At a windswept gravel airstrip in eastern Greenland, a small Danish military detachment has quietly kept watch for decades.
Now, under a new U.S. defense agreement signed this week, the outpost at Mestersvig could soon become a key American military foothold in the Arctic.
Mestersvig sits 149 miles from the nearest settlement (population 330), at the edge of an uninhabited national park larger than Germany and France combined. The place is covered in darkness during winter, with average temperatures of around 14 degrees Fahrenheit.
“This is as remote, as cold, and as extreme as you can find in the world. You have to go to Antarctica to find similar conditions,” said Anders Ibsen, a former officer with Denmark’s Sirius dog sled patrol, an elite unit that uses Mestersvig to resupply.
by Defense News – Desolate Arctic outpost likely to host US troops under new Greenland deal
