White Coat Supremacy, Greenland Style

Greenland has been much in the news with President Trump’s attempt to acquire the island from former colonial power Denmark. Trump’s bid has helped to expose a long-suppressed Danish campaign that could now incline Greenlanders to opt for a deal.

From 1966 to 1970, in an attempt to reduce the population of Greenland, Danish doctors forced intrauterine devices (IUDs) on 4,500 women and girls as young as 12. The forced procedure left many women sterile, and the practice continued on a reduced scale until 1992, when Greenland gained control of its healthcare system. The Spiralkampagnen—“coil campaign”—continued well into the 2000s. In 2022, Greenland and Denmark launched an investigation, but no apology emerged until August of 2025.

“We cannot change what has happened. But we can take responsibility,” said Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. “On behalf of Denmark, I would like to say sorry.” For University of Connecticut professor Barry Scott Zellen, senior fellow in Arctic Security at the Institute of the North, “‘sorry’ seems to grossly understate the gravity of the offense,” similar to what a misbehaving child would say to a parent. “Offenses of this magnitude need much more than a ‘sorry,’” Zellen contends. “They need generational healing. They deserve generous compensation. They need repeated acts of contrition, resignations, imprisonments. They need justice.”

Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen apologized “for the harm and abuse that may have been inflicted on several women after we took over responsibility for our healthcare system.” (emphasis added) Zeller found that response “woefully insufficient.” Naaja H. Nathanielsen, Greenland’s minister for justice and gender equality, said she was “very pleased by the apology” but “couldn’t see any way around it.” Zellen pronounced her “the minister of platitudes and contradiction.”

For those who believe that harm and abuse “may have” been inflicted, consider the experience of Henrietta Berthelsen, only 13 years old when Danish doctors forcibly implanted an IUD designed for mature women. She remembers the “terrible pain” and that “none of the grown-ups paid any attention to me.” Berthelsen and many others received “no psychological support of any kind from the state. If we seek help, we have to pay part of it ourselves.”

According to Copenhagen attorney Mads Pramming,  the Spiralkampagnen was part of government policy to limit population, and in some places, there were “zero births.” Four years later, the government considered the coil campaign a “big success,” so no need for any apology. French photographer Juliette Pavy found that discussion of the subject was taboo in Denmark.

Pavy interviewed Naja Lyberth and Bula Larsen, whose IUD produced a serious infection. Doctors removed then replaced it, and Larsen remained infertile, a common legacy of the campaign. Pavy shows a photo of a coil in the womb and pictures of the victims at the time of the forced insertion. By all indications, Danish doctors seldom, if ever, objected to the procedure, which also bypassed the victims’ parents.

In government-monopoly health care, the people get only the medical care the government wants them to have. As the Spiralkampagnen confirms, government medical care can force procedures the people don’t want to have, and which the government wants to keep secret.

Aaja Chemnitz, who has represented Greenland in the Danish parliament for 10 years, told reporters the Danish apology was a direct result of “the external pressure, especially from the United States.” As the people should know, President Trump’s campaign to acquire Greenland is not the first.

American attempts to acquire Greenland go back to the mid-1800s. During WWII, more than 10,000 Allied aircraft refueled in Greenland for bombing runs on Nazi Germany. In 1946, the USA sought to purchase Greenland for $100 million, but the Danes didn’t go for it. In 1951, the USA signed a treaty with Denmark giving the American military access to Greenland.  During the 1950s, the Eisenhower administration sought to acquire the territory, but failed to put forth an offer. While Trump makes his bid, there’s a back story here that the people should know.

At the end of WWII, Canada’s First Parachute Battalion blocked Stalin’s forces from occupying Denmark. That would have trapped Denmark in the Eastern Bloc and handed Stalin control of Greenland.  Potential suitors for that territory now include Russia, an autocracy led by former KGB man Vladimir Putin, and Communist China.

The PRC’s dictatorship is now forcing women to be sterilized or fitted with contraceptive devices in an effort to reduce the population of Muslim Uighurs. That may recall Denmark’s Spiralkampagnen to limit Greenland’s “inuit” population, which Denmark considered a “big success.” Their former colony of Greenland is hardly the only strategic territory in the region.

During WWII, the Allies also flew out of Newfoundland, a former British colony woefully neglected by the homeland. In 1949, Newfoundlanders voted to join Canada, in a contest some believe was rigged. See Greg Malone’s Don’t Tell the Newfoundlanders: The True Story of Newfoundland’s Confederation with Canada, based on documents kept secret for many years.

President Trump’s offer for Greenland should include justice for the Spiralkampagnen victims. Denmark could outline a counter-offer and both sides could let the people of Greenland decide. As Trump likes to say, we’ll have to see what happens.