Troubled Waters

How Iceland Won the Cod Wars
A conflict between two NATO members in the middle of the Cold War. The conflict has a long historical background.

In the icy North Atlantic, a tiny nation took on a superpower – and won. No one has told the full story of the Cod Wars in book form – until now. Nathan Morley digs deep into the centuries-old struggle for cod, tracing Britain’s presence in Icelandic waters back over 500 years. What unfolds is a raw, high-stakes drama: Britain, deploying warships and diplomatic muscle, versus Iceland, wielding conviction, cunning, and a fleet of trawlers. It was a clash not just over fish, but over sovereignty, survival, and the waning authority of empire.

With exclusive interviews, secret cables, and a personal connection – his own father was a fisherman caught in the storm – Morley reveals how Iceland turned a local dispute into a global reckoning. The Cod Wars were brief and bloodless, but they were quietly revolutionary.

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