History HD reveals the power and passion of history as an inviting place where people experience history personally and connect their own lives to the great lives and events of the past.

History HD

History - fascinating and exclusive programs on subjects ranging from American and world history to explorations of major events in politics, entertainment and social history.

History

A broadcast details historical espionage technology and covert surveillance operations; the account examines military tracking sensors used in Vietnam, a nuclear-powered surveillance device placed in the Himalayas and a Soviet listening device concealed within a gift presented to a U.S. ambassador; the documentation highlights how intelligence agencies use disguised tools to gather information during international conflicts.

Secrets Declassified With David Duchovny

Spy Gadgets

A broadcast details secret military architecture and defense installations; the account examines a 112,000-square-foot government bunker built beneath a five-star hotel, a fake wartime town constructed to conceal a factory and a secluded CIA training facility in West Virginia; the documentation highlights the historical methods utilized by intelligence and defense agencies to ensure government continuity and operational security.

Hidden Bases

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Some deals are made to announce headlines, while others are steered in the shadows; when the CIA wants to take out the Iraqi Prime Minister, they turn to a 20-year-old law student named Saddam Hussein, while in Guatemala, a banana company colludes with the CIA to topple the country's leader to protect its profits; decades later in Ukraine, a top-secret unit of CIA operatives thwarts Russia's invasion plans, before the world even knows the battle has begun.

Dark Deals

When conventional tactics fail, governments have been known to test the boundaries of reality; in the darkest days of World War II, Britain turns to an astrologer who claims he can alter the course of war using the power of the stars; in the jungles of Vietnam, U.S. forces turn to dowsing rods and ancient mystical practices to locate enemies hidden underground.

High Strangeness

Sometimes when governments can't negotiate their way to victory, they steal it; when the KGB sets its sights on a NATO missile, they enlist a smooth-talking German playboy armed with only a wheelbarrow, a carpet and a postage stamp; an Israeli covert operation hijacks 200 tons of uranium on the high seas to fuel a secret nuclear arsenal, while during WWII, the Allies deploy a female agent to steal top-secret naval codes, solely with seductive charm.

Covert Heists

Some missions are so risky, they're denied before they even begin. From a covert Mossad operation to abduct a Nazi war criminal in Argentina-identified through the smallest detail, the shape of his ears-to a chilling CIA plot that used a jazz tour as cover for an assassination attempt in the Congo; to one resistance fighter volunteering to be captured and sent to Auschwitz to reveal the horrors within-these operations are proof that the most dangerous missions are often the most unthinkable.

Rogue Missions

To outmaneuver the enemy, you have to sell the illusion; an FBI agent goes so deep undercover he's the best man at a Mafia wedding, while the Stasi deploys a covert network of charmers across borders to win trust and steal secrets; in Egypt, a German-born Jewish spy poses as a high-flying, champagne-soaked ex-Nazi to infiltrate its missile program for Israel.

Masters of Deception

In Operation Halyard, villagers and resistance fighters built an airstrip by hand to spirit stranded airmen out of Nazi territory, while Operation Mount Hope saw American forces steal a Soviet helicopter from the African desert under cover of darkness.

Extreme Extractions

Some of history's boldest missions succeeded because the world was looking the wrong way; the CIA concealed covert missions behind Air America's civilian façade, British intelligence planted a falsified invasion plan on a corpse to mislead Hitler, and "Agent Sonya" blended into English suburbia while funneling atomic secrets to Moscow; David Duchovny takes us into the long-spun elaborate tales governments have employed to blanket their boldest missions, showing us how the illusion works.

Smoke and Mirrors

When science meets national security, the results can be staggering: the secretive flights of Project Argus sent nuclear warheads into space to test whether radiation could cripple Soviet weapons, while Operation LAC covertly released chemical agents over American communities to simulate biological warfare; inside Stalin's secretive laboratory, even human waste became intelligence, analyzed to decipher the minds of adversaries, proof that no angle was too extraordinary to explore.

Extraordinary Experiments

Behind official policy often stand unofficial actors; discover the operations of Red Cell, the covert Navy SEAL team that staged attacks on U.S. bases to expose deadly weaknesses; "The Shop", the CIA's clandestine cadre of expert thieves and lock pickers who stole secrets worldwide; and the Alamo Scouts, the elite World War II special forces whose exploits remained a hidden chapter of history for decades; these units thrived where denial was policy, kept in the dark.

Secret Units

When secrecy can be the key to survival, codebreaking becomes a battlefield of its own; a stranded American pilot in Vietnam is rescued through a code built around familiar golf courses, while Navajo Code Talkers transmit messages that help turn the tide in the Pacific during World War II; David Duchovny breaks down every breakthrough where a strategist turned language into leverage.

Cracking the Code

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David Duchovny investigates some of the most secretive, disturbing or strangest government activities that have been declassified through history.

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Desperation breeds invention, and not all of it conventional; from a British scheme to launch airborne balloons against Nazi Germany, to American bats fitted with incendiary devices, to a covert effort to manipulate monsoon rains in Vietnam, newly unearthed documents reveal how far nations were willing to bend reality to their will; in the risky calculus of war, nothing is too strange to try.

S2 E5 | Bizarre Weapons