TEL AVIV, ISRAEL. 18 APRIL 2025, 18:36 IST.
Continuing on from last week’s issue “The top 3 watches to steal land with right now“ we shift our focus to the Nordic reaches, where America’s destiny is being outsourced manifested by other brave pioneers - with perfect timekeeping precision.
The following report was recovered from a diplomatic pouch intercepted en route to the U.S. embassy in Reykjavik. Its author, listed simply as “Operation Greenlight, Agency Observer,” was last seen boarding a freighter headed west from Thule.
THE NORDIC SPRING
CHEEKY COUP IN GREENLAND, INNIT
“When all this is over… I’m gonna open a Nando’s here.”
- Pioneer: Team leader, ‘Task Force Greenpeace’
- Watch: Tudor North Flag
- Reference: 91210N-0001
- RRP: Discontinued, available on secondary for <$3k
You didn’t see yourself blowing up Danish military personnel when you graduated from Oxford. You weren’t told it would be like this.
You glance away from your binoculars to check your Tudor North Flag for the third time this minute. The titanium timepiece was presented to you in an elaborate ceremony yesterday night by the company commander.
“Young Brits like you wore Tudor watches during the North Greenland Expedition in the ‘50s,” he’d said with slow reverence as a costumed troupe of minstrels banged out Greensleeves from the far end of the tent. “It’s only fitting that you wear one as we cleanse this same land of Danish tyranny.”
The lumed tip of the seconds hand sweeps silently across the dial, glowing dully in the dusk light. T minus three minutes until Operation Greenlight.
Listening to music is strictly against the rules on a mission like this (or on any mission actually) but you’re Team Leader, innit. You pop the AirPods in and play American Idiot by Greenday, hoping in vain that your heady nostalgia for the 2000s will somehow ease the horrifying reality that you’re about to trigger mass bloodshed and don’t have a clue what you’re doing.
It’s no use. The dread rising from your stomach and spreading through your limbs is impossible to smother. You’re in so far over your head you can barely breathe. Every second brings you closer to the possibility of death or imprisonment, maybe even an update gap on LinkedIn.
You reach into the pocket of your khaki fatigues for your weatherproof cocaine pouch. Just a little sniff. To calm your nerves. You’ve got time — you’ve got three minutes. Sod it, maybe a bigger one. This place is about to explode, who cares anyway?
You scoop out a heroic mound of powder with a spent rifle cartridge and hoover it up; the panic crushing your chest lifts slightly. As the burning sensation in your nostril wanes, you reach a rare moment of lucidity: How on God’s green earth did you end up here?
Your Oxford PPE degree was meant to give you elite access to the Western establishment. The keys to the kingdom. Permission to rinse the taxpayer, snort the desiccated remains of the British Empire.
But following a short-lived internship with Sir Philip Green and a similarly terminal role assisting David Cameron at Greensill Capital, things weren’t turning out as planned.
You tried out for the green berets while doing a part-time MBA at Green Templeton College and got pretty far through commando training, but then you got a greenstick fracture and the doctor discovered you were using Bavarian marching powder to get you through the long slogs.
Down in the dumps back home in Greenwich, you read Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey and made a conscious decision to say ‘yes’ to more opportunities in your everyday life. One thing lead to another at a Greene King pub in St James, and before you knew it you were cheering on the Greenbay Packers with a South African working in private security who said he could help you out.
“I’ll have a couple greenbacks sliding your way bru — no stress.”
He introduces you to his boss at the Ritz by Green Park the week after, a burly US military bloke straight out of a Graham Greene novel. He runs a mercenary outfit called Greenwater out of Dubai (a spin-off from his previous firm in North Carolina apparently). According to their website they ‘secure the green revolution’ by protecting mineral supply chains in Africa, but it soon becomes clear that they’ll secure anything of any colour if it means getting paid.
Passing you a Greenalls gin & tonic he says he’s recruiting - needs some ‘little green men’ for a job in Scandinavia. But I’m six foot three, you say. He laughs.
“You really are a greenhorn, ain’tcha son? Heh. Also - you’re five foot ten, max. Now let me tell you about this little patch of earth called Greenland…”
What’s on offer is an executive position at a Rare Earth processing plant they plan to build there, a stake in a bitcoin mine, and a clifftop house overlooking both complete with Ikea furniture and DVD box sets of The Bridge, The Killing, Wallander, Borgen, Bordertown and The Valhalla Murders. They’ll even throw in the complete works of Stieg Larsson (albeit second hand). It’s enough to make the toffs at Balliol alumni dinners green with envy.
All you have to do in exchange, is lead a blitzkrieg assault against a NATO ally complete with war crimes.
With practised cool, you suavely tucked a pouch of Oden’s Wintergreen chewing tobacco behind your lip and asked him for more details. Don’t rush to accept; let them come to you, you repeated in your head, recalling The Art of Seduction by Robert Greene.
Over a pint of Green Mark vodka he explained the strategy. Everything Danish on the island has been rigged with explosives. Your job is to start the fireworks show and lead a team of other sensitive young men to wipe out the survivors. You’ll be focusing on anyone in Danish uniform but have also been given carte blanche to deal ‘in absolute terms’ with any civilian that doesn’t look happy to be liberated.
Nobody will know your allegiance or home nation thanks to a diverse and inclusive range of equipment. The explosives are Indian, your uniforms are blank Russian, and your Chinese rifles are loaded with Green Tip ammo from Pakistan, while Irish football anthem ‘We are the boys in green’ will be played at max volume overhead by the helicopters providing close air support.
(The Danish Navy will be unable to intervene - some bloke called ‘Captain Titanic’ filled them up with Premium Unleaded instead of Marine Gas at the pump last week.)
A communications outage (to be blamed later on DEI hiring practices in the Danish army) will prevent any SOS signals reaching neighbouring countries. Instead, a carefully curated collection of shaky portrait-mode smartphone videos filmed three weeks ago in Alaska will be leaked to the international media showing militants with no insignia storming ‘Danish’ barracks.
To justify American intervention, the media will assume the aggressors are backed by an undefined nation state. Speculation will run rampant, with news anchors and politicos discussing what ambitions the Congolese might have in the region, or if this is the remnant of a Wagner unit that got lost years ago and thinks it’s in Ukraine.
(Weeks after the dust has settled, it will be concluded that this was a radical Greenlandic independence militia - the Great Revolutionary Emancipation of the Eternal North - which never would have existed if Adolescence on Netflix had been screened in Greenlandic schools.)
With Danish forces clearly useless at defending Greenland, the US Marine Corps - conveniently stationed nearby - will rush in to ‘stabilize’ the situation and (permanently) occupy the island. Your heroic actions will lay the foundation for another US Overseas Territory - maybe even Greenlandic statehood.
The proposition was compelling, but you were on the fence for several days. The operation clashes with a Ceelo Green concert you bought tickets for ages ago, and the carbon emissions from the explosives would violate the principles of the Green Giving pledge you made on social media last year (your ex made you sign it).
Then a woman came to your hotel room with a bottle of Johnny Walker Green Label and an eight ball of coke, and asked if there was anything she could do to assist your decision making.
She was exactly your type - a spitting image of Eva Green - and you were struck wordless by her beauty as she stood in the doorway before you rallied your confidence and boldly declared that yes, you would be willing to start an illegal war and murder civilians, if they sweetened the deal with a signed Haaland shirt.
You check your Tudor again, your wrist trembling slightly. One minute to go.
It may just be the narcotics that the same brunette succubus has been happily plying you with since you signed on the dotted line, but you have a paranoid suspicion that you’re being set up as a patsy for a different plan altogether.
The commander accidentally added you to a groupchat called ‘Cleanup’, then removed you before you could read anything. Then you overheard one of the higher-ups laugh and refer to you as ‘Oswald’ when he thought you were out of earshot.
And you’re pretty sure you saw a sniper team setting up at a vantage point overlooking your position two hours ago, but command says there’s nobody there.
As the seconds tick down to T minus zero however, a different thought keeps pressing to the front of your mind:
If you’re so important to this operation, why didn’t they give you a proper Rolex?
Until next time,
Jim Hawkins
The Treasure Island Times
🕰️ Coming up next week: Sand, Blood, Oil and Time
A Chinese admiral, a Russian accountant, and a Venezuelan communist walk into a Rolex AD. Who walks out with a steel Daytona?