A planet-swallowing black hole.
A nuclear confrontation in the Middle East that rapidly erupts into planet-wide atomic-warfare.
An unrelenting and incurable virus.
Hostile aliens.
There is also the view that the only thing likely to change is humankind’s mindset. In a best-case scenario, we will find ourselves on a new pathway toward world peace, enlightenment, and a renewed respect for our world and each other. Yeah, I know; kind of boring, and hardly the stuff of a big-bucks Hollywood movie. But it has been presented as a viable option.
On the other hand, we may all wake up safely on December 22 to find that absolutely nothing has changed in the slightest, and we can look forward to opening our Christmas presents only a few days later without fear of Armageddon. After all, not a single prophecy in the history of the planet has ever been proven conclusively to have come 100 percent true, so why should the 2012 fears be any different? It’s a perfectly reasonable question to ask. Unfortunately, “nothing is going to happen” fails to strike much of a chord with the media, the populace, or the domain of onscreen entertainment. “Worldwide catastrophe is only months away” does, however. All of which brings us to a critical issue: the extent to which such End Times beliefs — valid or not so valid — may have even infected the collective mind of the world’s governments.
Norway
In 2010, a highly controversial communication allegedly written and circulated by an unnamed Norwegian politician was widely published across the Internet and attracted a flurry of major attention in the process. It has been dismissed by many as nothing more than a tasteless, fear-mongering hoax, which it may very well be. But it contains at least a couple of intriguing nuggets of verifiable truth, which has ensured the controversy remains. It reads as follows:
I am a Norwegian politician. I would like to say that difficult things will happen from the year 2008 till the year 2012. The Norwegian government is building more and more underground bases and bunkers. When asked, they simply say that it is for the protection of the people of Norway. When I enquire when they are due to be finished, they reply before 2011. Israel is also doing the same and many other countries too. My proof that what I am saying is true is in the photographs I have sent of myself and all the Prime Ministers and ministers I tend to meet and am acquainted with. They know all of this, but they don’t want to alarm the people or create mass panic. Planet X is coming, and Norway has begun with storage of food and seeds in the Svalbard area and in the arctic north with the help of the U.S. and EU [European Union] and all around in Norway. They will only save those who are in the elite of power and those that can build up again: doctors, scientists, and so on. As for me, I already know that I am going to leave before 2012 to go the area of Mosjøen where we have a deep underground military facility. There we are divided into sectors, red, blue and green. The signs of the Norwegian military are already given to them and the camps have already been built a long time ago. The people that are going to be left on the surface and die with along the others [sic] will get no help whatsoever. The plan is that 2,000,000 Norwegians are going to be safe, and the rest will die.[25]
Hoax, joke, a distortion of reality, or an earnest and honest attempt to reveal the shocking truth of a dark fate that awaits us all in a very short time? We would all like to know the answer to that one. One thing is certain, however: The Norwegian government is preparing for the possibility of some sort of future, hypothetical cataclysmic event — not necessarily linked to 2012. It revolves around something called the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, which is situated on the Norwegian island of Spitzbergen. The SGSV acts as a secure repository for countless plant and crop seeds, partly in the event that some sort of above-surface disaster will require a below-surface attempt to rejuvenate the Norwegian landscape and populace. Interestingly, within UFO research circles, there have been longstanding rumors of a flying saucer having slammed into the ground on Spitzbergen back in the early 1950s, instantly killing its crew on impact. But I digress…a worldwide disaster just around the corner is far more important than a 60-year-old UFO crash could ever be. (That is, unless you happened to have been one of the unlucky pilots of that UFO.)
As far back as 1984, Norway’s Nordic Gene Bank was quietly collecting seeds and storing them within the depths of an old coal mine on Spitzbergen. More than a quarter of a century later, things have been taken to a whole new level — and I do mean literally a whole new leveclass="underline" Extending nearly 400 feet into and under a mountain on the island and controlled by what is known as the Nordic Genetic Resource Center, the SGSV is an incredibly impressive setup, which would surely make the builders of Hangar 18 green with envy.
In February 2008, after almost two years of construction, the installation was proudly unveiled, amid the startling revelation that it was already home to more than 1.5 million distinct seed types. And with countless safeguards to protect its precious cargo (possibly even for a period of thousands of years), this static, Noah’s Ark of plants quickly caught the attention of the world’s media — particularly so when it was revealed that numerous countries had a financial stake in its construction and content, including Australia, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, and Sweden. Even the Rockefeller Foundation and Bill Gates provided funding in the millions. Does Bill, perhaps, know something the rest of us don’t? Will he be making a quick trip to Spitzbergen around, say, December 18 or 19, 2012? Maybe he’ll have the presence of mind to fly in a week or two earlier, just to be safe.
Whatever the truth, the Norwegian government prefers to focus more upon the scientific importance of the project, rather than having to constantly answer awkward, survivalist questions about 2012. The fact is that the SGSV could, in an emergency situation, offer some degree of survival for a significant number of people. Providing you’re Norwegian. But what if, like most of the world’s population, you’re not? The word screwed might well pop up in the minds of many.
China
China has also been the target of claims in recent years that it has greatly expanded its plans to construct secret installations, either underground or burrowed right out of dense hills, as a result of a forthcoming, prophesied apocalypse. The most visible such place is located on the southernmost tip of Hainan Island, in the South China Sea, and has become known as Sanya Base. Although many Western military analysts believe the facility to be a secret installation designed for the construction, maintenance, and storage of an ever-growing armada of Chinese nuclear submarines, not everyone is certain that’s all it is. Vast tunnels more than 60 feet high have been photographed in and around the base and are said to expand into gigantic caverns that run far below the green hills. Maybe this really is merely China’s attempt to revamp its submarine fleet via the rapid construction of countless new underwater craft. However, the vast sculpting of Sanya is still underway right now, which has left more than a few 2012 researchers wondering if, time-wise, there might be a connection to the old Mayan predictions.
Russia
Some say Russia, too, is pulling out all the stops to complete the construction of a multitude of underground survival facilities before 2012 hits us, particularly in some of the more remote areas of the land. Two such bases are buried deep within the Yamantau and Kosvinsky Mountains in the Urals. And make no mistake: The installations are very real. Rudimentary construction at both sites was confirmed in the late 1970s by spy satellites of the United States’s National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). Today, the bases have progressed significantly, and data recently collected by other U.S. satellites suggests that expansion of both places in the last few years has been widespread and intense. The Kosvinsky site, for example, is now protected by around 1,000 feet of granite. It is a self-contained hub capable, rumor has it, of comfortably housing in excess of 50,000 individuals. As for the Yamantau base…well, one U.S. intelligence source has suggested it is the size of the Washington, D.C. area within the Beltway.