Iceland in the Cold War 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, during which they took significant steps toward nuclear disarmament. Five years later, in 1991, Iceland became the first country to recognize the renewed independence of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania when they broke away from the Soviet Union. Early in
Origins of the Cold War help to the Communists. The United States had tried in 1945–1948 to bring the Nationalists and Communists together in a coalition, but had no success. The conflict was not therefore part of the Cold War until 1949–1959. By the late 1950s, however, China and the USSR were at sword's point, and became bitter enemies over ideological control of the Marxist–Leninist orthodoxy. The two set up rival communist organizations in countries across the world. The Cold War then became a three-way conflict. France for many years had been dealing with a nationalist insurgency in Vietnam in which communists, led by Ho