President-elect Donald J. Trump said Tuesday that he would not rule out the use of military or economic coercion to force Panama to give up control of the canal America built more than a century ago and to force Denmark to sell Greenland to the United States.
In a rambling, hourlong news conference, Mr. Trump also reiterated his threat that “all hell will break out in the Middle East” if the hostages being held by Hamas are not released by Inauguration Day, repeating the threat four times.
“If they’re not back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East,” he told reporters. “And it will not be good for Hamas, and it will not be good, frankly, for anyone. All hell will break out. I don’t have to say anymore, but that’s what it is.”
Mr. Trump did not elaborate during the news conference, where he delivered a hodgepodge of grievances, complaints and false claims, from the Afghanistan withdrawal of 2021 to offshore drilling to the criminal cases against him and the size of his electoral victory.
He refused to rule out using military force to retake the Panama Canal, which was given back to Panama by treaty in the late 1990s, and Greenland, which Mr. Trump said was necessary for the national security of the United States.
“It might be that you’ll have to do something,” he said.
Trump’s desire to expand the U.S. footprint is entirely in keeping with his mind-set of making whatever he controls as big as possible, going back to his series of acquisitions in the late 1980s. In recent days, Mr. Trump has talked repeatedly about buying Greenland and taking over the Panama Canal.