Pentagon Fires Greenland Base Commander After Vance Visit
Washington, D.C. – April 11, 2025, 11:34 AM PDT – The Pentagon has sacked Colonel Susannah Meyers, commander of Pituffik Space Base in Greenland, following her pointed email distancing the base from Vice President JD Vance’s controversial March 28 visit. The Space Force announced her removal late Thursday, April 10, citing a “loss of confidence in her ability to lead,” hours after Military.com published her March 31 message to personnel. Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell doubled down on X, linking the report and warning, “Actions to undermine the chain of command or to subvert President Trump’s agenda will not be tolerated at the Department of Defense.”
Vance’s trip—where he and Second Lady Usha Vance toured the northernmost U.S. military outpost—ignited tensions with Denmark, Greenland’s overseer. He slammed Copenhagen, saying, “You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” accusing it of underinvesting in security amid Trump’s push to annex the mineral-rich Arctic territory, per Reuters. Meyers, who’d led the 821st Space Base Group since July 2024, fired back in her email: “I do not presume to understand current politics, but what I do know is the concerns of the U.S. administration discussed by Vice President Vance on Friday are not reflective of Pituffik Space Base.” She vowed all flags—U.S., Danish, Greenlandic, Canadian—would “fly proudly together,” a unity nod to the base’s multinational staff.
The dismissal’s swiftness stunned observers. Military.com’s scoop hit Thursday afternoon; by night, Meyers was out, replaced by Colonel Shawn Lee, ex-commander at Alaska’s Clear Space Force Station. The Space Force stressed commanders must stay “nonpartisan,” a line Parnell echoed, framing Meyers’s words as a breach of Trump loyalty. Posts on X split hard—some hailed her “standing up for truth,” others blasted “insubordination” in a military already reeling from Trump’s purges of top brass like Joint Chiefs Chairman CQ Brown and Navy chief Lisa Franchetti.
Context matters. Trump’s Greenland fixation—revived in his second term—pairs national security rhetoric with threats of force, despite 85% of Greenlanders opposing U.S. control in a January 2025 poll. Vance’s visit, meant to soften that stance with talk of “self-determination,” instead drew Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen’s ire: “This is not how you speak to close allies.” Meyers’s firing, amid gold’s $3,200 spike and U.S.-China tariff volleys, signals a Pentagon enforcing Trump’s line—dissent be damned.
