Original subtitles

[dramatic music]

[Duchovny] Tonight on "Secrets Declassified"...

government sites so surprising or dangerous

that they're kept from the public--

from a luxury resort hiding a government doomsday bunker...

- If a bomb drops on the golf course,

anyone behind the blast doors would be okay.

- To an explosive factory where every shift

is life or death...

[Martin] I can't imagine something more stressful

than trying to disassemble a thermonuclear warhead.

- And even a fake country in Virginia

that's really a CIA training camp.

- When you cross the border into this fake world,

it's Disney World for adults.

- These are the astonishing and sometimes terrible places

built by governments and the people who work for them.

It's time to bring them to light.

♪ ♪

In West Virginia, there's a luxury hotel

for the rich and famous

that boasts over 700 guest rooms,

exclusive restaurants, an 18-hole golf course,

and a secret underground bunker primed for Armageddon.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem] Nuclear anxiety is peaking in the 1950s...

and the U.S. president is concerned

about the safety of the government

in the case of a nuclear attack.

The government has commissioned

these bomb-proof havens

for the president and his cabinet.

[Duchovny] Now they want a bunker

for members of Congress--

somewhere big enough

to house over 1,000 government officials

and discreet enough to keep it secret.

The answer-- a five-star hotel.

[Hakeem] The Greenbrier is a luxury resort

in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.

This place is a slice of old-school luxury,

where the rich and powerful come to do business and relax.

You can find presidents or celebrities

sipping drinks at the bar.

[Duchovny] It sounds like the perfect place

to see out World War III.

- It's far enough from Washington, D.C.,

that hopefully it could escape the effects

of a direct nuclear attack on the capital city

but also close enough

that people would be able to escape to it in time.

[Duchovny] It's shielded by mountains

for extra protection.

- Perhaps what swings it, literally,

is the hotel's golfing facilities.

Eisenhower is a regular on the Greenbrier course.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] The government discreetly approaches

the hotel for their assistance,

and the management at the Greenbrier

are happy to oblige.

The only problem is keeping it a secret.

- An immense construction project

on the grounds of the Greenbrier

is sure to get the VIP guests gossiping.

So the bunker needs a cover story.

[Duchovny] The Greenbrier gets a brand-new extension--

the West Virginia Wing.

Underneath...

a vast doomsday bunker unlike any other

begins to take shape.

[Hakeem] The bunker underneath

the Greenbrier Hotel

hosts 153 rooms

spread out over 112,000 square feet.

There are two chambers

for the House and the Senate,

and there is this vast hall

for joint sessions.

It's essentially a giant underground capitol

for the government to continue functioning

in the event of a nuclear war.

- Beyond these chambers are the facilities you'd expect

in a top-of-the-range government survival bunker--

high-pressure shower to rinse off nuclear fallout,

over 1,000 beds for congressmen and women,

a hospital, a cafeteria,

and a small arsenal of handguns.

[Duchovny] Perhaps the most impressive features

are two enormous blast doors to seal Congress inside.

- Each door is 19 inches thick, weighs 28 tons,

and they're strong enough to withstand a nuclear blast

from only 2,000 feet away.

- If a bomb drops

on the eighth hole of the golf course,

anyone behind the blast doors will be okay.

- And these doors are hidden behind a false wall

in the exhibition hall just inches away

from where guests are mingling.

- For 30 years, the false wall stands firm,

and the bunker remains secret...

until 1992, when rumors finally begin to leak out.

♪ ♪

[Jesse] Ted Gup is a investigative reporter

for "The Washington Post,"

and an anonymous source tips him off

that the Greenbrier resort

might not be all that it seems.

[Duchovny] Gup speaks to former employees,

who confirm that something mysterious

is hidden beneath the West Virginia Wing.

But for a genuine scoop,

Gup needs hard evidence.

- So he decides to go stay at the Greenbrier himself

to see if he can get that final bit of proof.

[O'Keefe] When Gup meets the manager,

he goes straight to the point.

He asks, "Is there a government nuclear fallout shelter

under the hotel?"

Well, the manager immediately denies this.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] Gup doesn't get the answers he's hoping for,

but he's determined not to leave the Greenbrier

without his story.

- Gup visits the office of a maintenance company

called Forsyth Associates,

who are supposedly in charge

of maintaining the Greenbrier TVs.

When he gets to the offices, he sees something strange.

[Hakeem] He sees a wall covered with books

on nuclear war and Armageddon.

You don't need that if you're building TV antennas.

- When he digs deeper, he finds out

that many of the people who work at Forsyth Associates

are former U.S. military cryptographers

and radio specialists.

- Turns out, Forsyth Associates is just a front company.

Their real job is maintaining the communications

for the bunker.

[Duchovny] "The Washington Post"

runs Gup's story on May 31, 1992.

♪ ♪

And the Greenbrier's secret is finally unearthed.

Within days, the government goes public

about the Greenbrier bunker...

and announces its deactivation.

- Today the bunker is a tourist attraction.

For about $50,

you can go tour the halls where the American government

might have been reborn after Armageddon.

♪ ♪

- A luxury hotel might be the perfect place

to hide a government bunker,

but in the 1950s, the CIA has to hide something much bigger--

a vast college campus set up

to train the next generation of super spies.

♪ ♪

[Sami] At the dawn of the Cold War,

the CIA realizes that this is a conflict

that's not going to be fought

by traditional soldiers with bullets and bombs

but by covert agents stealing secrets

from under the enemy's nose.

When it comes to training spies, though,

the Americans are on their back foot

compared to their rivals at the KGB.

[Andrew] The KGB has a decades-old infrastructure

for training spies,

and CIA is relatively new to the game.

So they realize that if they're going to keep up

with their KGB counterparts, they have to step up big.

[Hakeem] The spy-craft skills that could save your life

and maybe even your country isn't something that's taught

in any college or university.

The CIA brass realize that their agents

need training to prepare them for the real world--

what they're gonna face out there in the field.

So, in secret, they set up

a new espionage university.

[Duchovny] The first step is finding the right place

for a campus.

- They need a very large place,

someplace secluded, someplace cut off,

but someplace large enough with infrastructure enough

to simulate the activities of a normal city.

[Duchovny] They find it

at a former naval base called Camp Peary.

- It stretches for 9,000 acres--

more than half the size of Manhattan.

♪ ♪

[Sami] To the outside world,

Camp Peary remains a regular naval base.

But behind its fences, the site is transformed

into an elite proving ground for spies.

- Trainees refer to it as "The Farm."

And generations of spies are secretly schooled here,

right up to the present day.

♪ ♪

Training begins

when students leave CIA Headquarters in Langley

on a blacked-out bus.

- The men and women chosen for this

are among the most elite.

They've gone through rigorous testing--

psychological testing, physical testing--

to prove that they are truly the best of the best.

[Hakeem] When a CIA trainee arrives at The Farm,

they leave their real identity at the door.

They're given a new cover story

that they must maintain throughout the training.

[Andrew] They are leaving the real world

to go into a fake world,

a fake microstate

that simulates life in a foreign country.

And it's in this simulated country

that their undercover training begins.

- The whole location of the Farm is one giant set.

There's a town square,

a shady downtown neighborhood,

suburbs, and then the countryside.

Everyone on the site,

from visiting diplomats to the local café owner,

is a veteran CIA operative playing a role.

There's even a cable news channel

reporting on the region's fictional politics.

- The Farm really is Disney World for adults.

[thunder rumbles]

[Duchovny] In this college,

lessons aren't learned in the classroom

but on the streets of its fake town.

- The foundation of undercover work

is being able to recruit and handle

foreign intelligence sources.

You're looking for people who have access to secrets.

♪ ♪

- The whole time, they're playing cat and mouse

with their rivals and enemies--

other students and operatives

who are trying to catch them out.

[Duchovny] Outfoxing the enemy

calls for some of the more advanced maneuvers

that a wannabe James Bond must learn.

- You're trained how to flip a car during a car chase,

how to get in a firefight

and not shoot unarmed, innocent civilians,

how to parachute out of aircraft

and survive in the woods on, you know, no food.

You learn all the kind of things

that you would see in a spy movie.

[Duchovny] The new recruits are pushed

to the edge of their wits.

- After six months

of intense blood, sweat,

tears, stress, strain, anxiety,

this siren blares out... [siren blaring]

And signals that the simulation is over,

and any trainees that are left have made the cut.

[Duchovny] The government has never officially admitted

it exists at all.

Graduates of the Farm rarely go on the record

about their experience...

until 2019.

- Former CIA intelligence officer Amaryllis Fox

actually wrote about all of her experiences

at the Farm in her book, "Life Undercover."

♪ ♪

The Farm is truly a journey

that's inspiring and pleasurable,

more than it is something that's scary and terrifying.

The scary and terrifying part

is when you have to use those skills in the real world.

- As the Blitz hits London,

Winston Churchill needs a bomb-proof shelter

where he can lead his troops in secret.

It's got 70 rooms, 500 staff,

and the strangest thing about it--

a private line to the president inside his restroom.

[dramatic music]

- By 1938, British government know that war with Germany

is on the horizon.

And this war is going to be

unlike anything in human history.

For starters, the Germans have the aerial capability

to rain bombs over Britain's towns and cities

on an apocalyptic scale.

[Duchovny] To stand any chance of winning the war,

the British government needs an emergency hideout,

and the safest place is underground.

[James] Halfway between the prime minister's residence

in Downing Street and the British Parliament

sits the Treasury.

Here, they have a vast basement ten feet below the ground,

which is used to store thousands

of Treasury documents.

[Duchovny] A top secret makeover begins.

- This underground space beneath the Treasury

is divided into 70 hyper-secure rooms.

Now, this included everything from the cabinet office,

offices for secretaries and switchboard operators,

and a dedicated bedroom for the prime minister himself.

[Duchovny] The war rooms are kept on standby for a year...

[air raid siren blaring]

Until London comes under attack

and Winston Churchill takes his cabinet underground.

♪ ♪

- On September 7, 1940,

the Luftwaffe drop 1,000 bombs over the capital...

♪ ♪

Killing 430 civilians and injuring 1,600 people.

It's called Black Saturday.

♪ ♪

Black Saturday is only the beginning.

57 consecutive days of attacks followed,

testing the resilience of both London

and its leadership as never before.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] Despite the hammerings,

the war rooms and Churchill survive.

So the Germans turn up the heat.

- By late 1940, the Germans are using parachute mines.

And these weapons descend under an open parachute,

and they're fused such

that they will explode at rooftop level,

and they'll create a pattern of destruction

that's 300 feet in diameter.

They can flatten an entire city block.

If a weapon like this were to explode

over the cabinet war rooms,

it could bury the prime minister

and the entire war cabinet in one shot.

That's a risk that simply cannot be taken.

[Duchovny] The underground compound is reinforced

with a massive concrete roof,

referred to as "The Slab."

- That means that the cabinet war rooms

can sustain a direct hit from a 500-pound bomb.

[Sami] During the renovation,

Churchill requests the expansion

of the complex itself.

It triples in size,

making room for 500 personnel

working underground 24-7.

[Duchovny] Such a bustling underground workspace brings

one particular problem... [telephone rings]

That Churchill hates above all others.

- Churchill is notoriously sensitive

to excess noise.

So 500 people working in a busy, claustrophobic,

and echoey underground environment

can cause quite a ruckus.

- To make the boss happy,

several things are put in place.

One of them is phones that don't ring

but instead light up whenever someone is calling.

They also import noiseless typewriters

from the United States

to mitigate all the noise that will be created

inside this underground bunker.

- The expansion of the cabinet war rooms

brings a new problem.

With so many people coming in and out,

Churchill fears classified talks

with the U.S. president may be compromised

by spies working for the other side.

[Sami] He needs a secure line of communication

with Franklin D. Roosevelt, so he figures,

where's the one place I'm not gonna be interrupted

or eavesdropped on?

The bathroom.

Churchill has a new private toilet installed

for his personal use,

and inside is actually a phone

that connects to an encrypted line

direct to the Pentagon in Washington.

So any spy will just assume

that the prime minister is taking a bathroom break,

when, in reality,

he's actually masterminding victory.

It kind of goes back to the old adage of,

your best ideas happen when you're on the toilet.

Perfect example.

[Duchovny] The cabinet war rooms remain the beating heart

of Britain's war effort for almost six years.

Then two days after Japan's surrender,

on August 16, 1945,

the war rooms and its secrets are locked for good.

For 40 years, it lays beneath London,

untouched and forgotten.

Then in 1984...

♪ ♪

The bunker's secrets are finally revealed

when the Imperial War Museum opens its doors to the public.

♪ ♪

- Everything is restored to its original state,

frozen at the precise moment when the Allies won the war.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] After World War II,

the United States engages in a race

to stockpile the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons.

Building the most destructive warheads on Earth

requires a new kind of top secret factory,

a place so dangerous, it comes with a chilling fail-safe.

One wrong move, and it self-destructs.

♪ ♪

- By the early 1950s,

we're in the beginnings of the Cold War,

and both the Americans and the Soviets have the bomb.

So, in order to regain nuclear superiority,

the U.S. goes all-in on maximizing production.

The attitude from American military leaders is this--

if we can't have the only nuclear weapons,

then we have to have the most.

[Duchovny] A few hundred warheads won't cut it.

The U.S. wants thousands.

- You're creating these things in volume,

in a factory packed full of volatile materials.

One false move, and you'll have a nuclear fireball

on home soil.

[Duchovny] A site this hazardous

needs to be remote, secure, and secret.

- The Atomic Energy Commission, or the AEC,

begins scouting for suitable sites.

One facility that ticks all the boxes

is an old World War II munitions plant

in the Texas Panhandle, 25 miles from Amarillo.

It's called Pantex.

During the war, thousands of workers, mostly women,

packed munitions and shells here,

but now the factory is closed.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] The AEC spends $25 million

renovating the old factory,

and in 1951, the U.S. has itself

a brand-new

nuclear-weapons facility.

Workers at Pantex quietly and efficiently assemble

the world's most lethal product--

while trying not to blow themselves up.

- Workers assembling the warheads

must perform what's called the mating process--

when the explosives and the nuclear materials

are brought together inside the warhead.

[Martin] If there's one accident...

it's going to set off a chain reaction

that will produce a nuclear explosion.

- A single second of human error

could wipe out a large portion of the Texas Panhandle.

[Duchovny] To avoid this nightmare scenario,

Pantex builds six new bunkers for assembling these warheads,

called Gravel Gerties.

[Hakeem] Each Gravel Gertie

is a steel-reinforced concrete lab,

where the technicians work,

and above them is what amounts to a mountain of gravel

held in place by steel cables.

Inside the lab, three workers assemble the nuke.

And this process is so sensitive

that one of the worker's jobs

is just to read the instructions step-by-step

as the other two workers carry out their directions.

[Duchovny] One false move from a tired technician,

and the whole facility goes up.

Hence, the merciless fail-safe.

- If there's an accidental detonation,

the explosion will snap

the steel cables supporting the roof.

The entire chamber is then buried

under thousands of tons of gravel.

The design traps the radioactive material,

reducing fallout by 90%.

However, it also entombs the three workers

who triggered the explosion.

It's a literal death trap.

[Duchovny] The possibility that each shift

could be their last

hangs over the heads of the Pantex workforce.

And yet production rates rocket.

- Pantex is producing 2,000 nuclear warheads a year.

The U.S. arsenal swells to 37,000.

That's enough to destroy not only the Soviets

but every civilization on the face of Earth.

[Duchovny] For four decades,

Pantex fuels the nuclear stockpile,

until the end of the Cold War forces a sudden U-turn.

The slowdown in missile production

makes the world safer.

But for workers at Pantex,

the danger levels skyrocket.

- Nuclear weapons that were manufactured,

in some cases decades previously,

have to come into a manufacturer

for disassembly.

I can't imagine something more stressful

than trying to disassemble a thermonuclear warhead.

- Nuclear weapons aren't designed to be disassembled,

and some of these have been sitting around

for up to 40 years.

They've degraded, and some of their explosives

are not as stable as they once were.

- Now it's turned over to Pantex and go,

here's the problem-- you solve it.

You take it apart, and try not to have an explosion.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] It's not just the nukes

that are past their use-by date.

[Martin] At this time, Pantex is over 50 years old,

and it's in desperate need of an upgrade,

but, instead, they're rushing to complete the materials.

[Duchovny] The rush is so intense

that in 1996, factory workers blow the whistle.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem] "The New York Times"

publishes some astonishing and disturbing claims

that at Pantex, the equipment is faulty,

and safety measures are being ignored.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] For the first time,

the public is alerted to a nuclear threat

on their own doorstep.

♪ ♪

The site is still in operation,

with as many as 2,000 warheads

still waiting to be disassembled.

♪ ♪

- If the Soviets sent assassins

to try and kill you not once but 22 times,

it makes sense to build a secret underground hideout.

But that doesn't mean it can't be comfortable.

This is the story of how one European dictator

commissions his own private super bunker

to the tune of $20 billion.

[dramatic music]

- After World War II, Yugoslavia is led

by a socialist dictator by the name of Josip Broz.

He is better known to the world as Tito.

[Duchovny] Yugoslavia is independent

from both Western Europe and the Soviet Union.

But this comes at a cost.

Stalin hates Tito and is out for blood.

- The Soviet leadership has orchestrated

over 22 assassination attempts on Tito,

so he must be thinking,

it's only a matter of time until his time runs out.

[Duchovny] Tito believes

a Soviet attack on Yugoslavia is imminent,

which would trigger a global response.

World War III could kick off in his backyard.

- Tito begins to prepare for the worst,

with a near-impossible solution.

He decides to build an impenetrable retreat

that has to be strong enough to withstand a nuclear blast

but big enough to hold his entire government.

[Duchovny] The only way to meet Tito's demands

is to tunnel under a mountain.

- Tito's engineers pick a site near the village of Konjic,

and the reason is because it's remote

and shielded by the mountains.

Plus, its central location

makes it pretty accessible for government ministers

who are in a mad rush to take shelter.

[Duchovny] The question is,

how do you hollow out a mountain in secret?

- To maintain total confidentiality,

Tito enforces extraordinary security protocols.

- He does not employ locals.

Instead, he brings in construction workers

from other parts of the country

who won't be able to recognize the location.

- As an extra measure, they travel in blindfolds

or in blacked-out vehicles to the location.

[Duchovny] The site is cordoned off from the public,

and an immense tunneling project begins.

♪ ♪

- Workers are using explosives

to slowly and methodically burrow within the mountain.

It's brutal and dangerous work.

In fact, later testimonies claim

that barely a single shift passes

without someone getting killed.

[Duchovny] As the deaths stack up, so does the cost.

Tito pours the equivalent

of $20 billion into the tunnel,

and meter by meter,

his hidden fortress takes shape.

- The entrance to Tito's bunker admits you

to a horseshoe-shaped 200-meter-long tunnel

that's carved into the mountain.

It has 100 dormitories

that are capable of housing 350

of Yugoslavia's political and military elite.

In every way, this facility is designed to provide

for the continuity of government

in the eventuality of a nuclear war.

[Duchovny] The base is fitted out

with the latest Cold War tech.

- It contains five operational centers

with a cryptography center

and even a fully equipped hospital operating room.

[Duchovny] The most iconic gadget

is straight out of a spy movie--

the red telephone, which will ring

when nuclear Armageddon kicks off.

If that happens,

Tito can sit out the end of the world

in relative luxury.

- The rest of the survivors will have to slum it,

but Tito gets a private residence

in the heart of the mountain.

It consists of five rooms,

including an office and a bedroom,

with the bunker's only double bed.

[Duchovny] The inside of the bunker is vast,

but the entrance is hidden to the outside world

by a stroke of genius.

It's camouflaged behind the façade

of three regular-looking houses.

- Tito's impossible dream

is finally completed in 1979--

26 years after construction began.

[Duchovny] But Tito never gets to take the grand tour.

He dies in 1980.

The secret bunker is fully operational,

and the Yugoslav government keeps it on standby.

Then, 40 years after construction began,

an incredible order is given--

to blow this thing apart.

♪ ♪

- In the early 1990s,

Yugoslavia, as it used to be known,

is torn apart as a result of a civil war.

And Tito's bunker is right in the middle of the conflict.

For the past 12 years,

the bunker has been looked after

by one of Tito's trusted servants--

Colonel Grabovica, who's now with the Serbian army.

Bosnian troops are advancing toward the complex.

Colonel Grabovica is given an order

to demolish the entire facility with explosives.

[Sami] This is an agonizing order,

because Grabovica has spent 12 years

taking care of this complex.

When his unit plants the explosives

and prepares to leave,

he makes a decision

that could cost him his life for treason.

He quietly cuts the cables connected to the explosives,

and he saves Tito's bunker.

[Duchovny] The underground complex

is taken by Bosnian troops,

who retain it as a secret military installation

until the end of the civil war.

In 2011, it's finally decommissioned,

and the government opens its doors

as a museum and art space.

Locals get to explore the secret labyrinth

that's been hiding behind these houses for 60 years.

- A quiet neighborhood in Germany

is the last place you'd expect to find a sinister CIA program.

It's a site that brings together Soviet spies, LSD,

and a Nazi scientist intent on mastering mind control.

[dramatic music]

[Martin] During the early years of the Cold War,

the CIA is more and more obsessed

with interrogation techniques.

They want to be able to manipulate the enemy

who falls into our hands,

and then they also want to figure out ways

to reinforce the will

of our personnel who might fall into enemy hands,

reinforce their ability

to resist interrogation techniques

that the enemy might expose them to.

The only way to figure out how best to serve

both of those masters

is to conduct psychological experiments.

[Duchovny] The CIA sets up a top secret program

to explore methods of mind control.

It's called Project Bluebird.

- These experiments can't be conducted

in a regular laboratory, obviously.

They have to be done in a classified environment--

a sort of black site

that governments typically turn a blind eye to.

[Duchovny] So Project Bluebird is taken out of the U.S.,

to battle-scarred West Germany.

- At this time, part of Germany is still

under American occupation after World War II,

when the U.S. military have a site

in a quiet town just north of Frankfurt.

[Duchovny] It's called Camp King.

- Camp King has been in use since World War II.

It was used for imprisoning

and interrogating Nazi leaders.

[Sasha] Camp King has the perfect infrastructure

for psychological experiments.

It has secure cells, housing for staff,

and even a hospital.

[Duchovny] But its most vital asset--

absolute privacy.

- The locals are used to seeing the Americans

from Camp King around, and they don't ask questions

about what they're doing inside.

[Duchovny] The project needs a lead scientist,

someone willing to turn a blind eye

to medical ethics.

- It turns out that the chief medical doctor at Camp King

has quite the résumé.

Dr. Walter Schreiber is the former surgeon general

of the German army.

- Walter Schreiber oversaw

horrific medical experiments

at Dachau and Auschwitz.

Under his watch,

concentration camp prisoners are frozen,

injected with hallucinogens,

and even dissected to track gangrene--

experiments that end in slow and painful death.

[Duchovny] Schreiber was picked up

by U.S. military intelligence after the war.

Now his skills are put to use on Project Bluebird,

running Camp King's experiments in mind control.

- This includes hallucinogenic drugs.

It includes hypnosis.

The idea is to break the prisoner from his own mind

and do what the CIA wants.

[Duchovny] The secure facility has a ready supply

of test subjects.

- Its current inmates are Soviet defectors,

spies, and refugees--

people who could be considered expendable.

They could be treated inhumanely

or die during trials, and who would know?

- The subjects are described

as experienced professional-type agents...

suspected of working for Soviet intelligence.

In one case, doses of drugs and hypnosis

induce a deep trance.

One spy remains under for two hours

and then completely forgets the experience.

[Duchovny] But mastering mind control proves elusive,

so new instruments are brought in,

and the facility expands its operations.

[Sami] They generate a new set of tests

to try on their subjects,

including exposure to gases,

irradiation by infrared and ultraviolet light,

pressure chambers, sonic torture,

and dietary manipulation.

Prisoners are often subjected to multiple combinations

of these experiments until they can't take any more.

[monitor flatlines]

- Experiments at Camp King continue

for the rest of the decade,

when they are quietly drawn to a close.

But the CIA's obsession with drugs and hypnosis

is far from over.

[Martin] The experiments with mind control

inform the administration

of the mother of all Cold War psychological projects...

♪ ♪

MKUltra.

[Duchovny] In 1993, the U.S. returns Camp King

to the German government, who build houses on the site.

Families move in, oblivious to its gruesome history,

until 2002,

when German researchers uncover the full details

of Camp King's experiments.

♪ ♪

And the new residents learn the terrifying truth

about the place they now call home.

- In the 1940s,

the U.S. sets up a weapons research lab in Los Alamos

that covers a sprawling 40 square miles.

But the Soviets--

they go bigger, 75 times bigger,

with a secret weapons facility 3,000 square miles in size.

The question is, how do you keep that hidden?

[dramatic music]

[Martin] By the end of World War II,

both the United States and the Soviet Union

recognize that missiles will dominate

the future battlefield.

♪ ♪

The Soviets have captured existing examples

of the German V-2 rocket--

the world's first ballistic missile.

In addition to that, they have captured German scientists.

The Soviets want to use the V-2 rockets

to help them develop a new missile defense system.

[Duchovny] The problem is,

they have nowhere to launch them.

[Greg] They want to test these bad boys out.

The thing is, they've got to do this

away from the eyes of the West.

They need something private, something secure.

[Duchovny] In May 1946,

Soviet command signs off the location

of their new facility.

And to ensure total secrecy,

it's in one of the most isolated stretches

of the country.

- The Soviets choose a remote location in the south,

in the desert, very close to the Kazakh border,

at a place called Kapustin Yar.

It's 600 miles from Moscow and 60 miles from the nearest town.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] The extreme isolation

is its major selling point and biggest problem.

- There's no roads, no rail, no power.

I mean, there's nothing out there but empty horizon,

which is perfect for secrecy and volatile rocket tests,

but it's terrible for a massive construction project

on an ambitious deadline.

[Greg] It's also a horrendous place to work.

In the summer, temperatures can get

well over 100 degrees Fahrenheit,

and in the winter, it plummets to below freezing.

[Duchovny] But Stalin wants rockets in the sky

as soon as possible, so he hands the project

to one of his finest commanders--

General Vasily Ivanovich Voznyuk.

- Voznyuk is a man who thrives on the impossible.

He's legendary for his iron will

and genius for logistics.

♪ ♪

[Amy] Voznyuk is sent to this remote site,

and he immediately gets to work.

He builds a tent city to house all the workers

and then builds roads and rail lines

to bring in all the construction material

they're going to need to make this base a reality.

[Duchovny] Voznyuk's team

may be sleeping in tents on the desert floor,

but in just two months,

they built a launchpad and a command center.

The new Soviet weapons program is ready for takeoff.

- In October of 1947,

the secret base at Kapustin Yar

launches its first-ever rocket--

a refurbished German V-2

that flies for almost 200 kilometers.

After that, the Kapustin Yar base

expands rapidly.

A new town is completed,

and it becomes the cradle of Soviet missile development,

all hidden from Western eyes.

- In the Cold War, nothing remains secret forever.

Whispers of a Soviet missile base

send Western governments scrambling

for photographic evidence.

And in 1959, the British sneak across the Iron Curtain--

or rather, above it.

♪ ♪

- On December 6, 1959, a British pilot sets off

towards the Soviet desert.

[Greg] They're flying an aircraft

that the world has never seen--the U-2.

[Amy] The U-2 is the pinnacle in aerial espionage.

It's designed to fly so high

with such high-resolution cameras

that it should be able to photograph this new site

while staying clear out of the way

of any possible Soviet missiles.

♪ ♪

- He passes right over Soviet territory,

and he comes back

with the first high-quality photographs

of Kapustin Yar to reach the West.

- The photos collected by the U-2

are absolutely critical.

They tell the Western Allies

exactly what type of technology

the Soviets have developed.

They tell them exactly what type of fuel they're using,

they tell them vital things that they need to know

about Soviet missile technology and capability.

♪ ♪

[Duchovny] Kapustin Yar is no longer a secret...

giving the West a vital window

into the Soviet missile program.

But U.S. surveillance doesn't slow down progress.

The desert base continues its operation

and remains the beating heart

of Russian weapons innovations today.

- There's a facility in Utah

that's bigger than the Pentagon,

with restricted access, no windows,

and a secret objective--

reportedly to spy on us all.

[dramatic music]

- In the early 2010s,

deep on the salt flats of Bluffdale, Utah,

construction begins on a sprawling 240-acre complex.

Now, this is not a secret complex.

It can't be a secret.

The place is over 50 times the size of the U.S. Capitol.

Officially, this complex is known

as the Intelligence Community

Comprehensive National Cybersecurity

Initiative Data Center.

Locals just call it the "Utah Data Center."

- This giant complex is a National Security Agency site

for cyber defense.

Today surveillance, sabotage,

and even terrorist attacks can be carried out remotely.

The NSA says the Utah Data Center

is designed to protect everyday Americans from cyberattacks.

[Duchovny] The latest sprawling data facility

barely makes the headlines,

which might be just what the NSA wants,

until journalists begin to question

the unprecedented scale of the site.

- At the heart of the construction,

four vast data halls are being built,

each 25,000 square feet.

These will be filled

with cutting-edge computer

servers and hardware

that will devour 65 megawatts of power.

- It will come with an electricity bill

of $40 million a year,

and keeping those servers from overheating

requires 1.7 million gallons of water every day.

[Duchovny] It's a technological marvel

that you can't see without top-level clearance.

- Security is fortress level,

with biometric access, 24-7 surveillance,

and barriers that can stop a 15,000-pound truck

moving at 50 miles per hour.

[Duchovny] So why all the secrecy?

[Sasha] When journalists crunch the numbers,

they realize that the Utah Data Center

can store an unimaginable amount of data.

Some estimate it's yottabytes--

a trillion terabytes.

[Duchovny] To put that into context,

that's the equivalent of 2 trillion laptops.

- This site could hold more information

than we ever thought possible

and still have space for more.

[Duchovny] It begs the question--

what exactly is the NSA going to store on those servers?

In 2012, journalists for "The New York Times"

pick up the trail,

when a retired NSA technical director

named William Binney steps out of the shadows

and blows the whistle.

[Amy] In the late 90s, Binney created a program

called ThinThread

that searched everything on the Internet

for anything that was potentially harmful,

like terrorist attacks or any other security attacks.

[Sami] His program protects the privacy

of innocent civilians by encrypting anything

that isn't suspicious,

while honing in on potential bad guys.

- Binney claims that after 9/11,

the safeguards were removed

and parts of ThinThread were used

in a sweeping surveillance program

on all U.S. citizens.

[Duchovny] In August 2012,

"The New York Times" publishes Binney's revelations.

♪ ♪

- He contends that the Utah Data Center

is part of a massive government effort

to store troves of data collected on Americans

without warrants and against the Constitution.

[keys clacking]

[Duchovny] According to Binney,

every message you send is recorded, saved,

and stored at places like the Utah Data Center.

- Allegedly, it's the last part of the NSA's mission

to own every digital communication

without oversight

and be accessed by NSA analysts

all over the country.

[Duchovny] The secret activity in those immense data halls

remains highly controversial.

To its supporters, it plays a vital role

in keeping the country safe.

To its detractors, it's the real-world embodiment

of Big Brother.

♪ ♪

From impenetrable bunkers

to high-security science labs,

governments perform their most covert activities

behind gates and fences in top secret sites.

But no door stays locked forever.

And the truth gets out in the end.

♪ ♪