During World War II, Operation Tabarin was a small British expedition launched from the UK in 1943 to the Antarctic to to establish permanently occupied bases.
Lead by Lieutenant James Marr, the team left the Falkland Islands in two ships on Saturday January 29, 1944. Bases were established during February near an abandoned Norwegian whaling station on Deception Island (February 3) in the South Shetland Islands, and at Port Lockroy (February 11) on the coast of Graham Land. A further base was founded at Hope Bay on February 13, 1945, after a failed attempt to unload stores on February 7 1944.
Operation Highjump (OpHjp), officially titled The United States Navy Antarctic Developments Program, 1946-47, was a United States Navy operation in Antarctica under the command of Richard Cruzen, which was launched on 26 August 1946 and lasted until 1947.
After the operation ended, a follow-up Operation Windmill returned to the area, citing that a large percentage of the aerial photographs from the earlier mission had been poorly exposed, and needed to be re-shot.
Operation Highjump has become a topic among UFO conspiracy theorists, who claim it was a covert US military operation to conquer alleged secret underground Nazi facilities in the Antarctica and capture the German Vril flying discs, or Thule mercury-powered spaceship prototypes.
At the time of the operation, the US Navy itself was being taken apart piece by piece as the battle-tested fleet was decommissioned with its mostly civilian crew bidding farewell to the seas forever.
The operation was also launched with incredible speed, “a matter of weeks.” Perhaps it would not be uncharitable to conclude that the Americans had some unfinished business connected with the war in the polar region.
Firstly, Operation Highjump would have to provide evidence that the mission included a reconnaissance of Neu-Swabenland and secondly, there would have to be an area of the frozen continent that could allow such a base to exist throughout the year.
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