From underground cinemas to radar stations on towering steel stilts – here the U.S. has had military installations in Greenland.

The U.S. has had over 30 military installations spread across Greenland, built during World War II and the Cold War. Today, only one remains.

U.S. President Trump has repeatedly emphasized its importance, and last night, Vice President JD Vance echoed the same message: Greenland is crucial for the Golden Dome missile defense system, designed to protect the U.S. from all airborne threats.

If Trump and the U.S. succeed in deploying radars, missile defense systems, or other infrastructure in Greenland as part of Golden Dome, it won’t be the first time the U.S. has placed an early warning system against airborne threats on the Arctic island.

Currently, the only remaining American military facility in Greenland is the Pituffik Space Base, which also operates a radar tracking Russian missiles among others.

But over the years—particularly during the Cold War—the U.S. maintained numerous military installations across Greenland, including four radar stations named DYE 1-4. Their purpose was to detect potential Soviet aerial attacks on the U.S., as the shortest route lay over the Arctic.

Several of the abandoned military sites, like the former Bluie East 2 airbase near Ikateq in East Greenland, have been left in decay, with rusting oil drums and remnants of buildings scattered around.

In the 1950s, U.S. military leadership realized they were vulnerable to long-range Soviet bombers that could exploit the Arctic route over Greenland. To counter this, they established the Distant Early Warning (DEW) radar line.

In 1958, the U.S. and the Danish government agreed that the U.S. could build four radar stations across Greenland. Two of them were constructed deep within the Greenland Ice Sheet, resembling drilling platforms. Ten-meter-high steel legs supported the stations above, allowing snow to drift beneath them.

All four stations operated for three decades. Three closed in 1988, and the last one shut down in 1991.

In the series *The Arctic Rescuers*, DR, alongside adventurer Erik B. Jørgensen—a former member of the Sirius Patrol and a hunter-soldier—visited DYE 2, one of the abandoned stations on the Greenland Ice Sheet.

The station was hastily abandoned due to fears that the structure would collapse, leaving behind soda, beer, and eggs to this day.

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**More than 30 military installations**

The U.S. had far more than just radar stations in Greenland. In the 1940s, they established a range of military installations under the names Bluie East and West, depending on whether they were on the east or west coast.

Scattered across Greenland, the U.S. operated over 30 military sites—some wilder than others.

For example, the Americans built an airport in Kulusuk to supply the DYE 4 station. The two stations on the ice sheet were serviced by Hercules planes fitted with skis.

The airport in Kangerlussuaq was also once an American base, known as Bluie West 8. Today, it serves as the primary Danish defense airbase in Greenland, hosting the Arctic Basic Training program.

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**600 nuclear missiles beneath the ice**

The U.S. military had several research stations in Greenland, some featuring tunnels beneath the ice where experiments were conducted—such as testing whether humans could live under it.

One of these was Camp Tuto, which Princess Margrethe (now Queen Margrethe II), her father King Frederik IX, and Queen Ingrid visited in 1960 during Margrethe’s first trip to Greenland.

The research stations were also used for glaciological and geophysical studies. For instance, in 1966, American scientists drilled the first ice core at Camp Century, reaching all the way from the surface to bedrock.

Camp Century included hundreds of meters of tunnels, a cinema, accommodations, and laboratories—all powered by a portable nuclear reactor.

But Camp Century was also used for something far more ambitious.

The U.S. had a plan to deploy 600 nuclear missiles that could be moved along tracks in thousands of kilometers of tunnels beneath the ice. This way, the missiles could be relocated so the enemy never knew their exact location.

The project, called Iceworm, was never realized.

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**Greenland’s role in Golden Dome**

The U.S. has not yet revealed specific plans for Greenland as part of Golden Dome.

However, Major Karsten Marrup, head of the Center for Air and Space Operations at the Danish Defense Academy, notes that the radar at Pituffik Space Base will be part of Trump’s initiative.

“It’s a massive, massive project, and it’s impossible to say what else might be needed to monitor low-flying hypothetical missiles crossing the ice sheet or other threats,” he explains.

But Greenland will likely play a key role as an intermediate layer, where enemy missiles could be intercepted early in their trajectory toward the U.S., according to Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard, a senior researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies (Diis).

“It will probably involve expanding Pituffik Space Base, which will be part of the system, and deploying additional radars around the region to better detect potential enemy missiles,” he says.

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