Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared to acknowledge that the Pentagon has developed plans to take over Greenland and Panama by force if necessary but refused to answer repeated questions at a hotly combative congressional hearing Thursday about his use of Signal chats to discuss military operations.
Democratic members of the House Armed Services Committee repeatedly got into heated exchanges with Hegseth, with some of the toughest lines of questioning coming from military veterans as many demanded yes or no answers and he tried to avoid direct responses about his actions as Pentagon chief.
In one back-and-forth, Hegseth did provide an eyebrow-raising answer. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., asked whether the Pentagon has developed plans to take Greenland or Panama by force if necessary.
There is literally no scenario in which it could possibly be "necessary" to invade Greenland.
How long are people going to continue to pretend that the US is not being governed by malicious lunatics?
Actually there is, and the plans most likely predate Trump's first term. The US military has all kinds of plans to invade every square foot of land on earth.
The military had a shitload of plans on how to respond to Soviet military advances, including occupying strategically important locations like Greenland (for a forward base) and Panama (to disrupt shipping/commerce). The US Space Force (ugh) has a base on Greenland already, because it is a strategic location. If the USSR was able to occupy it first, it would be necessary to retake the area and they spent decades coming up with all kinds of plans for different scenarios!
So this is 100% Pete using something that already existed and promoting it as something the current administration came up with and mischaracterizing the reason that it exists in the first place.
Greenland would always more likely ask to be 'strategically occupied' than risk being invaded by Sovjet forces. I think that still holds true today. Since you can only be invaded against your will, i don't really agree that the scenario you mention can be considered 'a necessary invasion' because the scenario in which you are invited by the host country is very very different to the scenario when you're going there uninvited.
The US would see it as necessary for US interests, not for the residents of Greenland.