The Rest Is Classified - 22. Why Trump Wants Greenland: Secret Bases, The Arctic Circle, and Project Iceworm (Ep 1)

Episode Date: February 24, 2025

Donald Trump has made it clear that he wants Greenland, but why? What is it about this largely barren, ice-covered island that extends well into the Arctic circle that he so desires? And how far back does this interest go? Filled with rare minerals that are becoming increasingly valuable due to modern technology, critically placed for access to Arctic sea lanes, and home to key US military infrastructure, Greenland is of major security importance. But this importance stretches back into the 20th century. Listen as David and Gordon discuss the secret history of Greenland and all the bizarre events of the 20th century that have led to it being on Donald Trump’s wishlist. ------------------- Order a signed edition of David's latest book, The Seventh Floor, via this link. ------------------- Get our exclusive NordVPN deal here ➼ www.nordvpn.com/restisclassified It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! Email: [e-mail] Twitter: @triclassified Assistant Producer: Becki Hills Producer: Callum Hill Senior Producer: Dom Johnson Exec Producer: Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TD Direct Investing offers live support. So whether you're a newbie or a seasoned pro, you can make your investing steps count. And if you're like me and think a TFSA stands for total fund savings adventure, maybe reach out to TD Direct Investing. Well, we need Greenland for national security purposes. I've been told that for a long time, long before I even ran. I mean, people have been talking about it for a long time.

You have approximately 45,000 people there. People don't really even know if Denmark has an illegal right to it. But if they do, they should give it up because we need it for national security. That's for the free world. I'm talking about protecting the free world. You don't even need binoculars. Look outside, you have China, ships all over the place. You have Russian ships all over the place. We're not letting that happen. We're not letting it happen. And if Denmark wants to get to a conclusion, but nobody knows if they have any right title or interest, the people are going to probably vote for independence or to

come into the United States. But if they did do that, then I would tear off Denmark at a very high level. Well, welcome to The Rest is Classified. I'm they did do that, then I would tear off Denmark at a very high level. Well, welcome to The Rest is Classified. I'm David McCloskey. And I'm Gordon Carrera. And that, very unsurprisingly, was US President Donald Trump, then President-elect Trump speaking to reporters before his inauguration about Gordon, his desire for the ultimate deal

to buy the largest island in the world, an ice planet known as Greenland. That's right. You didn't quite do the full Trump accent. I was slightly disappointed. I have a terrible track record of accents on this show and Trump is not in my repertoire, my very limited repertoire. And I should also say that if anyone who might be watching, they'll notice David is in a thick coat, even though you're in Texas. I am. Because it is Greenlandic in Texas where you

are right now. Is that right? It's Greenlandic in Texas. It is 15 degrees Fahrenheit, Gordon. It is snowing outside in Texas and I'm in my small studio, which does not have very powerful heat. And it is Greenlandic in here, Gordon. The temperature, it is like the Arctic Circle. So, I'm fully in character for today's episode. Yeah, well, perfect. Because what we're doing is we're going to have a look at Greenland and Greenland has been in the news recently, thanks to Donald Trump, perhaps in a way it hasn't normally been talked about.

One of the questions is why is Donald Trump talking about it? And obviously there's lots of theories and we're going to look at some of that. But we're also going to give the rest is classified take on why Greenland matters, why Trump might have it in his eye for a deal. By looking at the slightly secret history of Greenland, including stories of secret under ice bases and nuclear weapons crashes, I think we can probably shed a quite interesting light on actually why Greenland is in the news and why it's actually a lot more interesting and nuclear weapons crashes. I think we can probably shed a quite interesting light on actually why Greenland is in the news

and why it's actually a lot more interesting and important than people might realize. Well, and Gordon, you have a personal history on Greenland, is that right? You have scouted out your second home on Greenland before the Americans could go settle it, isn't that right? Yeah, that's right. Before Don Jr. turned up in his jet, as he did a few weeks ago in Greenland.

Trump Force One, Gordon landing in Greenland to go scout out the new frontier. I was ahead of them. I was ahead of them looking at the place. The advance party. Yeah, not for the Trump deals. So I went about a decade and a half ago, specifically looking at a US military base, which is right at the top of the world. And we're going to tell a story about some of the amazing things that have happened there,

which are relevant to why Greenland is important today and why you hear Donald Trump kind of talk in quite vague terms about the national security importance of it and its role securing the free world. And I think the backstory is fascinating and really explains that because there has been a bit of confusion, hasn't there, about why Greenland's in the news and why is it in the sights of President Trump? I guess the news, it's kind of this classic Trumpian thing, right? Where I guess the headlines essentially are, this guy wants to buy Greenland, right?

Now there's a long history of, which we'll'll talk about of trying to buy Greenland So he's not and in a lot of other properties in the Arctic So he's not you know sort of not a historical, but it sounds completely sort of mad I think in our modern context But it does if you kind of scratch below the surface of why is he talking about this and by the way He first proposed this in his first term, So this is kind of, this is an idea that's got some legs in Trump world. But as you dig into it, there are really, I think important strategic interests

that the US has, the broader kind of West has in Greenland, which are very fascinating. And there's a bunch of layers to this, but I guess we could start with maybe the geography, which is as the Arctic has gotten warmer, Greenland, more and more of the sea around it is open for longer periods of the year. And you actually have shipping lanes

that 25 years ago basically didn't exist that are now open for several months during the year that allow the Russians to ship things into the Atlantic, to ship things to China and have created kind of another set of sea lanes essentially at the top of the world. Yeah, that's right. And I think global warming is definitely one part of that. And climate change, another part is climate change is also making some of the natural resources on Greenland more accessible, which is another one

of the kind of narratives you hear about Donald Trump. And the reason is it's all about kind of getting hold of those critical minerals, the oil and gas that might be there, which are suddenly becoming more accessible. That being another kind of key reason for the interest there. You know, one of the things that I think is fascinating about the Arctic is that, you know, we're all sort of brought up on maps of the world that do not, I mean, I guess, how would you even describe how they picture or show the Arctic? I mean, it's kind of, it's a flat projection, right? And so you're kind of looking at the world and thinking, well, the top of Russia and the top of Canada or North America, they can look quite far from each other.

And yet if you create a map that has the North Pole at its center and look at the world that way, you know, almost like you'd think about a map of the Mediterranean, right? All of a sudden, the US and Russia are quite close to each other. And I think the way maybe it's helpful to think about Greenland in some ways is that it's kind of the Alaska of the Atlantic. It's a beachhead for the US that sticks way up north into the Arctic, that sticks out in the Atlantic and provides a kind of almost hemispheric defense of our eastern seaboard. And in fact, when Monroe promulgated his famous doctrine, Gordon, Greenland was included,

you know, as sort of part of the US sphere of influence. So, you know, there's a US general that put it this way with sort of the Arctic getting warmer, it's no longer a fortress wall up North and the oceans aren't moats, they're actually avenues of approach. And so there's opportunity and vulnerability because of Greenland's geography. That's right. And I think all of that suggests that Greenland

is actually not marginal. It's not on the corner of a map, but it's actually of real strategic and military importance. And there are lots of these places around the world, which people don't quite understand why they're so important. I mean, Diego Garcia, the Chagos Islands have been in the news here recently in the UK because the UK controls them, but there's a big US airbase on them. And they're another example of a place which seems incredibly remote, but is actually strategically important. I think that's definitely the case when it comes to Greenland. So let's just do a little bit about Greenland itself.

I mean, it's a huge landmass, but it actually has a population of around 60,000, not 45,000, as Donald Trump said. Sorry to fact check the president of the United States. Most of that population are Inuit. So these are people who came over, I think originally more from Canada many centuries ago, but there's only one person for every 15 square miles. So the place is mainly ice,

and the people live on a few remote communities, basically on the coast, which are habitable. It's called Greenland, bit of history, because a Norse murderer called Erik the Red got exiled from Iceland. And he got exiled from Iceland to Greenland, which wasn't called Greenland then,

but he wanted to entice other people to come settle on this new place by calling it the Greenland, which wasn't called Greenland then, but he wanted to entice other people to come settle on this new place by calling it the Greenland, which was obviously a lie. Sounds nice when you're coming from Iceland. Yeah. Yeah. So it's the first good example of a kind of real estate or an estate agent overselling the property, I think. It's downright Trumpian, Gordon, right off the bat.

Then you get these Norse settlements for a while. They come and then they go. It's under Norwegian control. And then with an alliance with Denmark, it comes under Danish control and becomes a Danish colony. Now zooming forward to the 20th century. So it's it's under Danish control. World War Two, Denmark is occupied by the Nazis. We skipped a lot of history there, Gordon. We did. We're not the rest is history. We'll leave that to Tom and Dom. We went about 1000 years. We did we're not the rest is history. We'll leave that to Tom and Dom. We went about a thousand years Yeah, let's get let's get to the classified stuff

So this is actually World War two where the connections with the US kind of really start because it becomes a refueling base a weather Station which is pretty important in the war. It's got mines which the US is gonna defend and so the US kind of Treats it almost as a protector at, something it's going to kind of defend while Denmark is occupied. There's also this critical thing called the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap, which is a kind of a choke point. And it's nice to hear the UK is critical, but which leads between the Arctic and the Atlantic. And in World War II, this was pretty important to control that, to stop, you know, German U-boats getting through. And it's still, it's still important.

So, you know, once you get to the end of the war, that's one of the many times when the US think we fancy a bit of Greenland. We'd quite like to kind of keep that. It's the Alaska of the Atlantic, Gordon. It is. I'll keep saying it. I mean, it really is, you know, it matters, right? It matters to US national security.

So of course we try to buy it. Yeah. So 1867, the US aboard Alaska from the Russians. Weird thing, isn't it? I mean, that's the other story. About $7 million. Great deal. And they tried. I think they looked at Greenland at the time. They look again in the 20s and the 30s. They look again at the end of the Second World War. The Danes don't want to sell it. But then this is the kind of key moment, I guess, where the Cold War starts and where we get to the kind of classified secret bit of our story. Because 1949, Denmark joins NATO and the Arctic is becoming strategically important in a way that it wasn't in the past. And again, your point about geography really matters in this. And as you said, it's that idea that you have to see the world as a globe and the fact that the shortest line between the new two superpowers, the US and the Soviet Union, if you want to fly a bomber or launch a missile, is basically over the North Pole to the middle of each country.

And so actually, Greenland is bang in the middle of that. And so the US already realizes at the very start of the Cold War that Greenland's significant. 1951 they signed a deal to build a base in a place called Tule. Tule. That's my Inuit pronunciation. You can correct it. If you speak Inuit, do you want to reveal that now? No, no, I'm gonna, I'm gonna sandbag you on the Inuit later and really, really entrap you. But isn't Tule, isn't it the company that makes those, you know, gear carriers that go on top of cars or that it's a brand or something like that? That's where I've seen, that's where I've seen the name before. Yeah. So Tulay is at the very top, north west coast of Greenland. So, you know, right up in the Arctic circle. Yeah. The name actually becomes kind of

ultimate Tulay becomes this idea of this, the most remote place possible. And so I actually becomes kind of Ultima Tule, becomes this idea of this the most remote place possible. And so I think for kind of people who are into the wilderness or trekking or everything else that that's where the kind of brand name I think comes from the idea of this being the most remote place you could get to. During the war, it's a weather station that the US uses. But then in 1951, they decide to build this big base. They relocate the Inuit inhabitants about 60 miles north to a town called Canak. I think that's my Inuit pronunciation.

That's good pronunciation. Solid B+. The key point about this base is it's the closest you can get to the North Pole, where you can still be resupplied by ship for a few weeks in the summer when the ice melts. So it's basically as far north as you can get, you know, to build a runway and a base, which is what the US is going to do. Well, again, I think listeners would be also surprised if they just, if you looked at a map that pinned the North Pole at its center, just how much further toward that pole, the northernmost part of Greenland, where Tule is, juts up. You do not

appreciate that if you look at it just a flat map of the world, I think. You don't see it, but it is literally like a kind of almost a knife pointing up toward Russia, right, which provides so much of the strategic advantages that we're going to talk about. Yeah. So they build this huge runway here at the base. And originally the idea is they're going to use about. Yeah. So they build this huge runway here at the base. And originally, the idea is they're going to be used as a refuel point, a stopping point for long-range bombers. But actually, soon the distance bombers can fly missiles.

I mean, they don't necessarily need to be landing them there. But the base is still vital. And the other aspect of it, beyond actually having a landing strip there, is the fact that the geography allows you to build a radar there. Now this is the really kind of fascinating bit about it is that in 1961 the US builds a huge radar to detect Soviet missile launchers and bombers coming over the North Pole. And it's the one part of what's called the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System, BEMUSE, which is designed to give a kind of 15 minute warning that World War Three is coming,

you know, and it transmits that to NORAD, Cheyenne Mountain. Have you seen War Games? Do you remember that? Is that before your time, Phil? No. When? The film War Games? Educate me. No, no, no. I have not seen it. Classic 80s Matthew Broderick hacker. you've got to watch it, hacks into the kind of the NORAD computer to play games, but accidentally nearly starts World War Three. But anyway, that's all to do with NORAD detecting early missile launches. And interesting enough, so Tule is one of the sites, they've got another site in Alaska, and then the third site, interesting enough, in the UK, in Yorkshire. For those who wonder what some of the big radar domes are in a place called Filingdale's in Yorkshire,

well, the origins of it are the radars as part of this ballistic missile early warning system. So, if you've got Alaska, you've got Yorkshire, and you've got Greenland, you've kind of got a triangle which covers all the directions. Iron triangle. To look for those Soviet missiles. Built in 61, still, you know, a very important radar, you know, transport. I love the fact it's been transferred, the control of it though, to the Space Force. US Space Force.

That's right. And renamed, right? It's no longer Dule. It's Pitufik. Pitufik. Which is the local name so I think that's a nod to the community which might have been displaced. But yeah it's still part of this kind of missile defense and space surveillance mission for the US up there at that base.

And Gordon you have wandered around Pitufik, isn't that right? And I've actually been to the radar itself, which is, I mean, so I went to the base, as I said, 2008. I went in September. It was balmy, right? I would describe it. So it wasn't entirely ice covered. It was a kind of Martian landscape, mainly kind of bits of ice, rocky. It was weird because it's light through most of the night at that point. So you can kind of get up at two in the morning and it's light. You still have, as you go around Greenland, even at that time, the kind of sense of disorientation,

which comes from, you know, the sun not really going down. You'll see these icebergs in the distance, which are actually like enormous. And you'll hear like a crack of thunder, which is an iceberg kind of breaking off the ice shelf and moving away. I mean, it is the strangest of breaking off the ice shelf of moving away. I mean, it is the strangest, most unreal place I think I've ever been.

The most random piece, and really, I think, most essential bit of research that I did for this episode was to determine that most of the icebergs in the North Atlantic cav off of Greenland. Yeah. And so Greenland sunk the Titanic, Gordon, which is a bit of a unknown sort of, I think, con in the sort of Greenland, you know, pro-con sheet. It's a decided negative.

But yeah, all of the icebergs in the North Atlantic come off of these kind of ice fjords in Greenland and then float south and sink and sink large passenger ships. So you've got this wild kind of cedary, and then you've got a US military base where they've got a bar which does karaoke and serves pizza, you know, in that, it's like an American base, and you've been to American bases.

They all kind of like try and transfer a little bit of America to wherever they are so that people can feel at home. They have a mile high club, is that right? A top of the world club, David. Oh, top of the world club, okay. Slightly different. Yeah, the other thing, Gordon,

I did some more research on this base and I had a question for you, which is when you were at Toulay, which direction did your compass point? Ah, yeah. Do you know? I cannot remember, but I remember everything going wild. You didn't bring a compass?

No, I didn't. I'm not an explorer. I would have thought on your Arctic expedition you would have brought a compass. Is that to do with the magnetic North Pole as to the real North Pole and things like that, isn't it? Your compass will basically point west. Right. Because that's where the magnetic North Pole is relative to Tule. And the other great bit here that I found is, do you remember when you opened an exterior door,

when someone opened an exterior door, whether they pushed the handle down or up? No, 15 years ago, I don't remember. Go on. They go up. And do you know why? Most handles, you know, you push it down. Yeah. Polar bears. So if you push, basically the idea of being the bear probably won't lift the handle, but it might like lean into the door and push the handle down and then get access to the base. Polar bears can't lift, that's what you're telling me. Yes.

That is something you, I bet your listeners were not expecting to learn that from today's show. Full of all kinds of wonderful facts. I guess it's the only or maybe one of the few bases in the world where you do have to think about protection from bears, polar bears in particular. The other weird thing was we didn't go to the radar and we drove towards the radar and I just remember the car kind of making these buzzing and popping sounds as you got close to the radar and the controls on the dashboard literally started having a life of their own

and the electrics of the car were clearly being frazzled by this radar. It was like an X-Files episode, another reference not sure you'll get. Oh, I get that. You get that. What happened to your pacemaker? Nothing, thank you, David. Gordon's pacemaker went haywire. I do not have a pacemaker before you ask.

You're being mischievous, trying to throw me. But anyway, so the radar itself is this kind of weird place where they're looking for stuff coming from space or over from the Soviet Union. Strange, strange place. Although that is not even the strangest thing that's ever been around that base. This is my favourite story. Before we get to the kind of story of a lost nuclear bomb, is a place called Camp Century, which I didn't visit because it's not there anymore. But it's about 150 miles from Tule and the US built in the way only the US could have

done in the Cold War, a under ice base in the middle of nowhere called Camp Century in 1959. It's got real Bond villain vibes to it, doesn't it? It's totally Bond villain. Although I have to say, Calum, our producer said it's more like the rebel base at Hoth in The Empire Strikes Back. Star Wars fan, David? Yeah.

Oh yeah, no, no. I actually was, I was trying to remember the name of the ice monster that captures Luke Skywalker and takes him to his cave. And I couldn't, so I had to look it up, but it's a Wampa. Okay. So you'd have, this was a, this would have been one of the, if you've seen the movie, as most listeners probably have, Empire Strikes Back, the vibes here, Gordon, would have been decidedly ice cavey. Yeah.

You would have had sort of giant yeti-like things running around. It was great. And they have a barbershop, apparently. Well, I guess where else? You can't leave to get your haircut anywhere else, right? Barbershop, chapel, theater, dormitories, the largest walk-in freezer. The whole thing's a walk-in freezer, right? Which I kind of think is a bit redundant anyway, which is why you need largest walk-in freezer. The whole thing's a walk-in freezer, right? Which I kind of think is a bit redundant anyway, which is why you need a walk-in freezer in

the middle of the ice. And a nuclear reactor. So to power it all, they shipped in a nuclear reactor. What's really interesting about this space is the base itself is not secret. So they actually have Walter Cronkite, the kind of US newsman, and some boy scouts come and visit it. And it's all to kind of the cover story, and it is a cover story is that this is a research base looking at survival in the Arctic, and even you know, climate change, how it's adapting. And that's also what

they tell the Danish government, of course, whose land it is. But actually, David, there was a darker secret to it. Obviously, there's a giant, you know, sort of like subterranean ice world. It's definitely has a dark secret. Project Iceworm. Oh, that's a great name. It's a good name. That's a great name. I'm looking for titles for my next book. That's going to be it. That's on the list. Which again, this is nutty bond stuff, which you couldn't believe really happened, but they're trying to work out whether you could have a secret network of nuclear missiles under the ice in Greenland, which would allow the US to hit the Soviet Union back if the Soviet Union has launched a first strike on the United States.

In other words, the Soviets blow up continental US, but secretly the US has 600 nuclear missiles in tunnels. The idea would have been moving along train tracks under the Greenland ice sheet, ready to pop up and launch at the Soviet Union in retaliation. Makes sense to this US taxpayer. Let's do it. But they never did. They actually put nukes there? No, they kind of they gave up. That's disappointing. Yeah, it is disappointing.

But basically, they realized you could put longer range missiles in hardened silos in the US, and you could use submarine launch missiles, and they would all give you the ability to survive a first strike without having to kind of use the Greenland base. But you know, there's this idea. So it's, you know, even back in the 60s, that Greenland could be a kind of a massive nuclear missile base. And eventually they abandoned it in 1966. And one of the reasons is the ice is crushing Camp Century.

It's moving and it's crushing the walls. And they realized basically this is not going to work. So it was abandoned just like the Hoth base. Exactly. Callum's analogy holds on multiple levels. Yeah, but there weren't attacks kind of attacking it. Anyway, it's a bit different. Well, okay. So we have Greenland set up as a giant island of strategic importance to the United States. It is pointed right at Russia. It allows us to monitor. I mean, this radar, Gordon, that you went

to that maybe fried your ability to do math because it's so powerful, it can apparently see something moving the size of like a tennis ball 3000 miles away. So this is a very serious real deal radar. So we've got the radar there. We're watching the Soviet Union. There's a bunch of important minerals on Greenland. Greenland. It's pointed right at the heart of Moscow. And critically, a nuclear bomber is going to experience some real trouble above Greenland. In the 1960s, when we come back, we're going to tell the story of a broken arrow in the heart of Greenland. See you after the break. All right, well, welcome back.

We are telling the secret history of Greenland on The Rest Is Classified. And Gordon, we are now at a point in the Cold War where things are going to get very, very hot on Greenland very quickly, aren't they? That's right. So this early Cold War period, as we were talking about, the US is still really fearing a kind of Soviet first strike. And so Strategic Air Command, which does the kind of US nuclear posture from 1958, starts running something called Chrome Dome missions. Great name.

Every day, 12 B-52 bombers armed with thermonuclear bombs go on 24-hour sorties over the kind of northern and southern part of the Atlantic. And the idea is that they are ready to drop the bomb on the Soviet Union. So the idea is if the Soviets launch a strike, these planes are constantly in the air, permanently carrying the weapons, just waiting for the go code to say go drop the bomb. What could go wrong? What could go wrong? What could go wrong? We're flying a giant super fortress above the North Pole with, you know, a handful of

thermonuclear weapons on it. What's interesting is Thule is particularly important to the base because they've worked out that the first thing the Soviets would do if they were about to launch a war would be to destroy the radar because the radar is going to give the US early warning. So actually one general tells Congress, I like to tell the commander at Tule that he will be probably one of the first ones to go if we get into a war, but there's one thing I would like to know from him and that's when we went. And so basically the crucial thing they want to know is if the comms go down from the base up there at the top of Greenland, is it because a war started? So from 1961 they

changed the route of one of the chrome dome missions so that one of the B-52s is permanently over the base. And so it's basically an airborne monitor over the radar site at Thule and ready to watch in case it's destroyed and report back immediately. I mean, it's kind of crazy. But January 21st, 1968, a B-52 is on one of these missions. The mission is codenamed Junkie 14. It's a good name. The Arctic sort of naming convention thing is working on this episode, I think. And so many years later, I actually interviewed two of the pilots who'd been on that mission, Junkie 14. The commander was a guy called John Hawke, and John was the kind of quiet, quite laid back, you know, even later in life, you could tell he was the kind of senior guy,

the commander. The other guy I interviewed, and we brought them back together, was a guy called Joe DiMario. He was the co-pilot, slightly more voluble character. He'd learned to fly age 16 in Maryland. He'd done Air Force combat missions in Korea. By the time you get to 1968, these are actually two pretty experienced pilots who are flying that day. Even though we talked to them 40 years after the mission, they could still remember every detail of what flying that day. And you know, even though we talked to them 40 years after the mission, I mean, they could still remember every detail of what happened that day. Which is going to make sense once we tell the story. Once tell the story. It's one of those days that just sort of fades away, you know, into the recesses of your

memory. So they leave New York from where they're flying from on a kind of crisp clear morning and they head over to Greenland and they're going to fly over the radar in a kind of bow tie pattern, which I guess is the way of circling around it. 24-hour mission carrying four nuclear weapons. The autopilot wasn't working, so they're flying by hand. It's already a bad start, but they refuel. It sounds crazy, but neither they nor the refueling tanker had autopilot. John Hawke, who's the pilot pilot is having to kind of hold the two You know the two planes close together enough to refuel in the air for half an hour

And even though he's wearing this kind of thick suit He's drenched in sweat by the end having done it. Joe DiMario is one of two co-pilots He takes his turn in the the co-pilot seat to give the other guy a break cruising at 30,000 feet and now over Greenland Unsurprisingly, perhaps it's really cold. It's 30,000 feet and now over Greenland, unsurprisingly perhaps, it's really cold. It's 30,000 feet, it's over Greenland, it's January. It's January, it's cold. It's colder than Texas is today, I think. Colder than Texas, yeah, you would need one of these coats that I have on here. They had an extra heating system to deliver some extra heat which you could turn on when the main heating system didn't work and that brought in hot air from the engine compressors.

Now what could go wrong? What could go wrong? Are you getting a sense of impending doom? So Jojo Mario switches that on and you've got to kind of regulate it, turn it up and down how much hot air you're allowing in. First thing they smell, burning rubber. Interestingly enough, what sort of triggers the potential doom here are and I think this is the technical term, ass cushions,

right? Because these guys are sitting in the plane. I mean, they're up there for 30 hours or something like that. Yeah, at least 24 hours at least. And of course, you're sitting on I guess a you know, US Air Force supplied you know seat which probably isn't that comfortable and so they've brought a polyurethane cushion for everybody to sit on so that it's more comfortable when you're you're pulling the shift and polyurethane fire marshals will call this solid gasoline, Gordon, because they are extremely flammable pieces of material. And I guess one of them is sitting kind of close to a heating vent.

Is that right? Yeah. I think what actually happens is there's a heating vent, then there's a metal box next to the heating vent, which heats up. And then next to that is this kind of cushion. And the cushion basically, you know, catches fire. And this is on, we should explain there's a kind of lower and an upper deck to these planes and they're smelling this burning rubber. They're trying to work out where it comes from. Smoke and fumes are starting to come into the upper deck. And so they work out that there's something going on on the lower deck by the jump seat where this cushion has been.

Now the navigator who's down there tries you know grabs one fire extinguisher then another to try and put it out and it's not working. So this is a pretty serious fire and pretty soon the whole of that lower deck is engulfed with flames. At this point John Hawke who's piloting it says we've got to head to the base you know there's a runway there and we've got to get there. Another Thule fact Gordon. Yeah. What color is the runway at do that? Do you remember it's painted isn't it? It is it's painted. I can't remember why it's to the permafrost isn't it? That's right Yeah, it's white and I guess the issue there is you don't want it to absorb a bunch of heat in

From the Sun kind of I guess in spring summer and melt the permafrost below it because the whole base is built on the permafrost right essentially built on kind of like ice right and so if things if the heat from transfers from runway from buildings it kind of melts almost the foundation and things start to sink so the runway is painted white they've decided to head for there jodemario gets on the radio and issues a mayday so says it's the only time in his long flying career he's ever had to do it. But right after he does the Mayday, they lose all electrical power. All the electrics go on the pain. Upper deck now, the smoke is coming into the upper deck as well.

They can't see the instrument lights and it's totally dark outside because it's January. This is a great situation. This is bad. John Hogg is trying to use the lights because obviously there's some lights from the base. So he's trying to use those to manually guide him towards where it is.

But at the same time, he realizes the plane is too heavy. They can't do a controlled landing. They've got no instruments and they're not going to make it because the flame and the smoke is just getting worse and worse. Someone else in the crew kind of asks him and says are we over too late yet? And Hogg looks out of the window and he leans out and at that moment he can't see the lights so he realizes that means they must be right over the the base. I mean, that's the only way he can he can work that out because it's so dark and they're at about

8,000 feet and he basically gives the order we got to bail out. because it's so dark and they're at about 8 000 feet and he basically gives the order we got to bail out. Joe DiMahario doesn't hear the order and all he remembers hearing is bang bang bang bang four bangs and what's that he shouts over to John and John Hawke says well it's the others ejecting you know you gotta go you gotta bail so Joe reaches down he raises the armrests of the ejector seats and rotates the ejection trigger guards. That then blows a hatch over his head and stows the kind of central column, the steering column in front of him, so it doesn't smash his knees as he ejects.

He says he doesn't actually feel a jolt or anything as he ejects. All he knows is the next thing he's outside the plane. His seatbelt automatically releases after one second And then the seat is actually blown away by the wind and then a lanyard attached to the seat pulls the rip cord of his parachute and he said, you know It's like the feeling was then like his legs were being ripped off as the parachute kicks in Strangely for a pilot he's scared of heights. It's kind of bit bizarre, but there you go. But he says he wasn't scared. Instead, he said he kind of felt godlike is the way he describes it as he floats down from the aircraft. He's up in the air. Now, they've all left the aircraft. Everybody got out,

right? Well, unfortunately, apart from one person. So, seven in the crew, six eject, one person, unfortunately, who is in that kind of lower deck and he's not at the seat to eject. So he tries to kind of manually bail out of a hatch and jump out the hatch and the speed they're going with, he jumps out head first to the hatch and the airstream just slams him back into the plane. So he's actually, he's the one who's not going to make it. But the other six of them all managed to eject. So the plane is now empty. It's unattended and it's

making a kind of slow left turn and descending down with four hydrogen bombs on it with four hydrogen bombs on it. And as he's floating to the ice, Joe DiMario just sees a bright light flash seven or eight miles away. And then after a few seconds, he's suddenly swung around by the shockwave of a massive blast. And we should say this is at 4.39pm Atlantic Standard Time, that the B-52 is going to hit the ice. And immediately the news of the crash leads to a flash alert being sent to the US Air

Force. And they declare the code and the code word designating an accident involving nuclear weapons and that's Broken Arrow. Also, a great 1990s action movie. Totally. With Christian Slater and John Travolta. One of the formative action movies of my youth, when you say the words Broken Arrow, when I saw it in the script, I thought of I can still, when you say the words broken arrow, when I saw it in the script,

I thought of John and Christian up in that B2 bomber and the scene where Travolta, I think Travolta kills someone with a pipe in that movie. He swings a pipe at somebody and kills him, hits him in the chest. And I remember as a kid seeing that and thinking that was pretty crazy. So whenever I hear broken arrow, I think of that movie.

Which same concept, right? The idea was Travolta was gonna steal nuclear weapons by crashing the plane and selling them to a terrorist group. Yeah, that's right, yeah. And in this case, well, I guess that was slightly more entertaining than this one. All right, but enough about John Travolta, Gordon. I digress.

So I think with a full-on Broken Arrow incident, missing nuclear weapons, let's break and we come back next time. We will talk about what in the world happened to these bombs and how does this incident from the 60s really draw us into today and explain a lot about why in the world Donald Trump wants to buy Greenland. So join us next time. See you next time. See you next time. has CIA officer Artemis Proctor convinced there is a mole working for the Russians. But who is it? To find the answer, she will have to dredge up her checkered past in service of CIA,

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