The New Iron Chancellor of RealPolitik

 

While an uneasy world looked on today, President Trump signed into legal force the Board of Peace charter, after which he proclaimed: “Once this board is completely formed, we can do pretty much whatever we want to do”—a proclamation followed by President Trump announcing Russia will join the Board of Peace and President Putin offering to give $1 billion to the Board of Peace.

At the World Economic Forum in Davos-Switzerland yesterday, and showing why he needs the Board of Peace to repair a fractured world, President Trump declared about socialist European leaders: “It’s horrible what they’re doing to themselves, they’re destroying themselves”, then his Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick harshly revealed: “The Trump administration and myself, we are here to make a very clear point: globalization has failed the West and the United States of America”.

In viewing the Board of Peace, which President Trump is the permanent chairman of, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz factually observed: “This new world of great powers is being built on power, on strength, and when it comes to it, on force...We have entered a time of great power politics”—Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney warned: “Let me be direct...We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition...Call it what it is: a system of intensifying great power rivalry where the most powerful pursue their interests using economic integration as coercion”—and the New York Times truthfully assessed: “We are living in a time of what’s been called radical uncertainty...We are in a transition in which the previous system is unraveling but we don’t yet know what comes next”.

If I were to describe to you a man born into vast family wealth and privilege, who basically coasted through life then unexpectedly rose into political power, through sheer force of will decided to remake his country into his own image, all while the rest of world was aflame in wars and conflicts, you’d be correct to assume that I’m talking about Donald Trump.

However, whom I’m describing is Otto von Bismarck, who single handedly took on all of the European powers in the 19^th Century to create Germany and make it great—while watching America destroy itself in its Civil War, he believed in its future rise to power and observed: “God has a special providence for fools, drunkards, and the United States of America”—and 26-years before an assassination in the Balkans ignited World War I killing nearly 100 million, he warned: “One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans”.

Exactly like Trump, it saw Bismarck strictly adhering to realpolitik instead of any ideology, with him stating: “When you want to fool the world, tell the truth”—Bismarck would fully support the Board of Peace created by Trump to repair the world, and factually declared: “The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood”—and most assuredly, as the evidence proves, Trump has taken to heart Bismarck urgently advising all future world leaders: “The secret of politics?...Make a good treaty with Russia”.

With Bismarck most popularly known as the Iron Chancellor of Germany, today it can be rightly said that Trump has arisen to become the Iron Chancellor of the entire world—a fact that reminded me of the article “Biden Is Betting Americans Will Forget About Afghanistan”, which revealed: “People in and around the White House are relying on Americans’ notoriously short-term memory”—and is a fact that also reminded me about the article “Americans Read Headlines. And Not Much Else”, wherein it reported: “Roughly six in 10 people acknowledge that they have done nothing more than read news headlines...And, in truth, that number is almost certainly higher than that, since plenty of people won't want to admit to just being headline-gazers but, in fact, are”.

Because notoriously short-term memory Americans only read headlines and not much else, it was not surprising to see the news: “In 2025, over 17,000 jobs were cut across television, film, broadcast, news and streaming in the first 11 months of the year...This figure was up 18% from last year”, nor was it surprising to read the observation: “The clearest way to understand media in 2025 is simple...Journalistic authority ceased to be something earned through credibility and process and instead became something reflected through performance...What mattered most was not how the image was made, but how it looked when it reached our smartphones”.

As for myself, I can’t imagine a world where when the most momentous events in modern human history are occurring, people are willingly hiding themselves away from the truths and realities that will affect their lives, which at the same time destroys the careers of those few still trying to inform everyone about what is coming next based on a firm knowledge of history.

from whatdoesitmean.com on January 23, 2026

Trump Completely Re-Orders Global Power in Less Than 24 Hours

President Trump tonight returned home, leaving allies rattled, but touting a win on Greenland, even as he says negotiations over a future deal are just getting underway.

Maria Bartiromo: The GDP of Greenland is like $3.3 billion, but people are valuing Greenland at between 50 billion and almost a trillion. So, what are you willing to pay for Greenland?

Trump: “Well, I'm not going to have to pay anything. We're going to have total access to Greenland. We're going to have all the military access that we want. We're going to be able to put what we need in Greenland because we want it. We're talking about national security and international security. So, we're going to not have to pay anything other than the fact that we are building the Golden Dome. And the Golden Dome is going to be something that's going to be very amazing. It'll be Israel times probably 100.”

What if I told you that Trump, NATO, and Greenland just rewired global power and it didn't even take 24 hours? Because this is exactly what just happened in less than a day. Trump walked onto the global stage, confronted NATO, froze tariffs that were supposed to detonate, and suddenly the conversation around Greenland, the Arctic, and global defense shifted... fast. Not next week, not after months of negotiations... immediately. And here's why that matters.

For years, you've been told America is declining, that our allies don't listen, that global institutions run the show. But in under 24 hours, NATO recalculated. France flinched and BRICS started posturing... not because of a war, not because of troops on the ground, but because leverage was applied where it actually hurts.

This isn't just about ICE and maps. This is about money, power, trade, and who controls the rules when things get serious.

Most people are completely missing what actually changed here and why it happened so fast. So tonight, I'm going to go ahead and walk you through what NATO didn't expect, why Greenland was the pressure point, and how one move forced the entire board to reset... because when the world blinks in under 24 hours, that's not diplomacy, that's dominance.

So here's the part that most people are missing. The headline isn't Greenland. The headline isn't tariffs. The headline is TIME. When something reshapes alliances in under 24 hours, that tells you where the real power lives.

This wasn't months of back channel diplomacy. This wasn't years of slow consensus. This was compression... and compression forces mistakes. Global institutions survive on delay. They drag things out. They bury decisions in committees. And they wait for pressure to cool.

What happened here blew that model right up. By moving fast, Trump denied NATO and European leaders the one weapon they rely on most... time to coordinate a response.

This is why recalculation happened immediately... not because everyone suddenly agreed, but because hesitation became riskier than compliance.

Speed creates imbalance. Imbalance creates leverage. And leverage forces decisions that polite diplomacy never could. This is why the phrase, "It hasn't even been 24 hours," matters so much. It's not commentary. It's evidence that the board was tilted before anyone could even sit down.

Maria Bartiromo: Mr. President, thank you so much for talking with us today. You have talked about this framework, the beginning of a framework that you've spoken with the NATO secretary about. Can you tell us anything about that? Does this mean that the US will ultimately acquire Greenland?

Trump: “Well, I don't know if I can say that, but it could be. I mean, it's possible. Anything's possible. But in the meantime, we're getting everything we wanted... total security, total access to everything... as many bases, all the equipment that we want. And very importantly, you know, we're building the Golden Dome. We have a technology. You saw what we did with Israel; it's foolproof and we're going to be building it... and it works much better when we have access to Greenland... just covers more territory, more accurately. Missiles will be more accurate. It's very important strategically and we will have all everything we want... at no cost.”

Now, I want to get real precise here, because this is where misinformation fills the gaps. There was no annexation. There was no flag planting. What emerged was a framework. And frameworks are often more powerful than formal treaties. This one here centers on access, defense coordination, and long-term infrastructure influence in Greenland... with Denmark still formally involved.

The key shift is practical control, not legal ownership. Who secures the territory? Who builds the systems? Who integrates defense? Those answers matter more than lines drawn on a map. By establishing coordination through NATO channels, the United States positions itself as the indispensable security provider in the Arctic.

This wasn't resistance. It was accommodation. Greenland becomes protected. NATO avoids a fracture and tariffs get frozen, not removed... preserving leverage. That's not a retreat. That is a holding pattern that favors the side that's already in motion.

Moments like this don't just shift geopolitics, they expose something that a lot of people avoid thinking about. This is where NATO had no choice but to blink.

So, here's where the leverage snaps into focus. NATO didn't blink because it wanted to. It blinked because it had no structural alternative. Now, if you strip away the speeches, you're left with math. And you've said you want a defense budget of $1.5 trillion for 2027.

Maria Bartiromo: How do you pay for that with the $37 trillion?

Trump: “Look, yeah, the money that's coming in is astronomical. You know, we'll be taking in over $600 billion this year alone in tariffs. And that's because we're doing it nice and easy. We're not even doing it strongly. We hope we have a good decision from the Supreme Court. If we don't, we figure something else. But it certainly makes life a lot easier if we have that decision that we're waiting for. But we have a lot of money coming in. We have a tremendous success. We have over $18 trillion. Could be when I get the final numbers even more than that, because that was a month and a half ago... but we do have the $18 trillion coming into the country in the form of investments. We have thousands of businesses being built all over the country... and you see it, you report on it better than anybody else. I appreciate that. But, you know, when you think of 18 trillion plus, no country's done anywhere near that... that's probably four times, five times more than any other country's ever done. And I always say money goes where it's treated best.”

The United States under Donald J. Trump covers a disproportionate share of NATO's defense burden, especially in high-cost theaters like the Arctic. Europe simply just doesn't have the lift, the logistics, or even the readiness to secure Greenland without US involvement. And Arctic reality makes this even worse. Distance, climate, even infrastructure requirements explode the costs.

Maria Bartiromo: So, what are we talking about? An acquisition of Greenland? Are you going to pay for it?

Trump: “I mean, it's really being negotiated now... the details of it, but essentially, it's total access. There's no end. There's no time limit. I think it's going to be something that's going to be very well reviewed. I noticed the stock market went up very substantially after we announced it, but the details are being negotiated now. It'll be very good.”

A drawn out dispute risked exposing NATO's weakest flank in real time. So once that vulnerability is public, deterrence collapses. NATO chose cohesion over pride, and it did it real fast.

This wasn't surrender, it was triage. When the bill comes due and only one ally can pay for it, well, the decision gets made for you. This is where the narrative flipped and a lot of people got it wrong.

Freezing tariffs is not the same as abandoning them. Trump kept the weapon loaded and he simply took his finger off the trigger. That part matters. Once tariffs go live, leverage is spent. But when they're frozen, leverage compounds. So, by pausing escalation, the United States avoided hardening opposition inside NATO while keeping every option intact. Brilliant move.

Allies could deescalate without losing face, but they knew that the pressure could resume instantly. That uncertainty is the point. It forces compliance without collateral damage.

This move also boxed in the critics. If Trump pushes tariffs immediately, he would be blamed for economic fallout. By freezing them, he forced NATO to act first, and they did.

This is how you corner institutions built on consensus. You make delay more dangerous than agreement. So, this is where the pressure really found a crack.

Emmanuel Macron didn't panic because of Greenland, he panicked because France is uniquely exposed when trade threats become specific. Wine and champagne are not symbolic exports, they're economic pressure points. If you add in pharmaceutical pricing disputes, then suddenly France is staring at a double-digit hit... prestige, industries, and cost controls all under threat. They can't handle all that.

This is why their response wasn't defiance... it was agitation. France relies very heavily on US market access while simultaneously positioning itself as a moral counterweight to American power inside Europe. But those two things collide the moment that the tariffs are on the table.

Macron's posture couldn't hold because the math just didn't back it up. So, when Trump floated tariff escalation, France became the test case. And everyone else in Europe noticed how fast the tone changed.

So, here's where this gets bigger than the headlines. Greenland isn't valuable because it's cold. It's valuable because it sits right at the intersection of rare earth minerals, AI supply chains, and even missile defense geography. These are not future concerns. These are current choke points in global competition.

Maria Bartiromo: So the Golden Dome will be on Greenland?

Trump: “A piece of it, yes... a very important part because everything comes over Greenland. If the bad guys start shooting, it comes over Greenland. So we knock it down. It's pretty infallible. It's amazing. You know, Ronald Reagan had the idea a long time ago, but we didn't have any technology at that point. The concept was great, but there was no technology. Now, we have unbelievable technology. I mean, virtually 100%. And we need it. I think we need it. And it's all going to be made in the United States. We have the best weapons in the world. We have the best companies in the world. We want them to produce faster. And you know, we've put a mandate out... you're going to have to produce faster... whether it's the Patriots or the Tomahawks or the F-35s or anything else, we make the best equipment, but they have to make it a lot faster.”

Control over Arctic access affects satellite coverage, early warning systems, and resource extraction that feeds advanced technology. This is why China has been circling Greenland for years through research partnerships and even investment interests.

The framework agreement didn't shut the door with force. It closed it with alignment. Whoever secures Greenland's infrastructure secures the pipeline for what comes next... AI dominance and defense superiority.

Now, while global leaders were posturing on stage, BRICS was making noise behind the scenes, and this didn't happen quietly by accident. The World Economic Forum was the biggest stage because this is where narratives are usually controlled... closed rooms, scripted panels, carefully managed consensus. And this is exactly why Trump chose to confront leaders there publicly.

Public pressure changes narratives. When disagreements stay private, institutions stall. When they go public, hesitation becomes weakness. Calling out defense failures, trade imbalances, and free riding allies in front of global cameras forced instant recalculation. This is why figures like Emanuel Macron visibly bristled.

The usual delay tactics disappeared. This wasn't humiliation for entertainment. This was negotiation by exposure. So by shifting the venue from back rooms to the open floor, Trump removed NATO's ability to quietly resist while appearing unified. So once the narrative cracked in public, the internal consensus collapsed right behind it.

Now we need to look at what didn't happen. BRICS didn't counter with action. They countered with theater announcements, war games framed as peace, symbolic moves designed to project relevance rather than demonstrate capacity. That distinction matters.

China and Russia understand leverage, but they also understand limits. The Arctic framework narrowed their options without firing a shot. So instead of escalation, we got signals, drills, rhetoric, posturing. That's not strength. This is in response to a lost initiative.

If this were a true power shift, you would see material counter moves, but you didn't see that. You saw noise. And noise is what fills the space when real leverage slips away. BRICS wasn't reacting to Greenland. They were reacting to speed. And this is where the fear narrative falls apart.

What happened here wasn't escalation. It was containment. Trump didn't move troops. He didn't draw red lines that demand enforcement later. He applied pressure through access, alignment, and economics... the tools that prevent wars instead of triggering them. When tariffs, defense coordination, and infrastructure control are used together, they remove incentives for confrontation.

Russia and China weren't challenged with force. They were boxed out of opportunity. That matters.

Wars usually start when access is ambiguous and lines are unclear. This framework did the exact opposite. It clarified who secures Greenland, who coordinates Arctic defense, and who sets the rules without a single boot on the ground. This is deterrence through inevitability. NATO stays intact. Europe avoids humiliation. Rivals lose leverage quietly. That's not chaos. This is conflict prevention, even if it made headlines look dramatic.

So, here's a real big distinction that most analysts miss. Maps don't define power. Logistics do. Greenland didn't change flags, but control shifted in every way that matters... defense coordination, infrastructure development, even security integration now run through the United States, with Denmark formally intact but practically aligned.

This is how modern influence works. You don't annex land. You anchor system. Whoever builds the radar, protects the roots and finances the infrastructure owns the outcome. This is why rivals were boxed out without confrontation.

The deal didn't redraw borders, it re-drew dependencies. And once dependencies shift, reversing them becomes nearly impossible. This is why the reaction was so fast. It was also why the recalculation happened in under 24 hours.

Now, here's the emotional truth underneath all of this: Speed terrifies systems that are built on delay. Global elites, especially those that are clustered around places like the World Economic Forum depend on process, procedure, and endless negotiation cycles to maintain control. What happened here ripped that safety blanket away when Trump forced outcomes in under 24 hours.

This exposed exactly how fragile those systems really are. No committees, no years of talks, just pressure, clarity, and decisive movement. This is why reaction felt panicked. It wasn't about Greenland alone. It was about the realization that the old playbook doesn't work anymore.

Once bureaucratic delay stops being a shield, power reverts to whatever is willing to move first. And this is the part that just keeps global elites up at night. The clock is no longer on their side.

And so now comes the quiet part. NATO can posture. Sure, it can issue statements. It can even talk about ongoing discussions. But here's the reality. Recalculating after you've already blanked is exponentially harder than resisting at the start. Once dependencies shift, once defense coordination, infrastructure, even leveraging a line around the United States occurs, backing out becomes costly politically, economically, strategically - this is why this unfolded so fast. This is also why it's very unlikely to reverse quietly.

So, this wasn't chaos. This was sequencing. Move fast, freeze leverage, force alignment, then let everyone else explain why they didn't see it coming. And this is the real takeaway. And it hasn't even been 24 hours. And the world has already adjusted.

Genius! Pure genius!

by Ron Yates at YouTube @RonYates1 on January 22, 2026

President Trump arrived in Davos with one item on his mind: Greenland.  The goal was to make a bid for the ice-covered landmass, which is so valuable to the United States from both a geopolitical and financial standpoint.  At the crossroads of the Arctic, the great “piece of ice,” as our President endearingly labeled it, is situated at a crucial intersection for trade and military operations.  It can provide a great strategic boost to any superpower which claims it, a reason for President Trump’s strong campaign to acquire it, and on the flipside of that, a reason for Chinese and Russian warships becoming an increasingly common sight off its coastline.

Greenland also has tactical utility: intercontinental missiles from any of the aforementioned nations may use Greenland as a strategic outpost for launching them.  Likewise, drones.  Its close proximity to the United States thus heightens the stakes for modern technological warfare if any of the other powers were to claim it for themselves.  While President Trump may have backed away from deploying troops to acquire Greenland by force, instead resorting to diplomacy, if heaven forbid China or Russia, and not our ally in Denmark, should claim this land for themselves, a military option for acquisition would then not only be revived, but perhaps foregone.

Thus, the strong campaign for Greenland is a rare example of an American leader responding to an evolving world order and mapping out a long term strategy in real time.  While the United States is enjoying something of a renaissance under the second Trump administration, Europe continues to languish.  By every metric, European strength, relative to the United States, depreciated exponentially over the last two decades, a trend forecasted to only accelerate in the years ahead.  Europe and the United States may be partners, but the union forged between them today is not that of co-equals.  President Trump knows this; based on similar principles, he understands that it is no longer realistic for Greenland to be managed by a country that has not been geopolitically significant in at least four centuries.

Then there are the resources.  Greenland, which is more than three times the size of Texas and five times that of California, is teeming with natural riches: from rare earths to precious metals to natural gas.  In this respect, it can be an economic windfall for the United States, a benefit that if annexed for Uncle Sam would accrue to the rest of the world as well.  This is because only the United States possesses the technological know-how and manpower to penetrate Greenland’s rough and lifeless tundra that stretches on for miles.  Denmark lacks the requisite drilling equipment; it also lacks the ability to secure the landmass militarily or otherwise.  Already, it has long managed Greenland in a semi-dependent partnership with the United States and other nations.  It is about time that it abdicates its role to greater powers, recognizing that the United States is the clear regional hegemon, and only it can maximize Greenland’s potential, with its vast mineral resources, and stave off hungry competitors like China or Russia in the process.

Beyond the economic upside, Greenland also symbolizes President Trump’s renewal of the Monroe Doctrine: a reinvigorated United States willing to defend its hemisphere responsibly, with a peace through strength foreign policy approach grounded in realism.  This is a gritty philosophy that aptly recognizes power dynamics for how the world is, not how liberals and globalist technocrats would like it to be.  The ideology of globalism, paired with its promise of a new world order, had long deluded European leaders into thinking borders were no longer necessary, human conflict had been permanently abolished, and that Europe could indefinitely profit off American industry, goods, and services, while never having to pay anything remotely close to a fair share in return.

The result of this bad deal has been catastrophic for the United States; not only did we get robbed, over decades, by our European partners, who were smart to exploit our leaders’ “generosity.”  But additionally, as we allowed our industries to get bled dry in service to the false creed of globalism, China and other rivals started to sink their teeth into our territory.  Though America’s leaders were wedded to globalism, China felt no special obligation to the same faith.  So they began planting their companies on our shores, offloading their industries on us and our allies, while making use of lax immigration laws to penetrate Western nations, their schools, and their job markets, with Chinese migrants, transforming our demographics along the way.  These trends have allowed China to take up shop, both in Europe and on America’s own shores; they took what they felt they could claim for themselves, sensing the weakness of their enemies and the dysfunction sown throughout their societies by a negligent ruling class over many decades.

Donald Trump has ushered in a new era in American-European relations.  Rather than subscribe to a deluded and outdated quasi-religious doctrine, he has recognized reality for what it is.  He knows the current state of global affairs.  He also knows the strength of American power and is not afraid to flex its muscles to get what he wants, which is what is in America’s best interests.  For Europe to recoil from that ask speaks less about the United States and more about Europe and its continued devotion to a subversive, backward-looking worldview.  Donald Trump knows Europe is weak and has called its bluff; he also realizes that weakness begets more weakness.  Thus, given the choice between entertaining Europe’s charade, which acts as if NATO does not entirely owe its existence to the United States, and the alternative – a world of vigorous American power, a renewed Monroe Doctrine that rightly claims territories like Greenland in its sphere of influence – Donald Trump has signaled the alternative is the way forward.  It is, in fact, the only way forward.

In a world where great powers such as America, China, and Russia increasingly steward global affairs, it is best that smaller countries recognize these emerging arrangements and take sides accordingly.  If Europe pushes America out of its house, China (or Russia) will move in.  At that point, Europe may face a reckoning – and realize that it would rather have the United States, with its shared Western culture, Christian religion, and commitment to liberty, than the autocratic alternatives. If there is a takeaway from Davos 2026, it would be this.  Greenland boasts incredible strategic and economic potential, for sure.  But even more than that, it is a portent for an evolving world order, one where Western countries will be forced into decisive commitments, or else face conquest by emerging threats. Donald Trump is showing, by his example, how the United States might remain on top of this power hierarchy long into the future.  Europe will have to take heed of these lessons if it wishes to remain relevant in this century as well.

by Publicola at thegatewaypundit.com on January 26, 2026