Cod Wars Iceland's unilateral extension of its fishery limits from . Unlike in the Cod Wars, the Royal Navy was never sent into Icelandic waters. The British trawling industry, however, implemented costly sanctions on Iceland by imposing a landing ban on Icelandic fish in British ports. The landing ban was a major blow to the Icelandic fishing industry (the UK was Iceland's largest export market for fish) and caused consternation among Icelandic statesmen. The two sides decided to refer one part of the Icelandic extension to the ICJ in early 1953: the controversial Faxa Bay delimitation. Cold War politics proved favourable for
Cod fisheries that can be taken not only with nets but with fishing-baskets," and around 1600 English fishing captains still reported cod shoals "so thick by the shore that we hardly have been able to row a boat through them." In the early sixteenth century, fishermen from England, France, Spain and Portugal discovered the best places to fish for cod in the waters off Newfoundland, and how best to preserve the fish for the journey home. The French, Spanish and Portuguese fishermen tended to fish on the Grand Banks and other banks out to sea, where fish were always available. They salted