DEEP within the forests of western Lithuania, a chilling relic of the Chilly Struggle nonetheless lies hidden — a secret underground nuclear missile base the place three folks misplaced their lives.
The Plokštinė Missile Base, buried in Žemaitija Nationwide Park about 30 miles from the Baltic Sea, as soon as housed Soviet R-12 Dvina missiles pointed at Western Europe.
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At this time, it’s the park’s prime vacationer draw, reworked into the Cold War Museum and attracting 35,000 guests in 2024 alone.
However behind the eerie reveals of Lenin statues, Soviet flags and dimly lit tunnels lies a lethal historical past.
Museum information Aušra Brazdeikytė, who grew up close by, instructed CNN: “A soldier fell to his demise when his [safety] belt broke throughout a routine service test.
“Two different troopers died throughout a nitric acid spill whereas attempting to refuel the missile.”
Accomplished in 1962 after two years of development involving greater than 10,000 employees, the bottom was one of many USSR’s most secretive websites.
Surrounded by barbed wire and a two‑mile electrical fence, it remained hidden till US satellites lastly noticed it in 1978 — by which period it had already been decommissioned beneath disarmament agreements.
The doorway, nonetheless marked by a Russian signal studying “Please, wipe your toes,” leads right down to a labyrinth of rooms and 4 silos plunging 100 toes underground.
Guests can now peer into the abyss of one of many shafts, which by no means launched a missile however claimed lives throughout service.
The positioning as soon as housed round 300 troopers in a ghost city close by — bizarrely transformed right into a youngsters’s summer season camp referred to as Žuvėdra (“seagull”) after the bottom shut down.
Its bus cease nonetheless bears a mural of a gnome on a mushroom holding a flower.
After Lithuania broke free from Soviet rule in 1990, the bottom was deserted and stripped for scrap.
It reopened as a museum in 2012 with EU funding, giving the general public uncommon entry to a facility as soon as designed for nuclear battle.
At this time, the stark stays of the Plokštinė base — its mud‑lined hangars resembling historic pyramids — stand in sharp distinction to the idyllic lakes and forests round it.
The area, as soon as a militarized zone bristling with rockets, is now a gem of gradual journey in Lithuania.
The museum’s reveals stroll guests by means of propaganda, weapons know-how and every day life beneath Soviet management.
Lifelike mannequins dressed as grim troopers add to the unsettling ambiance, making the underground tour really feel like stepping again into the Iron Curtain period.
For locals like Brazdeikytė, recollections of the bottom run deep.
She remembers troopers turning into a part of on a regular basis life, usually engaged on close by collective farms however by no means daring to speak about what lay beneath the forest flooring.
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“We labored alongside troopers from totally different Soviet republics at collective farms, however by no means mentioned army subjects,” she instructed CNN.
The bottom’s location in Plokštinė forest was chosen rigorously by Soviet planners: the sandy soil was simple to excavate, close by Plateliai Lake offered water for cooling programs, and the sparse native inhabitants meant fewer eyes watching.
Guests in the present day can mix the chilling underground tour with the pure magnificence above floor.
Žemaitija Nationwide Park affords biking and mountaineering trails, and Lake Plateliai is a favourite spot for campers and nature lovers.
The close by city of Plateliai is house to an 18th‑century wood church and even a Mardi Gras museum with its well-known carved masks.
However deep beneath the birch bushes and Baltic pines, the echoes of the Chilly Struggle — and the lives misplaced in its shadow — linger within the silence.
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