Cold War

Greenland, Nasa discovers US nuclear base under the ice by accident

The legendary Camp Century, an ultra-secret base active during the Cold War, has been found: it was to house nuclear missiles. Unbeknownst to Denmark

by Enrico Marro

16 May 2025

Una rara immagine della costruzione di Camp Century, base militare top secret Usa in Groenlandia durante la Guerra Fredda.

2' min read

Key points

Top Secret Base Camp Century
Project Iceworm missiles
Do you sell us Greenland?

2' min read

It was discovered a few weeks ago by ateam of scientists from NASA.

They were flying over Greenland, 205 kilometres northeast of the US military base at Pituffik, in the middle of the Arctic Circle. They were testing anew type of radar capable of 'seeing' through the ice.

When they spotted it, they could not believe their eyes: a network of interconnected tunnels, huge compartments, warehouses. Almost a mysterious alien civilisation, buried under thirty metres of Arctic ice cap.

Instead they are the frozen remains of a colossal abandoned American military base: Camp Century. The Cold War resurfacing from the ice.

The top secret Camp Century base

Incredulous NASA scientists had accidentally found the legendary ultrasecret base built by the United States in the 1950s and operational from 1959 to 1967. So secret that it only became public domain in 1996, thanks to the 'declassification' of highly confidential documents.

Twenty-one interconnected tunnels, three kilometres long in all, with living quarters, scientific laboratories, a canteen, even a nuclear reactor transported in great secrecy to Greenland to power the base.

Missiles of Project Iceworm

Camp Century wasthe outpost for the construction of the deadly 'Project Iceworm', i.e. the installation under the ice ofhundreds of American nuclear missiles, capable of surviving a hypothetical 'first strike' from Moscow by destroying the entire Soviet Union in retaliation.

Iceworm turned out to be a hole in the water (rather, in the ice): the Arctic ice cap was too unstable to house and launch missiles. In 1967, the reactor at Camp Century was dismantled in great secrecy and the base abandoned.

Nuclear bombs under the ice

But American nuclear bombs were not far away. In 1968, an accident to a B-52 strategic bomber revealed that the Americans had secretly hidden atomic weapons in the other Arctic base, that of Pituffik. Unbeknownst to Denmark.

Stories that tell well of the relationship between the two allies. Secrets jealously guarded by the Pentagon, despite the fact that Copenhagen had since as far back as 1951 entrusted the defence of Greenland to the United States, which had already occupied it during the Second World War to avoid German raids on the Allied supply routes to the Soviet Union.

You sell us Greenland?

More. In 1946 Washington even put 100 million dollars on the table to buy Greenland en bloc. An offer politely declined by Copenhagen. Proving that, when it comes to American expansionist impulses towards the North Pole, Trump has invented nothing.