The United States are to re-open a Cold-War era military base in Iceland amid deteriorating relations with Russia, the U.S. military have announced. The plans have been kept secret from the public and the Prime Minister of Iceland himself, until now. Sputniknews.com reports: “A lot of Icelanders are worried,” Paul Fontaine, news editor with the Reykjavik Grapevine, told Radio Sputnik. “When the base closed in 2006, a lot of Icelanders were relieved.” Located near the capital of Reykjavik, the base, originally built during World War II, will be retrofitted to house P-8 Poseidon surveillance planes. News of this arrangement came as a complete surprise to many Icelanders. “Why did we learn about this from Stars and Stripes, the US military’s media outlet,” Fontaine asked. “Even the Prime Minister himself said that he learned about these plans from the news, and that’s highly unusual.” While the US has so far stated that it only plans to upgrade a single hangar, the move makes it likely that the military presence at the base could be greatly expanded in the future. “The US military has said that they kind of look at Iceland as having the potential to be like their base in Sicily,” Fontaine says. “And their base in Sicily has some 4,000 troops and family members and other base workers. I think that calls for worry.” While [...]