The Danish Defense Intelligence Service, in its latest annual assessment, said Washington’s greater assertiveness under the Trump administration also comes as China and Russia seek to diminish Western, especially American, influence.

Perhaps most sensitive to Denmark — a NATO and European Union member country, and a U.S. ally — is growing competition between those great powers in the Arctic. U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed a desire to see Greenland, a semiautonomous and mineral-rich territory of Denmark, become part of the United States, a move opposed by Russia and much of Europe.

“The strategic importance of the Arctic is rising as the conflict between Russia and the West intensifies, and the growing security and strategic focus on the Arctic by the United States will further accelerate these developments,” said the report, published Wednesday.

The assessment also follows the release last week of a new Trump administration national security strategy that depicts European allies as weak and aims to reassert America’s dominance in the Western Hemisphere.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Russia is worried about NATO’s activities in the Arctic and will respond by strengthening its military capability in the polar region.

The findings and analyses in the report echo a string of recent concerns, notably in Western Europe, about an increasingly go-it-alone approach by the United States, which under Trump’s second term has favored bilateral deals and partnerships at the expense of multilateral alliances like NATO.

“For many countries outside the West, it has become a viable option to forge strategic agreements with China rather than the United States,” read the report, which was written in Danish. “China and Russia, together with other like-minded states, are seeking to reduce Western – and particularly US – global influence.”

“At the same time, uncertainty has grown over how the United States will prioritize its resources in the future,” it added. “This gives regional powers greater room for maneuver, enabling them to choose between the United States and China or to strike a balance between the two.”

The Trump administration has raised concerns about respect for international law with its series of deadly strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean — part of a stepped-up pressure campaign against President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela.

Trump has also refused to rule out military force in Greenland, where the United States already has a military base.

“The United States is leveraging economic power, including threats of high tariffs, to assert its will, and the possibility of employing military force – even against allies – is no longer ruled out,” the report said.

Using a special procedure meant for economic emergencies, the EU blocked the assets until Russia gives up its war on Ukraine and compensates its neighbor for the heavy damage that it has inflicted for almost four years.

EU Council President António Costa said European leaders had committed in October “to keep Russian assets immobilized until Russia ends its war of aggression against Ukraine and compensates for the damage caused. Today we delivered on that commitment.”

It’s a key step that will allow EU leaders to work out at a summit next week how to use the tens of billions of euros in Russian Central Bank assets to underwrite a huge loan to help Ukraine meet its financial and military needs over the next two years.

“Next step: securing Ukraine’s financial needs for 2026–27,” added Costa, who will chair the Dec. 18 summit.

The move also prevents the assets, estimated to total around 210 billion euros ($247 billion), from being used in any negotiations to end the war without European approval.

A 28-point plan drafted by U.S. and Russian envoys stipulated that the EU would release the frozen assets for use by Ukraine, Russia and the United States. That plan, which surfaced last month, was rejected by Ukraine and its backers in Europe.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot wrote on X that the EU decision means that “no one will decide in place of the Europeans the use of these funds.”

Hungary and Slovakia object

The vast majority of the funds — around 193 billion euros ($225 billion) at the end of September — are held in Euroclear, a Belgian financial clearing house.

The money was frozen under sanctions that the EU imposed on Russia over the war it launched on Feb. 24, 2022, but these sanctions must be renewed every six months with the approval of all 27 member countries.

Hungary and Slovakia oppose providing more support to Ukraine, but Friday’s decision prevents them from blocking the sanctions rollover and make it easier to use the assets.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán – Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest ally in Europe – said on social media that it means that “the rule of law in the European Union comes to an end, and Europe’s leaders are placing themselves above the rules.”

“The European Commission is systematically raping European law. It is doing this in order to continue the war in Ukraine, a war that clearly isn’t winnable,” he wrote. He said that Hungary “will do everything in its power to restore a lawful order.”

In a letter to Costa, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said that he would refuse to back any move that “would include covering Ukraine’s military expenses for the coming years.”

He warned “that the use of frozen Russian assets could directly jeopardize U.S. peace efforts, which directly count on the use of these resources for the reconstruction of Ukraine.”

But the commission argues that the war has imposed heavy costs by hiking energy prices and stunting economic growth in the EU, which has already provided nearly 200 billion euros ($235 billion) in support to Ukraine.

Belgium, where Euroclear is based, is opposed to the “reparations loan” plan. It says that the plan “entails consequential economic, financial and legal risks,” and has called on other EU countries to share the risk.

Russia takes court action

Russia’s Central Bank, meanwhile, said on Friday that it has filed a lawsuit in Moscow against Euroclear for damages it says were caused when Moscow was barred from managing the assets. Euroclear declined to comment.

The Belgian clearing house has around 17 billion euros ($20 billion) in Russia and it’s unclear what would happen to that money if the legal challenge or others like it succeed.

In a separate statement, the Central Bank also described wider EU plans to use Russian assets to aid Ukraine as “illegal, contrary to international law,” arguing that they violated “the principles of sovereign immunity of assets.”

But EU Economy Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis brushed off the suit, saying that the decision is “legally robust,” and that he expects Russia “to continue to launch speculative legal proceedings to prevent the EU from upholding international law.”

Chris Weafer, CEO of Macro-Advisory Ltd. Consultancy, said that the timing of the court action is “clearly linked” to the EU’s intention to use the frozen assets.

“The Russian Central Bank is making clear that it will respond with legal actions against all countries involved in the decision to take the Russian money,” he said.

Friday’s EU decision came hours after Germany summoned the Russian ambassador in Berlin following allegations of sabotage, disinformation campaigns, cyberattacks and interference in its elections.

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Associated Press journalists Karel Janicek in Prague, Sylvie Corbet in Paris, Katie Marie Davies in Manchester, England and Stefanie Dazio in Berlin contributed to this report.

A survey last month from the Chicago Fed found that third-quarter repayment rates in the Midwest for non-real-estate farm loans were lower than a year earlier for the eighth quarter in a row.

Meanwhile, 21% of the lenders who responded to the survey said collateral requirements for farm loans rose in the third quarter, while none reported that requirements eased.

And an overwhelming 92% majority expect net cash earnings, including government payments, for crop farmers to be lower during the fall and winter than a year earlier. 

As a result, nearly half the bankers surveyed see forced sales or liquidations of farm assets owned by financially distressed farmers rising in the next three to six months.

Earlier this month, the American Soybean Association (ASA) projected that 2025 will mark a third straight year of losses, noting that when harvest began in September, futures prices for November were 25%-30% lower compared to 2022.

At the same time, farm production expenses are seen increasing by $12 billion from a year ago to reach $467.4 billion in 2025. And with costs seen staying high next year, 2026 is shaping up to be more of the same.

“Unless revenues increase significantly next year, this would squeeze farmgate profits for a fourth year, marking the longest stretch of substantial soybean production losses since [USDA’s Economic Research Service] 1998-2002 reporting period,” the ASA warned.

Several factors have spiked costs recently. President Donald Trump’s tariffs have made key imports more expensive, Russia’s war on Ukraine boosted fertilizer prices, and the Federal Reserve’s earlier round of rate hikes lifted borrowing costs.

On the demand side, Trump’s trade war essentially halted Chinese orders for U.S. soybeans until just recently.

Separate data have shown that U.S. farm bankruptcies have soared this year, and the National Corn Growers Association raised alarms this summer about “the economic crisis hitting rural America.”

Trump administration plans a $12 billion rescue that will serve as a “bridge” before more aid comes next year, but farmers say the short-term lifeline still won’t be enough to cover their losses.

In fact, losses this year for the nine major commodity crops should range from $35 billion to $44 billion, Shawn Arita, associate director of the Agricultural Risk Policy Center at North Dakota State University, told Reuters.

Caleb Ragland, president of the ASA and a farmer himself, estimated the aid package will be enough for only about one-quarter of soybean losses.

“We’re appreciative of an economic bridge,” he told Reuters, but added that the money is just “plugging holes and slowing the bleeding.”