1918-1939 Iceland since 1945









Iceland during World War II

When World War II broke out, the Icelanders sympathized with Britain, France and soon-occupied Poland, and then with Finland which found itself under attack from the Soviet Red Army. The Icelandic government, although not responsible for foreign policy (a prerogative of the Danish government) pursued a policy of neutrality.
On April 9th 1940, German troops occupied Denmark; the British occupied the Faroes and Iceland (May 1940, c. 25,000 troops) to make sure the Germans would not establish footholds there. Just after the ATLANTIC CONFERENCE, US forces established an airbase on Greenland (1941) and took over the task of occupying Iceland from the British (60,000 troops); they established a base there at Keflavik.
A few Icelandic cargo or fishing vessels were sunk by German u-boats, aircraft or sea mines. German airforce planes repeatedly flew over Iceland, but caused little damage.
In 1944, the Icelanders met at Thingvellir, where they declared full independence from Denmark. As first president, they elected SVEINN BJOERNSSON, who had acted as regent since 1941.






EXTERNAL
FILES 		Timeline Icelandic History, from Nordic Usenet
DOCUMENTS Documents relating to the evacuation of children of Reykjavik 1940, from EuArchiv Reykjavik
Icelandic banknotes, from Ron Wise's World Paper Money and from Currency Museum
Lists of Presidents, Prime Ministers etc. from World Statesmen by Ben Cahoon
Message of President Roosevelt to the Congress on Iceland, July 7, 1941, from V. Ferraro, Mt.Holyoke, also from Public Papers of the Presidents : Franklin D. Roosevelt; from Words of Peace, Words of War; from Jewish Virtual Library
Prime Minister, Winston Churchill in House of Commons on U.S. Troops in Iceland, July 9, 1941, from Words of Peace, Words of War
REFERENCE Article : Iceland, in : Statesman's Year Book 1943 pp.1009-1015 [G]
Article : Iceland, in : Americana Annual 1940 pp.373-374, 1943 pp.354-355, 1944 pp.330-331, 1945 pp.350-351, 1946 pp.356-357 [G]
Article : Iceland, in : New International Year Book Events of 1940 p.344, 1941 pp.268-271, 1942 pp.312-313, 1943 pp.273-274, 1944 pp.283-284, 1945 pp.263-264 [G]
Article : Iceland, in : Britannica Book of the Year 1944 pp.345-346, 1945 pp.349-350 [G]
Article : Iceland, in : Funk & Wagnall's New Standard Encyclopedia Year Book 1940 pp.295-296, 1941 pp.245-246, 1942 pp.220-221, 1943 pp.223-224, 1944 p.148 [G]


This page is part of World History at KMLA
First posted in 2001, last revised on August 25th 2007

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