Britain, the United States and the Militarization of Iceland 1945–1951

Abstract

This article focuses on British attitudes towards US military bases in Iceland, 1945–1951. In the beginning, the British government was willing – for a mixture of idealist and realist reasons – to distance itself from the United States in an attempt to modify its military goals. British faith in the United Nations when it came to post-war security was genuine, even if its interpretation of the mandate of the UN Security Council proved wrong. And it did not want to antagonize the Soviet Union and thus tried to avoid a potential confrontation over bases in the Nordic countries. But the British position was compromised by a desire for joint wartime base rights with the Americans. With the emergence of the Cold War in 1946–1947, it is argued, a shift occurred in British policy. The United Kingdom gave the United States full backing in its quest to integrate Iceland into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949 and to station US military forces on the island in 1951. British cooperation with the Americans in Iceland not only reflected shared opposition to the Soviet Union; it also entailed a willingness to help local Icelandic political elites to battle an internal foe: the Socialist Party. The British, however, were never in a position to shape Iceland's integration into the Western Alliance. During the early Cold War, their function was essentially to assist the United States in achieving and maintaining its military position in Iceland.