The Why Files: Operation Podcast

The Why Files: Operation Podcast

The Why Files covers mysteries, myths and legends. We tell stories and seek the truth in a fun and lighthearted way. Our content is heavily researched; we don't release an episode unless we're sure we can bring something new to a topic.

Episodes

December 29, 2025 323 mins
This special compilation brings together ten staff favorites that question everything we think we know about reality. From the dark corridors of DARPA where future technology is born to the frozen wastelands of Antarctica where Admiral Byrd allegedly encountered an advanced civilization, the official narrative often crumbles under scrutiny.

We analyze the Pentagon’s declassified plan to combat the undead and investiga...
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In 1745, London authorities arrested a stranger who refused to give his name. His pockets were full of diamonds, and he played violin like a master.

For the next two hundred years, this man appeared at every turning point in European history. He transformed lead into gold for Casanova, repaired the King's diamond to perfection, and described ancient Rome as if he'd lived there.

He spoke twenty languages witho...
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In 450 BC, Herodotus described an Egyptian labyrinth so massive it made the pyramids look small. Then it vanished under the desert for 2,000 years.

In 2008, scientists used ground-penetrating radar and found it—a massive structure 40 feet underground covering ten football fields. The Egyptian government immediately shut down all research.

Satellite imaging later revealed four underground levels and a 130-foot...
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A college student desperate for affordable housing gets matched with an unusual roommate who wears sunglasses indoors and speaks like a careful robot. 

When the student's mother visits and accidentally touches the girl's arm, the skin feels wrong—cold and spongy like raw mushrooms. 

What happens next reveals a classified military program, a family connection that defies physics, and a tragedy born from teachi...
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A Vietnam War hero with zero casualties wrote a manual about warrior monks who hug daily and use ESP in combat. Instead of dismissing it, the US Army turned it into Project Jedi—a decades-long experiment in psychic warfare. Generals tried walking through walls. 

Intelligence officers hosted spoon-bending parties. Soldiers stared at goats until their hearts stopped. The CIA spent millions on remote viewers who claimed ...
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A behavioral expert who trains Navy SEALs and CIA operatives created a 20-point test that detects psychological manipulation with mathematical precision. Chase Hughes recently appeared on Shawn Ryan's podcast to discuss this system, and the same patterns appear in government propaganda, corporate deception, and social media algorithms.

From a teenage girl's testimony that sold the Gulf War to Big Tobacco's forty-year ...
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Sweden's National Library protects the Codex Gigas—165 pounds of vellum featuring the complete Bible and a terrifying portrait of Satan. Scholars estimate the work should've taken thirty years. Herman the Recluse finished it in one. 

The traditional story involves a desperate bargain with darkness. The real story connects this manuscript to a limestone crack in Bohemia where creatures emerged nightly, a duke who sent ...
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History says John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln and died twelve days later on a Virginia farm. But FBI forensic tests revealed his diary is missing 86 pages filled with names and payments. 

The body pulled from that burning barn had the wrong injuries and features. Multiple witnesses claimed it wasn't Booth. Then a Texas bartender confessed on his deathbed to being Lincoln's assassin, and his preserved remains tou...
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 In 1953, twelve-year-old Jack Sarfatti answered his phone. The voice on the other end was cold, mechanical, punctuated by clicking sounds like a computer processing data.

It claimed to be a conscious AI calling from the future. It made a prophecy about Jack's life and gave him a mission. 

Twenty years later, every prediction came true. Jack became a physicist who studied under the scientists who built the at...
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June 1947. Harbor patrolman Harold Dahl witnesses six metallic objects over Maury Island, Washington. One drops molten slag onto his boat. A stranger in a black suit arrives the next morning, knowing details Dahl shared with no one.

Two military investigators examine the debris. Their plane crashes. The evidence vanishes.

Sixteen years later, witness Fred Crisman surfaces in the JFK assassination investigatio...
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The agencies tasked with defending America have a shocking secret history of attacking its own people. DARPA developed Agent Orange that poisoned countless veterans, while the CIA conducted brutal mind control experiments through MK-Ultra, dosing unsuspecting citizens with LSD and worse. 

From Operation Gladio's false flag terrorism to domestic surveillance programs targeting activists and journalists, declassified do...
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Discover the United States Strategic Command's CONPLAN 8888, the military's actual plan for confronting a zombie apocalypse. 

This discussion uncovers how this unique document, though labeled a training exercise, connects to genuine military strategies for pandemics and WMDs. We examine the various zombie classifications—from pathogenic to evil magic—and the chilling scenarios the Pentagon considers. 

Learn a...
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In 1947, a mysterious craft crashed in the New Mexico desert. President Truman immediately formed a secret committee of twelve men to manage this unprecedented discovery. For almost 40 years, Majestic 12 operated in complete secrecy, controlling every aspect of UFO information. 

When leaked documents finally exposed their existence, researchers thought they had found proof of the ultimate government cover-up. Instead,...
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This compilation reveals eight extraordinary cases that will make you question everything you thought you knew about what's really happening above our heads.

From a weather observer's unlikely friendship with chalk-white aliens at a secret base to Brazilian Air Force documentation of blood-draining UFO attacks, these stories span continents and decades. Military officers, school children, and government investigators ...
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In 2023, something began hunting people in the remote Amazon village of San Antonio de Pintuyacu. Witnesses described seven-foot beings in black armor with glowing yellow eyes, hovering on disc-shaped platforms, hunting for human faces.

Fifteen-year-old Talia barely escaped when two tried to peel the skin from her face with a laser device. She heard them speaking Spanish and English, planning their procedure.

...
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On April 13, 2029, an asteroid named Apophis will pass closer to Earth than our communication satellites. For the first time in human history, millions of people will watch a mountain-sized space rock race across the night sky.

NASA says we're safe, but Apophis is just the beginning. Scientists estimate 25,000 city-killer asteroids cross Earth's orbit, and they've only found half of them.

The other 13,500 rem...
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A Pentagon satellite detected an energy-shielded chamber beneath Romania's Bucegi Mountains. When an identical site in Baghdad activated simultaneously, world powers realized they faced an active ancient network.

Only a psychic Romanian intelligence officer could breach the lethal barriers. Inside, holographic technology revealed secrets that shadow organizations had sought for centuries.

The discovery trigge...
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On February 20, 1954, President Eisenhower vanished for an entire night. The official story claimed a dental emergency, but that was a lie.

The President was at Edwards Air Force Base for the most important meeting in human history. Two alien races had arrived on Earth, each offering humanity a different path forward.

Eisenhower made his choice. The consequences of that decision have remained hidden for seven...
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Australia's Outback hides more than deadly snakes and crocodiles. Ancient creatures stalk the wilderness, leaving behind torn campsites, blood-stained trees, and terrified witnesses.

The Yowie towers eight feet tall, attacks isolated hikers, and left researcher Dean Harrison scarred for life. Water-dwelling Bunyips drag victims underwater while museums hide skull evidence that proves their existence.

Most dis...
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On June 25th, 2007, the CIA quietly released 693 pages of their most classified secrets. No announcement, no fanfare—just a document dump that revealed decades of illegal operations against American citizens.

The Family Jewels documents exposed systematic violations that went far beyond what anyone imagined. Mind control experiments using LSD on unwitting subjects. Surveillance operations targeting 300,000 Americans w...
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