Donald Trump says US needs Greenland and Canada for 'national security' | BBC News

the incoming president Donald Trump was holding that press conference at maral lag in Florida it's his second news conference since winning the election and fair to say as Gary suggests the headlines from it will be perhaps ringing alarm bells in many foreign capitals Mr Trump refused to rule out using military force to retake the Panama Canal he said he would tariff Denmark at a very high level if it does not give Greenland to the United States he suggested renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America and he said he would use economic Force to

make Canada the 51st state of America Panama Canal is a disgrace what took place at the Panama Canal Jimmy Carter gave it to them for $1 and they were supposed to treat us well I thought it was a terrible thing to do if those hostages aren't back I don't want to hurt your negotiation if they're not back by the time I get into office all hell will break out in the Middle East well we need Greenland for national security purposes I've been told that for a long time are you also consider considering military force to

Annex and acquire no economic Force because Canada and the United States that would really be something but why are we supporting a country 200 billion plus a year uh our military is at their disposal all of these other things they should be a state that's why I told to do I hope to have six months first three to six mon no I would think I hope long before six months look Russia is losing a lot of young people and so is Ukraine Gary we all often told not to take everything Donald Trump says literally but

I would suggest demot takes it very seriously the Danish King has just made Greenland a much bigger uh part of the coat of arms uh and we've had a quote from uh Justin Trudeau the outgoing Canadian Prime Minister who says there isn't a snowballs chance in hell Canada will become the 51st state of the United States so there clearly is alarm bells ringing in foreign capitals after today's press conference yeah and I think I think it's worth saying I mean there's a couple of things I think that are important to note here look Donald Trump

will be the president of the United States in 13 days time that makes anything he says news anything he says is important it's also worth saying I think that one of the things we know from his first term and indeed the years after that is that sometimes there is some posture during sometimes you might even describe that as sort of negotiation out loud megaphone diplomacy whatever you want to call it uh that doesn't come to anything sometimes it does come to something so I think the context is important but we cannot be sure I don't

think how serious he is about some of these things he's clearly serious about things like NATO because that's been been very consistent and he did get some concessions from NATO over the years whether he really means that Canada should be the 51st state I just don't know and I don't think anyone knows and I'd be amazed even if anyone in his inner circle really knows the answer to that so these things I think we have to we have to do we have to take them seriously but we also have to remember that this is a

very very sophisticated and uh effective way of sucking up the the oxygen of publicity the new cycle of dominating free media in this country and around the world and as you say keeping lots and lots of diplomats lots and lots of heads of government in lots and lots of capitals around the globe on their toes Ambassador Gary questions how we should how we should characterize it at this moment and the style in which he delivers it a a Ukrainian colleague in the office this afternoon remarked that when he refers in this way to Canada and

greenlanders crucial to our security and we have friend friends there but we should all be one country he sounds a lot like Vladimir Putin it's the same Imperial language that is very interesting and and the antithesis of President Carter uh he made the decision to give back the Panama Canal because it was costing the United States a lot and it was controversial it was not an inexpensive uh entity to maintain and it belonged to Canada so suggesting that it would be taken back or suggesting that force would be used would bring bring all of that

back and while taking him seriously uh many American presidents as well as diplomats leaders around the world understand that what you part personally want or want to have happen does not necessarily happen it doesn't matter just because the president of the United States except except that he he negotiates in a zero some fashion and what he's talking about is using economic Force he's talking about significant tariffs on on green on on Denmark significant tariffs economic force in dealing with an ally like Canada that is that is very different to the incumbent of the oal office

talking about what he would like that's true but we also know that what he has said today may be 180 degrees different than what he says tomorrow and he's not yet president once he gets back in the office gets the full briefings presumably it'll be tempered but he's not consistent no one will accuse him of that and and he's not yet president so we will listen and we will see what he does when he gets into office but again the comparison uh to President Carter it couldn't be more night and day and we'll see whether

his way is more successful that's a good place to bring you in Laura as a historian I'm not sure whether there needed to be a press conference today at a moment they were paying respects to Jimmy Carter but there we are the juer position of it how how did you see it the style that you get from from Donald Trump versus the Diplomat that Jimmy Carter always was they are Polar Opposites but it's interesting because obviously Reagan who defeated Carter made him that one-term president was the one who coined the phrase make America great again

but he used it in the sense of optimism not xenophobia not you know I'm talking about anti-immigration I so it it's opposite in terms of polic but there are some sort of similarities in Reagan was the oldest president at the time so there are interesting things in terms of age in terms of how he approached briefings Reagan was very much keen on not really focusing on the detail of policies so it's very very sort of similar in in that respect but very different in the policies that they do land on and the style of communication

so for Carter it's absolutely polar opposite for Reagan we see some similarities but we also see the fact that this is definitely now Donald Trump's Republican Party I mean when you talk about Jer positions Gary you you could hardly have two different characters than Jimmy Carter and Donald Trump I think jimy Carter said the most extraordinary thing that happened to him growing up in the 1930s was that the house where he was raised got electricity they didn't have running water I mean his life in in some respects was was 19th century America when he was

a teenager absolutely right and ironically of course Donald Trump railing against electricity to today in his press conference in one of those kind of moments where he riffs uh talking about how gas fires are much better than electric fires and they look nicer and all that kind of stuff that we uh we got used to in his first term one of the things I think is different this time around Christian is that if you remember at the beginning of Donald Trump's first term he had people like James Mattis in the Pentagon he had people like

Dr tilletson in the uh State Department he had people here in Congress who were sort of stopping him doing some stuff not all stuff but stopping him doing some stuff this time it's very different there's not going to be a Jeff sessions launching as attorney general launching a you know a Russia probe the Müller investigation uh the defense department is not going to stand in the way of of what he says on this day or that state department the same so the Dynamics are going to be very different now of course there are still the

courts and there is plenty of money slushing around in America that's opposed to Donald Trump that will try used the courts to stop him doing things but there won't be that sort of political internal opposition and as your guest was saying he's won some of these big arguments the Republican party that was the free trade party the party of free global trade is now a protectionist party and that is his doing because he has reshaped it in his image