Iceland in the Cold War the military protection of the United States, even if the economic benefits of the US military presence are gone. With the withdrawal of US forces, the country's military co-operation with other allied NATO countries, such as Norway, has increased. Iceland in the Cold War Throughout the Cold War, the nation of Iceland was a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and allied with the United States, hosting a US military presence in Keflavík Air Base from 1951 to 2006. In 1986, Iceland hosted a summit in Reykjavík between United States President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev,
1989 Sino-Soviet Summit massive student protests in the Chinese capital. Nonetheless, neither side proposed to postpone or reschedule the meeting. Gorbachev refused to pass judgement on the student protests in hopes that the Chinese leaders and the student protesters would resolve their differences by themselves. Even though the demonstrations disrupted the reception of the Soviet delegation and many of the social events of the visit were cancelled, Gorbachev was still very pleased with the reception in Beijing as well as the summit as a whole as he was able to accomplish his goal of normalizing relations. According to political scientist, William Taubman, even