Since the mid-twentieth century, the power dynamics and system of alliances that made up the postwar global order provided a strong check on campaigns to conquer and acquire territory—an otherwise enduring feature of human history. But rather than marking a definitive break from the aggression of the past, this era of relative restraint now seems to have been merely a brief deviation from the historical pattern. From Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to U.S. President Donald Trump’s avowed interest in acquiring Greenland, international land grabs are back on the table. Threats of territorial conquest are once again becoming a central part of geopolitics, driven by a new phase of great-power competition, growing population pressures, shifts in technology, and, perhaps most crucially, a changing climate.

The case of Greenland is emblematic of how climate change may spur a global contest for land. Trump first raised the prospect of the United States incorporating the Danish territory on the eve of his inauguration, and in the weeks since, he has reiterated that wish and refused to rule out the use of force to turn it into reality. Denmark is uninterested in selling Greenland, and the territory’s largely indigenous population is wary of outside powers—a legacy of the island’s brutal history under Danish rule. But that has not discouraged Trump’s overtures or threats. His interest in the territory stems ostensibly from its strategic position as a buffer between the United States and its great-power adversaries. “It has to do with the freedom of the world,” Trump said in January. But as the planet warms, retreating icecaps and thinning sea ice will make Greenland important for other reasons, as its vast tracts of once inhospitable land become newly alluring to outsiders.

Washington’s bid for Greenland is just the opening chapter of a new global competition for territory. There are many qualities that make land valuable, such as access to resources, human habitability, agricultural productivity, and proximity to trade routes. For decades, countries have, for the most part, played with the hands they were dealt. But now, climate change is reshuffling the deck. As major powers try to position themselves for success in a warming world, many will rush to secure access to vital territory and resources—ushering in an era in which blatant land grabs are a recurrent theme.

WINNERS AND LOSERS

What seems brazen and bizarre now may well become more common in the coming decades as policymakers grapple with the consequences of a warming planet. For a great power looking to set itself up for success in a future shaped by climate change, Greenland is a prize. The massive island will likely become an important waypoint for new northern shipping routes that open as Arctic ice melts. Although ice cover has so far limited the exploration of mineral deposits in Greenland, scientists believe it could possess significant quantities of iron ore, lead, gold, rare-earth elements, uranium, oil, and other valuable resources, including those minerals needed for the clean energy transition.

As the climate warms, people will be forced to flee places made inhabitable by rising seas, unbearable heat, and extreme weather—and by that time, Greenland will be far more comfortable for human settlement than it is now. Bitterly cold winters will ease, and summers will warm substantially. Recent years have seen average temperatures that are Greenland’s warmest on record for the past 1,000 years and are around 1.5 degrees Celsius above the twentieth-century average. Further temperature rises will foster new vegetation and even agriculture. Climate projections show that areas covered today by the low-to-the-ground vegetation of the tundra could host growing forests by 2100.

Climate change will create intractable problems for some countries and open new opportunities for others, encouraging a race for territory. Global warming–induced changes in productivity and habitability will carve new trajectories for economic output and migration. Emigration from North Africa, the Sahel, and the Middle East, for instance, will increase, as temperatures rise and agricultural productivity declines in those regions. People will also draw back from low-lying and flood-prone coastal areas, such as the Ganges Delta of Bangladesh and parts of coastal Florida.

International land grabs are back on the table.

Northern climates and areas with higher elevation will attract most of these displaced populations, although areas in the far south will gather a small number, too. Research by Stanford University scientists has shown that economic productivity accelerates as temperatures rise in cooler climates and slows as hotter climates heat up. The reasons are easy to identify: temperate climates allow greater agricultural production, enhanced population health, and better conditions for work. Excessively hot climates produce more heat-related deaths, higher energy costs, water shortages, and lower crop yields.

Countries with vast tracts of soon-to-be-desirable territory stand to benefit, if they play their cards right. Canada and Russia, the world’s two largest northerly countries, are particularly well situated. Agriculture in both could expand dramatically as a result of longer growing seasons, warmer temperatures, and the melting of permafrost. One recent climate model has shown Canada gaining 1.6 million square miles of arable land suitable for crops such as wheat, corn, and potatoes by 2080—a fourfold increase of the area currently available for cultivation. Russia will gain a comparable amount of newly arable land in the coming decades. Even though the soils on these lands will not all be highly productive, the sheer scale of the change positions these two countries to dominate global grain markets in the future.

Canada and Russia will also soon find themselves sitting along major international shipping routes. Melting ice is opening maritime passageways in the Arctic, and shipping in the region, already on the rise, will only ramp up further as the world warms. Major economies are all eyeing two shipping routes that connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans: the Northwest Passage, which runs along the northern part of Canada, passing Greenland, and the Northern Sea Route, which traces the northern edges of Russia. Canada’s and Russia’s positions along these routes will foster economic activity in those countries and give them leverage over the flow of maritime traffic.

Climate change will create problems for some countries and opportunities for others.

To be sure, Canada and Russia can still expect to suffer from climate change–induced natural disasters. These and other expensive risks, such as the damage that thawing permafrost can inflict on infrastructure, will be a drag on their economies. But the coming of more temperate climates will also drive population growth and boost overall economic activity. In Canada, at least, ideas about how to take advantage of those trends are already circulating. Influential and well-connected Canadian business and political leaders have formed a group called the Century Initiative, which advocates for increasing the country’s population from around 40 million today to 100 million by 2100, largely by supercharging immigration and establishing regional development hubs. One of the founders of the initiative served as an economic adviser to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and its platform has gained support from prominent Conservative and Liberal Party members and advisers.

Russia’s outlook is more mixed. The warming of large swaths of its vast tundra and boreal forests certainly holds significant economic potential. But Russia’s reliance on hydrocarbon production makes its economy vulnerable as the world shifts toward renewable energy—especially if agriculture, shipping, and other newly viable forms of economic activity cannot fill the void left by declining fossil fuel exports. And whereas Canada offsets its low birthrates with relatively open migration policies, Russia is far less welcoming to immigrants. Unless that changes, Russia’s population could decline 25 percent by 2100.

Other northerly territories will likely undergo similar changes to those in Canada and Russia: Finland, Norway, Sweden, and the U.S. state of Alaska will all have a growing base of arable land in the coming decades. The continental United States and China, by contrast, will face declining crop yields, increasing migration out of their hottest and most disaster-prone areas, and decreasing productivity. Both could see their power and influence wane unless they can balance these disadvantages with investments in cheap renewable energy and plans to eventually relocate vulnerable populations to more livable places.

SCRAMBLE FOR LAND

Faced with stark climate-related economic and demographic challenges, countries will try to lock in any advantage they can.Wrangling over Greenland is just the beginning. There are dozens of territories around the world that fit a similar profile to Greenland’s: sparsely populated, likely to become more habitable in the coming decades or home to valuable resources, and possessing weak, ambiguous, or transitional sovereignty. As a self-governing territory of Denmark, Greenland’s foreign affairs are managed from Copenhagen, but its leaders have expressed a desire for full independence and drafted a prospective constitution. Even though most Greenlanders initially reacted with disdain to Trump’s offer to join the United States, it is not out of the realm of possibility that the territory could gain independence and entertain such a proposal in the future. Other nonsovereign territories, such as the Faroe Islands, the Falkland Islands, French Guiana, or New Caledonia, could also enter into the sights of great powers or opportunistic neighbors. All these areas have been contested before and could be contested again.

Antarctica is another flash point. During the Cold War, major powers signed the Antarctic Treaty, setting aside territorial claims on the continent and committing instead to use it as a site of international scientific exploration and cooperation. That arrangement is now starting to unwind. China and Russia recently incorporated interests in Antarctica into their national security strategies, and China has invested in an icebreaker fleet and the construction of satellite ground stations on the continent that could be repurposed for military applications. Both countries have expanded their krill fishing in the waters surrounding Antarctica, and they have rejected the renewal of existing marine protections and proposals for additional ones by the 26-country Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources. Argentina and Chile have responded by reasserting their own long-standing territorial claims on the continent. As climate change makes it possible to extract valuable resources, extend control over expanding shipping routes, and build monitoring stations and research bases that could be militarized, Antarctic cooperation could fall apart entirely.

Wrangling over Greenland is just the beginning.

Countries that possess resources vital to the transition to renewable energy will also become sites of competition. The demand for rare-earth minerals such as cobalt, coltan, lithium, and tantalum is driving efforts to source and secure these resources wherever they can be found. In some cases, territorial sovereignty is compromised in the process, from the creeping influence of multinational companies engaged in large-scale land acquisition to more blatant violations in the form of foreign military incursions. The recent invasion of the mineral-rich Democratic Republic of the Congo by the Rwandan-backed M23 rebel group can be explained as a way for the group, and by extension, Rwanda, to gain access to valuable minerals in eastern Congo that are used to produce batteries for electric vehicles and cellphones.

The competition to secure access to food will intensify, too, as climate change affects crop yields and growing patterns around the world. Some countries will need to find new sources of agricultural goods, and the countries that can continue to produce and export food in a warming world will gain influence. Russia’s invasion of eastern Ukraine can be seen in part as a play for political leverage through agricultural advantage. For decades, the Soviet Union and Russia imported grain, but in the last two decades, Moscow has made a concerted and successful effort to boost domestic agricultural production. Now, not only is Russia no longer dependent on imports, but it also has become the world’s largest wheat exporter. By seizing prime agricultural land in Ukraine, Russia has further consolidated its domination of global grain markets. That position gives it immense power: if Moscow bars exports to a country that relies on imported grain, it can destabilize that country’s politics and drive hunger and even emigration.

THE FIGHTS TO COME

Climate change will shape relations among states in complex ways in the coming decades, but the broad contours of these shifts are already visible. Even now, trade and commodity markets are transforming as powerful states grab key resources and new shipping routes open. Populations have already begun to move both within and across countries as climate change renders some parts of the earth less habitable and others more so. As these trends accelerate, they will fuel efforts by major powers to acquire new territories.

Although it is impossible to predict with certainty where and when countries will be prepared to go to war for land, environmental trends today suggest many possibilities for aggression down the road. A China facing grave threats from climate change—from rising seas and extreme weather in coastal areas to flooding along major rivers and desertification in the country’s north—could try to secure resources, habitable land, and geostrategic advantage by making incursions into Southeast Asia, claiming island outposts, or even grabbing pieces of eastern Russia or North Korea. Nigeria, on track to become more populous than China by the end of the century, could turn central Africa into a tinderbox. As climate change brings droughts, floods, and heat waves, disrupting agriculture and displacing communities, Nigeria may find it needs more resources to sustain its fast-growing population—and set its sights on neighboring countries to get them. Russia, meanwhile, could expand its footprint in the Baltics and countries such as Norway in order to secure northern shipping routes and expand its sea access. It could do the same in Antarctica, setting the stage for conflict with other great powers active there. And the United States, facing climate devastation in places such as coastal Florida, wildfire-prone California, and the drought-stricken Southwest could act on its territorial ambitions in northern territories including Greenland or even parts of Canada.

International agreements and alliances, already fraying as great-power competition heats up, will struggle to contain these fights. In a world where might makes right, countries that find themselves seeking new territory may not hesitate to use force to get it. With the most dramatic effects of climate change still to come, the race for land is just getting started.