Inside the secret US military base hidden 100ft under Greenland

President Donald Trump has spent his first weeks on the office of calling for the United States to buy Greenland while refusing to exclude the possibility of military force – even when officials declare that the country is not for sale.

Trump claims the United States has to own Greenland to tackle the national security concerns – and this is not the first time that the country’s strategic significance has been the focus of the US military.

More than six decades ago, the US Army Corps of Engineers worked hard on a project in Greenland: Camp Century.

The project itself, which was put in a military base with two miles tunnels, was not entirely classified. Journalists were invited to visit the area and the army announced it as a nuclear power base, National Geographic Reports.

But hardly anyone known the truth: Camp Century also developed Project Iceworm, a network of complex tunnels and railway tracks that could house and transport some 600 nuclear missiles. These missiles could then be shot over the North Pole towards the Soviet Union.

Now new information about the mysterious base has emerged.

Why Camp Century was built – and why it was abandoned

Camp Century was built in 1959 and was in operation for seven years. The crew lived in extreme insulation, 127 miles away from other people, according to National Geographic.

The only way to reach the base was via sled – and strong snow, wind or freezing temperatures could make the journey difficult. But Austin Kovacs, an army research engineer who worked in Camp Century, said it never felt dangerous.

“People thought it was dangerous,” he said National Geographic. “And it wasn’t dangerous. It was comfortable. And at times it was very, very monotonous. “

The base was not only equipped with research facilities – it also included a clinic, a theater and a library, NPR Reports.

“We had everything you could imagine – light and warmth and all that kind of thing,” John Fresh, a soldier who visited Camp Century, told NPR. “It was cold. I mean, you know when you go down there you could feel it’s like going into a freezer. “

As for project worms, few were at – until years later. It was not until 1968 when an American jett -armed with nuclear bombs crashed that a study of American activity in Greenland was launched, NPR reports. The study revealed that the Danish Prime Minister had hidden approved project details.

While doing a good job of keeping the secret, however, the army planners calculated tremendous reality by building a base inside a glacier. The unpredictable nature of glaciers meant that steel courts could tighten due to the movement and missiles could overturn. Even the nuclear reactor itself was in danger when the ice during it changed, National Geographic Reports.

Eventually, the army officials admitted that this might not be the best idea and the nuclear reactor was shut down in 1963. In 1967, the camp had been completely abandoned.

In 1969 the camp was in ruins, National Geographic Reports, with snow spilled in in hallways and splintered wooden beams.

Modern insight into Camp Century

Scientists are still trying to put together everything that happened at the mysterious Greenland camp.

Last April, NASA scientist Chad Greene and his crew flew over Greenland as their radar unexpectedly picked up the century’s large network of tunnels under the ice.

“We were looking for the ice on the ice and Pops Camp’s century,” said Alex Gardner, a cryospheric scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in one declaration. “We didn’t know what it was at first.”

Their readings helped map the large buildings and times in Camp Century better than ever before. Now, after snow and ice continue to accumulate, the base is about 100ft beneath the surface.

“In the new data, individual structures in the secret city are visible in a way they have never been seen before,” Greene said.