Vance's visit has thrust the remote Arctic base into the spotlight, as US President Donald Trump locks horns with Denmark over his public desire to annex Greenland from the Scandinavian country.
Located 1,524 kilometres (950 miles) from the North Pole, the base, named Thule Air Base until 2023, began life as a trading post founded by Greenlandic-Danish explorer Knud Rasmussen in 1910 next to a glacier.
It was then bought by the Danish state at the beginning of World War II before becoming an American weather station in 1946.
Following a defence agreement between the United States and Denmark signed on April 27, 1951 it was made into a military base between 1951 and 1953.
Greenland, which receives rent from the US administration, has been a party to this agreement since 2004.
The expansion of the station forced inhabitants of Pituffik, the local community, to leave their land for Qaanaaq, 140 kilometres to the north.
Their descendants have received apologies and reparations from Denmark, but their ancestral right to the rich hunting and fishing grounds has not been recognised.
- Protecting the United States -
Trump's administration argues the United States needs strategically placed Greenland, a self-governing Danish island, for security reasons.
"Vance refers to the importance of Greenland for US national security. That's true, it's been like that for a very long time," Marc Jacobsen, a researcher at the Royal Danish Defence College, told AFP.
The base's purpose is "to protect the US against threats, especially from Russia since the shortest distance from missiles from Russia towards the US goes via North Pole, via Greenland", according to Jacobsen.
The Pituffik base was used as a warning post for possible attacks from the Soviet Union during the Cold War and remains an essential part of the United States' missile defence infrastructure.
With its strategic location between North America and Europe the base still plays a surveillance role in the northern hemisphere.
At the height of the Cold War, more than 10,000 people were stationed at the base, most of them American, as well as fighter planes and bombers carrying atomic bombs.
In 1967, Denmark secretly authorised the United States to station nuclear weapons in Greenland. Officially, Copenhagen has refused to accept any nuclear weapons on Danish territory.
But on January 21, 1968, a B-52 plane carrying four hydrogen bombs crashed into the ice, revealing Denmark's dual nuclear policy.
Today, the base only houses around 150 US soldiers, alongside Danes and Greenlanders.
But it is not so much a question on the number of men as the quality of the equipment, according to Jacobsen.
"There are a very important radars there," he said.
The radars enable the detection of missiles and activation of counter-measures.
The military base, which also has a satellite control station, is operated by the 821st Space Base Group and is the only US military base on the Arctic island.
Its runway, some 3,000 metres (9850 feet) long, handles more than 3,000 American and international flights a year.
The base is also home to the world's most northerly deep-water port.
According to its website, this "provides a unique platform for arctic training, international scientific research and environmental programs".
Because of its location north of the Arctic Circle, Pituffik lives in constant darkness between November and February while the sun does not set from May to August.
Vance due in Greenland as anger mounts over Trump takeover bid
Copenhagen (AFP) Mar 28, 2025 -
US Vice President JD Vance is on Friday due to tour a US military base in Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation amid President Donald Trump's bid to annex the Danish territory.
Trump insisted on Wednesday that the United States needed the vast Arctic island for national and international security, and has previously refused to rule out the use of force to get it.
"We have to have it," he said.
Danish and Greenlandic officials, backed by the European Union, have insisted that will not happen.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen denounced plans by a US delegation to visit Greenland uninvited -- for what was initially a much broader visit -- as "unacceptable pressure" on Greenland and Denmark.
In the end, the US visit has been reduced to Vance and his wife Usha visiting the US-run Pituffik Space Base in the northwest of the island.
Vance is to meet with US Space Force members and "check out what's going on with the security" of Greenland, he said in a video message.
The vice president angered Danes in early February when he said Denmark was "not doing its job (protecting Greenland), and it's not being a good ally".
A fuming Frederiksen quickly retorted that Denmark had long been a loyal US ally, fighting alongside the Americans "for many, many decades", including in Iraq and Afghanistan.
- Key missile defence cog -
The Pituffik base is an essential part of Washington's missile defence infrastructure, its location in the Arctic putting it on the shortest route for missiles fired from Russia at the United States.
Known as Thule Air Base until 2023, the base served as a warning post for possible attacks from the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
It is also a strategic location for air and submarine surveillance in the northern hemisphere, which Washington claims Denmark has neglected.
Vance is "right in that we didn't meet the American wishes for an increased presence, but we have taken steps towards meeting that wish", Marc Jacobsen, a senior lecturer at the Royal Danish Defence College, told AFP.
He said Washington needed to present more specific demands if it wanted a proper Danish response.
In January, Copenhagen announced that it would allocate almost $2 billion to beef up its presence in the Arctic and north Atlantic.
The government said it planned to acquire three new specialised vessels for the polar region and two more long-distance surveillance drones, and would boost its satellite capacity.
- 'Not for sale' -
Greenland is home to 57,000 people, most of them Inuits, and is believed to hold massive untapped mineral and oil reserves, though oil and uranium exploration are banned.
Trump's desire to take over the ice-covered territory, which is seeking independence from Denmark, has been categorically rejected by Greenlanders, their politicians and Danish officials.
The United States "knows that Greenland is not for sale", the Danish prime minister said on Wednesday.
While all of Greenland's political parties are in favour of independence, none of them support the idea of joining the United States.
A poll in late January also showed that a large majority of Greenlanders also reject the idea.
JD Vance's visit comes at a time of political flux in Greenland.
Following elections in March, the territory has only a transitional government, with parties still in negotiations to form a new coalition government.
Initially, Vance's wife Usha was supposed to attend a dogsled race in the town of Sisimiut, while various reports suggested US national security adviser Mike Waltz and Energy Secretary Chris Wright would also take part in the visit.
"Our integrity and democracy must be respected without foreign interference," Greenland's outgoing Prime Minister Mute Egede said in a post on Facebook on Monday.
He recalled that the government had not "sent out any invitations for visits, private or official".
A visit to Greenland by Trump's son Donald Jr on January 7 had also been seen as a provocation.
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