The Russian president, however, claimed he was open to compromise, with the Kremlin calling on the US to join it in dividing up the natural resources for the two nations to share
Putin said the world should not take Trump’s comments lightly and claimed Moscow would be ready to protect its interests in the Arctic if NATO nations expand their territory in the region.
Greenland is already a part of NATO. The US owning it would not expand NATO territory.
I’m convinced that Trump only wants Greenland so that he has an even biglier piece of stolen land than Putin has with Ukraine. It’s all a tiny dick-measuring contest.
Putin realizes this fact and puts out a message like this to remind his subordinate (Trump) of his place.
I could be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure it's because, in spite of publicly denying its existence, they are very aware that climate change will make once difficult to tame lands very highly valuable in the near future. A good deal of all that ice and snow to the north will become much less of an issue within many of our lifetimes.