Cod Wars Cod Wars The Cod Wars (, "the cod wars", or "Landhelgisstríðin", "the wars for the territorial waters") were a series of confrontations between the United Kingdom and Iceland on fishing rights in the North Atlantic. Each of the disputes ended with an Icelandic victory. The Third Cod War concluded in 1976, with a highly favourable agreement for Iceland; the United Kingdom conceded to a Icelandic exclusive fishery zone after threats that Iceland would withdraw from NATO, which would have forfeited NATO's access to most of the GIUK gap, a critical anti-submarine warfare during the Cold War. As a result, British
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