Half of the Danes are personally willing to defend an attack on Denmark: "The Danes have realized that we are threatened."

A person is what they say.

Something else is what they actually do.

However, as recently as a month ago, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen declared in a Børsen interview (https://borsen.dk/nyheder/perspektiv/mette-frederiksen-taler-ud-hvis-det-sker-vil-jeg-ikke-vaere-statsminister-mere?b_source=borsen&b_medium=row_1&b_campaign=breaking_1) that she was willing to die for Denmark.

"Think, if Ukrainians weren't ready for it – and we honor them as our era's heroes," sounded from the prime minister.

The Democracy Perception Index 2025, conducted by Nira Data for the Alliance of Democracies, shows that nearly half of Danish respondents are willing to fight for Denmark.

So, 48 percent of the surveyed Danes answered yes to the question of whether they personally would fight to defend Denmark if Denmark was attacked by a foreign power.

20 percent answered no, and the rest are unsure.

Former defense and justice minister and current political commentator Hans Engell has read the survey, and it makes him partly "depressed," but also optimistic about how high Danish citizens' willingness to fight compares to like-minded allies on a European level.

"Danish citizens have become aware that we are threatened," says Hans Engell and expands on the European data:

"But generally, the willingness to stand up for one's own country's defense is not great. It is not numbers that are deeply impressive."

The survey, conducted in April in connection with the Copenhagen Democracy Summit, shows that the readiness to fight among the population of heavyweights such as Germany, France, Spain, and Italy is significantly lower than in Denmark.

For example, only 26 percent of the French respondents answered yes to the question of whether they are willing to defend their country in the event of an attack.

Therefore, the Scandinavians are among the most willing populations in all of Europe, and for example, 55 percent of Norwegians answered yes to the question of whether they are willing to defend Norway if the country is attacked.

-------------------------

A cohesive society

-------------------------

The world is in the degree of disintegration, and it has been so increasingly in recent years.

For example, Donald Trump's return to the White House, according to critics, has directly destabilized the cohesion within NATO. This has happened while the war between Ukraine and Russia, which began less than three and a half years ago, is still ongoing.

And yet, the Military Intelligence Service (FE) warns here at home that the threat picture (https://www.fe-ddis.dk/da/nyheder/2024/trusselsbilledet-mod-danmark-er-blevet-mere-alvorligt/) against Denmark has become more serious.

"Most people are aware that the democratic society is under heavy pressure, and that the threat to the West has taken on a completely different character," says Hans Engell.

And it is precisely this that the numbers reflect when the survey shows that almost half of Danish citizens themselves are ready to defend Denmark if Denmark is attacked, adds the political commentator, who believes that the effect can be seen in several places.

"Access to the Home Guard has not been greater in many, many years, and in tandem with the military receiving more equipment, more barracks being put into service, and an increased level of activity with better exercises, I actually think that the military will be able to attract a lot of people."

Morten Frederiksen, dean of social sciences at Roskilde University, was behind the Danish Values Survey – a part of a larger survey that examined values among populations in several different countries.

He is generally not surprised by the Danish citizens' willingness to defend Denmark against an attack.

"And in reality, it could have been higher. It is an extreme situation to be put in, so despite the fact that war is not deeply rooted in us, it does not surprise me, as we are a society with relatively high national pride," says Morten Frederiksen.

An expression such as national pride is also an expression that one would normally be able to attach to examples such as France, where the combat spirit is significantly lower, but the dean emphasizes that Denmark is more patriotic than nationalistic.

And that can be one of the reasons for the Danish respondents' answers, he assesses, who calls Denmark a "community-oriented, strongly bonded society."

"Even though Danes are individualists in the same way, we are tied together by a common welfare state and a series of values that we go around and imagine that we share with each other. It is things that are with helping to strengthen the fact that one is willing to defend one's community," he says and adds:

"If polarization leads to the fact that one does not feel that the community one lives in is one's own, and that could certainly be said about a part of the French population, then it will certainly go beyond the willingness to defend."

------------------

"Very depressing"

------------------

In June, the absolute top of NATO met for a meeting in The Hague, where the nations agreed to give five percent of their respective GDP to defense.

In Denmark, there is generally strong support for spending money on defense, but it is not everywhere.

"All in all, the picture looks very sensible, but when I look around in Europe, it is not particularly encouraging. It is very depressing to see how large European countries such as Germany, Spain, France, and Italy are low in this survey," says Hans Engell.

For example, only a small minority of 30 percent of Spaniards in the Democracy Perception Index 2025 answered that they are willing to increase their defense budget, even if it will cost higher taxes or lower public spending.

The unwillingness came particularly to the fore when Spain announced just before the NATO summit that it would opt out of spending five percent of GDP on defense.

According to Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, two percent is "compatible with the welfare state," he told Reuters.

This is an example of how, according to Hans Engell, it is the responsibility of European politicians that the support of their populations to fight for their own respective countries is so low in the large European nations.

For according to him, the European top politicians have not been able to engage their citizens in the importance of the issue, and the measurement is, says the political commentator, in the degree a "warning" to the European politicians.

"There should not be many swings before the support drops sharply. If the numbers are not higher in a high-tension period like the current one, how will they look in a more peaceful world," asks Hans Engell.

Warning: This article was translated by a Large Language Model, in case of doubt, you can always visit the original source.