with the F-35 was one other example of where Canada needs alignment with the U.S., despite the present tensions with Trump.
“The clear reality is that when you take away from the F-35 program, you might be just shooting yourself within the foot industrially,” he said, pointing to 1000’s of Canadian jobs reliant on training and repairs that may be upended. “You’re not helping develop a top-end Canadian industry — not to say you’re pissing off the Americans.”
Sayle said Canada still won’t be insulated from Trump’s ever-changing “whims” regardless of how much it raises its defence spending and hurries up procurement.
He pointed to Trump’s use of tariffs to coerce Canada and other nations to combat fentanyl trafficking — which didn’t stop after Canada announced recent border security and fentanyl-related measures — for example of that reality.
“The Canadians have options, they will work with who appear to be the rational and regular partners in Washington, however the president has a capability to deeply complicate that by asking for things that Canada can’t deliver,” he said.
That dynamic may change after Trump leaves office, or whilst soon as this 12 months’s midterm elections within the U.S., which could see Trump’s Republican Party lose control of Congress, Shimooka said.
“Most Americans don’t want this,” he said of a Greenland takeover. “And we’re just as vital for them [in Arctic security] due to our territorial position.”