Cod War
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The Cod Wars (also called the Iceland Cod Wars) were a series of confrontations between the United Kingdom and Iceland over Iceland's claims of authority over tracts of ocean off their coastline as being their exclusive fishery zone.
As fish stocks diminished around the world, the scope for confrontation has increased. Throughout the world, examples exist of a nation's fishing fleets committing systematic incursions into fishing areas considered either "protected" or under the jurisdiction of another country.
In 1972, Iceland—whose quarter of a million population was at that time almost exclusively dependent on fishing—unilaterally declared an Exclusive Economic Zone extending beyond its territorial waters, before announcing plans to reduce over-fishing. It policed its quota-system with its coast guard, leading to a series of net-cutting incidents with the British trawlers that fished the areas. As a result, a fleet of British Royal Naval warships and tug-boats was employed to act as a deterrent against any future harassment of British fishing crews by the much smaller Icelandic craft.
In 1976, a compromise between the two states allowed a maximum of 24 British trawlers access to the disputed 200 nautical mile (370 km) limit. This did not slow the decline of the British fisheries, severely affecting the economies of northern fishing ports in the UK, such as Grimsby, Hull and Fleetwood.
Two hundred nautical mile Exclusive Economic Zones became recognised internationally on November 14, 1994, after having been agreed at the conference on the Third United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in 1982.
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[edit] The Cod War of 1893
With the inevitable increases in fishing power enabled by steam power in the latter part of the 19th Century, pressure was exerted on boat owners and skippers to exploit new grounds. Large catches in Icelandic waters meant voyages across the North Atlantic became more regular. As a result, in 1893, the Danish Government, who governed Iceland and the Faroe Islands, claimed a fishing limit of 13 nautical miles (24 km) around their shores. British trawler owners disputed this claim and continued to send their ships to Icelandic waters. Danish gunboats patrolling the area escorted a number of vessels to port, fined them and confiscated their catch.
The British Government did not recognise this claim, on the grounds that setting such a precedent would lead to similar claims by nations which surrounded the North Sea, which would be damaging to the British fishing industry.
In 1896, the United Kingdom made an agreement with Iceland which allowed for British vessels to use any Icelandic port for shelter, provided they stowed their gear and trawl nets. In return, British vessels were not to fish east of a line from Illunypa to Thornodesker Islet.
In April 1899, the steam trawler Caspian, was fishing off the Faroe Islands when a Danish gunboat tried to arrest her for illegally fishing inside the limits. The trawler refused to stop and was fired upon. Eventually the trawler was caught, but before going aboard the Danish vessel, the skipper ordered his fishing mate to make a dash for it. The Caspian set off at full speed. The gunboat fired several shots, but could not catch up with the trawler, which returned heavily damaged to Grimsby. On board the Danish gunboat, the skipper of the Caspian was lashed to the mast. A court held at Thorshavn convicted him on several counts including illegal fishing and attempted assault and was jailed for thirty days.
With many British trawlers being charged and fined by Danish gunboats for fishing illegally within the 13 mile (24.1 km) limit (which the British Government did not recognise), the British press began to enquire why this Danish action against British interests was allowed to continue without intervention by the Royal Navy. The issue was left largely unresolved, and the reduction in fishing activity brought about by the First World War effectively ended the dispute.
[edit] The First Cod War
The First Cod War lasted from 1 September until 12 November 1958. It began as soon as a new Icelandic law that expanded the Icelandic fishery zone from 4 nautical miles (nm) to 12 nm (from 7.4 to 22.2 km), came into force at midnight of 1 September.
The British declared that their trawlers would fish under protection from their warships in three areas, out of the Vestfjords, north of Horn and to the southeast of Iceland. All in all, 20 British trawlers, 4 warships and a supply vessel were inside the newly declared zones.
Many incidents followed, such as the one on 4 September, when V/s Ægir attempted to take a British trawler off the Vestfjords, but was thwarted when HMS Russel intervened, and the two vessels collided.
At the end of September, the crew of V/s Þór (Thor) noticed that the British trawler Cape Palliser was flying the Soviet flag along with the Union Jack. Þór's captain sent a message to the commander of HMS Grafton, asking whether this was done at their request or the crew of the Cape Palliser had actually changed their nationality. When news of this reached the USSR, the Soviet government protested heavily, for this was a violation of international law. Later the Cape Palliser was rammed and holed amidships by another trawler. During the period it was drifting helplessly, the Captain of the Þór attempted to board the Cape Palliser and arrest her, but was thwarted by HMS Grafton, who did temporary repairs by putting a patch on to the Cape Palliser so that she could limp home. The Cape Palliser stopped in Faroe Islands (Thorshavn) on the way back to Hull, where the shipyard workers, though on strike, turned out to make a more permanent repair to the Cape Palliser, by welding a plate over the hole in her side.
On 6 October, V/s María Júlía fired three shots at the trawler Kingston Emerald, yet the trawler escaped to sea.
On 12 November, V/s Þór encountered the trawler Hackness which had not stowed its nets legally. Hackness did not stop until Þór had fired two blanks and one live shell off its bow. Once again, H.M.S. Russel came to the rescue and its shipmaster ordered the Icelandic captain to leave the trawler alone as it was not within the 4 nm (7.4 km). Þór's captain, Eiríkur Kristófersson, protested that he would surely not do so, and ordered his men to approach the trawler with the gun manned. In response, the Russel threatened to sink the Icelandic boat if it so much as fired one shot at the Hackness. More British ships then arrived and the Hackness escaped.
Eventually the British government yielded to Iceland.
[edit] The Second Cod War
On 1 September 1972, the enforcement of the law that expanded the Icelandic fishery limits to 50 nm (92.6 km) began. Numerous British and West German trawlers continued fishing within the new zone on the first day.
The next day, the V/s Ægir chased 16 trawlers in waters east of the country, out of the 50 nm zone.
During this war, the Icelandic Coast Guard started to use the net cutters.
On 18 January 1973, the nets were cut off eighteen trawlers. This day forced the British seamen to threaten to leave the Icelandic fishery zone unless they had the protection of the Royal Navy. The day after, large, fast tugboats were sent to their defence. The first was the Statesman. The British considered this insufficient, and formed a special group to defend the trawlers.
On 23 January 1973, the volcano Eldfell on Heimaey erupted and the Coast Guard needed to divert its attention to rescuing the inhabitants of the small island.
On 17 May, the British trawlers left only to return two days later along with British frigates.
The Icelandic lightship Árvakur collided with four British vessels on 1 June and six days later V/s Ægir collided with H.M.S. Scylla, when it was reconnoitring for icebergs off the Vestfjords, even though no trawlers were present.
On 16 September, Joseph Luns, Secretary-General of NATO, arrived in Reykjavík to talk with Icelandic ministers, who had been pressed to leave NATO as it had been of no help to the Icelandic people in the conflict.
After a series of talks within NATO, British warships were recalled on 3 October. An agreement was signed on 8 November.
The agreement bound British fishing to certain areas inside the 50 nm limit, resolving the dispute that time. The resolution was on the premise that British trawlers would limit their annual catch to no more than 130,000 tons. This agreement expired in November 1975, and the third "Cod War" began.
[edit] The Third Cod War
The Third Cod War (November 1975–June 1976) occurred again between the United Kingdom and Iceland. Iceland had declared that the ocean up to 200 miles (370 km) from its coast fell under Icelandic authority. The British government did not recognize this large increase to the exclusion zone, and as a result, there came to be an issue with British fishermen and their 'incursion' into the disputed zone. The 'war', which was the most hard fought of the Cod Wars, saw British fishing trawlers have their nets cut by the Icelandic Coast Guard, and there were several incidents of ramming by Icelandic ships and British trawlers, frigates and tug-boats.
One of the more severe incidents happened in the middle of December, 1975. V/s Þór, under the command of Helgi Hallvarðsson was leaving port at Seyðisfjörður, where they had been minesweeping, when orders were received to investigate the presence of unidentified foreign vessels at the mouth of the fjord. These vessels were identified as three British ships, Lloydsman which was three times bigger than V/s Þór, Star Aquarius (an oil rig supply vessel of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food), and Star Polaris. They were sheltering from a force nine gale within Iceland's 12 mile territorial waters.[citation needed] Around two nautical miles from the coast, the Royal Navy said Thor moved alongside the British vessels and signalled that the Star Aquarius should stop or she would shoot at the unarmed ships.[citation needed] Reports are confused about which vessel then struck the other but as the Thor broke away the Lloydsman surged forward to protect the Star Aquarius. Captain Albert MacKenzie of the Star Aquarius said the Þór approached from the stern and hit the support vessel, before it veered off and fired a shot from a range of about 100 yards. Niels Sigurdsson, the Icelandic Ambassador in London, said the Thor had been firing in self-defence after it had been rammed by British vessels. This incident led to Iceland charging Britain before the United Nations Security Council as it happened well within Icelandic territorial waters.
A second incident occurred in 1976, when HMS Andromeda was dented when Thor sailed close to her bow. Thor sustained a hole in its hull. The British Ministry of Defence said that the collision represented a "deliberate attack" on the British warship "without regard for life". The Icelandic coastguard on the other hand insisted Andromea had rammed Thor by "overtaking the boat and then swiftly changing course".
Britain deployed a total of 22 frigates against 16 Icelandic vessels. The Icelandic government tried to acquire U.S. Ashville class gunboats, and when denied by the American government they tried to get Soviet Mirka class frigates. In response, the United Kingdom deployed a total of twenty-two frigates, seven supply ships, nine tug-boats, and three support ships to protect its fishing trawlers,although only six to nine were on deployment at any one time.
A more serious turn of events came when Iceland threatened closure of the NATO base at Keflavík, which would, in the military perception of the time, have severely impaired NATO's ability to defend the Atlantic Ocean from the Soviet Union. As a result, the British government agreed to have its fishermen stay outside Iceland's 200 nautical mile (370 km) exclusion zone without a specific agreement.
[edit] The Last Ramming
On the evening of 6 May 1976, after the end of the third Cod War had already been decided, the Icelandic ship Týr was caught trying to cut the nets of the trawler Carlisle. Captain Gerald Plumer of HMS Falmouth decided to ram V/s Týr. The Falmouth at the speed of 22+ knots (41+ km/h) steamed into the ship, almost capsizing her. However, Týr did not sink and managed to cut the nets of Carlisle anyway. This resulted in another ramming. At that moment Týr was heavily damaged and proppelled by only a single screw and pursued by the tug-boat Statesman. In this dire situation Guðmundur Kjærnested, captain of V/s Týr gave orders to man the guns, in spite of the overwhelming superiority of firepower the Falmouth enjoyed.
[edit] Source of the name
It is believed by some that the name stems from a pun on the term "Cold War" (with "cod" reading so similarly to "cold"), possibly via the British tabloid press—however, the Icelandic name for these "conflicts" is Þorskastríðin, which can translate into Cod Wars in English. Which term came first is unknown.
The Cod Wars are also occasionally called the Landhelgisstríðin in Iceland, which can be translated as "The wars for the territorial waters". This name, however, is a reference to the Icelandic Coast Guard as its name in Icelandic directly translates as "Territorial waters Guard", since the wars were not for the territorial waters but for the expansion of an exclusive economic area. (Although the fighting was occasionally taken into Icelandic territorial waters.)
[edit] The Cod Wars in popular culture
The UK show The Goodies featured a parody of the Cod Wars with encroaching Icelanders territory now well within British waters. During the episode Icelandic fishermen—dressed as Eskimos—were seeking the capture of a giant cod—which later exploded and turned into fish fingers.
[edit] See also
- Overfishing
- British military history
- Spanish ships and the Canadian Navy had clashes over fishing in the 1990s in what was known in the Spanish press as la guerra del fletán, the Turbot War.
[edit] Further reading
- Kurlansky, Mark. Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World. New York: Walker & Company, 1997 (reprint edition: Penguin, 1998). ISBN 0802713262, ISBN 0140275010.
[edit] References
- American University Case Study - The Cod War
- MV Miranda Site Website of the MV Miranda, a Trawler support vessel
- Britain's Small Wars - The Cod War
- BBC Video footage from the BBC (Requires Realplayer)
- Þorskastríðin (Icelandic) - Fiskveiðideilur Íslendinga við erlendar þjóðir, by Guðni Jóhannesson
- BBC 'On this Day' 1973: Royal Navy moves to protect trawlers
- BBC 'On this Day' 1975: "Attack on British vessels heightens Cod War"
