These Wars were Started Over… Food

15. The Second Cod War of 1972 – 1973

Pressures on the cod stocks in Icelandic waters from heavy fishing led to depleted catches by the end of the 1960s. In order to conserve, and to give their own fishermen a wider area of protected waters, Iceland again extended their territorial limits in 1972, to 50 nautical miles. It was one of the rare occasions when the Warsaw Pact and NATO agreed. All opposed the extension, as it limited their own fishing fleets from some of the most fertile fisheries in the world. The Icelandic Coast Guard, considerably larger than in 1958, deployed net-cutters to sever the fishing trawlers’ nets when they encountered them. The British responded with aircraft patrols, which warned the units of the Royal Navy of the whereabouts of Icelandic patrol craft. British ships then positioned themselves to protect the fishing boats.

Once again, Iceland threatened to leave NATO and expel the American military. After several at sea incidents, numerous collisions and exchanges of gunfire, and the seizure of foreign fishing trawlers an agreement was brokered within NATO. The 50-mile limit was accepted, though foreign trawlers could enter it during specific seasons, and remain in specific areas, with a license. The British trawlers were limited to a catch of 130,000 tons. The agreement which ended the Second Cod War, signed in November 1973, was set to expire in two years. The interim period was to be used to resolve any remaining differences between Iceland and Great Britain over continued use of the Icelandic fisheries. Instead, the November 1975 expiration of the agreement serves as the starting point for the Third Cod War.

16. Iceland continued to attempt to expand its exclusive fisheries zones.

By the early 1970s, numerous nations supported the idea of expanding their territorial limits over the seas which bordered them. Traditionally, territorial limits had been defined by the range of shore-based cannon. By the 1970s that definition had long been obsolete. Long-range missiles, changes to ships and submarines, and other factors led to international conferences to discuss the world’s territorial waters and freedom of the seas. During the third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea, which opened in 1973, general agreement from many members set territorial limits at up to 100 miles, where practicable. Yet no official decision had been made. Meanwhile, despite its previous efforts to protect its fisheries, Iceland (and other countries) continued to monitor declining catches. Both the number of fish per vessel and the size of the fish declined.

In the summer of 1975 the Icelandic government, in response to pressure from the fishing industry, decided to once again extend the territorial limits. Their goal was to create a much larger exclusive fishing zone for their own fishing fleets and assign areas under license in the outer regions of the zone to foreign fishing trawlers. In July 1975, the Icelandic government announced that when the agreement which ended the Second Cod War expired in November, the territorial limits would be extended to 200 miles from Iceland’s shores. Though some concessions were offered to Great Britain, such as a limited number of trawlers and tonnage allowed in the new zone, the British refused to accept them. Britain announced it did not accept the new zones, and that its trawlers would not respect them. Once again, the Royal Navy took on the task of protecting the fishing fleet.

17. The Third Cod War of 1977 – 1976

Five centuries of Britain’s unrestricted fishing in the seas around Iceland came to an end with the conclusion of the Third Cod War in 1976. It was the most fiercely contested of the Cod Wars, and it required a NATO brokered convention to bring it to an end. As with the previous two cod wars, the third ended with Iceland obtaining its goals, to the detriment of the British fishing industry. Iceland firmly established a 12-mile exclusion zone, to be fished only but its own vessels. A 200-mile exclusion zone in which fishing vessels from other nations could operate only with licenses, and with limited catches, surrounded the small nation. Iceland’s victory was costly, during the Third Cod War there were at least 55 ramming incidents between British warships, fleet tugs, and fishing vessels and Icelandic patrol vessels. Fifteen British warships suffered significant damage and required extensive repairs.

In the aftermath of the three cod wars, Great Britain attempted to protect its fishing industry by declaring a 200-mile exclusion zone around its own shores. But the damage had been done. The British fishing industry was devastated, jobs lost, and fishermen idled. For Great Britain, the cod wars changed the economy, as well as the food industry. Shops which formerly featured fish and chips as their main attraction to customers began to offer alternative dishes to attract customers. Chicken and specially developed sausages, with casings which don’t split when deep-fried, replaced fish as the main attraction on many menus. In 2006, the US military, whose presence in Iceland parlayed into victory in the cod wars, departed Iceland. Ten years later the Americans returned, again citing the strategic importance of the island nation to NATO.

18. The Pig War of 1859 helped settle a border dispute between the United States and Great Britain

The Pig War, an armed confrontation between the United States and Great Britain, saw only one casualty, the eponymous pig. In the 1850s, both the United States and Great Britain claimed possession of the San Juan Islands, situated in the waters separating the mainland of North America and Vancouver Island. While American and British diplomats dickered and bickered over a resolution to the problem, settlers from British Canada and the United States jointly occupied the disputed territory. In 1859 an American settler, Lyman Cutlar, went to tend his potato garden. He found a pig rooting among his tubers, and rather than chase it away, he shot the hapless animal. The pig belonged to an employee of the Hudson’s Bay Company, an Irish-Canadian shepherd. The Irishman, Charles Griffin, demanded $100 in compensation for the lost pig, considerably more than Cutlar was willing to pay.

Griffin then turned to the British authorities on the island, who threatened to arrest Cutlar. Cutlar and his fellow American settlers on the island turned to the Americans for protection from the British. In British eyes, the American settlers on the islands were mere squatters, with minimal rights of occupation. The Americans considered themselves legal possessors of the land under the Donation Land Claim Act of 1850. Both nations maintained small military commands in the area to support their respective points of view, but the pig and potato dispute created tensions between British subjects and American citizens. The United States quickly dispatched a contingent of Army troops to prevent the British authorities from arresting Cutlar. Britain responded with a naval force supplemented with a contingent of Royal Marines. As it had before, the Oregon border appeared to be the casus belli for war between the US and Great Britain.

19. The Americans sent a small military force to San Juan

American authority in the Department of Oregon rested with Brigadier General William S. Harney, a Tennessean who had once been accused of beating a female slave to death with his cane (he was acquitted). The Pig War became just one more of several instances of questionable judgment exhibited during Harney’s career. In response to the American settlers’ request for protection, Harney dispatched a military force of infantry and artillery under Captain George Pickett to San Juan, with orders for them to prevent the British from landing troops on the island. The bellicose Pickett announced the Americans would fight if the British landed. The British responded by sending three men-of-war to the region, which landed marines on the north end of the island. Americans maintained a camp on the south end. By mid-August, 1859, nearly five hundred Americans confronted five British warships and well over 2,000 men.

Harney’s British counterpart, Royal Navy Admiral Robert Baynes, received orders from the British Governor of Vancouver to attack the Americans and drive them from the islands. Baynes had the common sense to ignore them, considering a war between the US and Great Britain over the disposition of a pig ridiculous. The British and American troops on the island were told not to provoke an attack, but both sides were prepared to defend themselves if the other fired upon them. American and British authorities in their respective capitals were stunned when they learned of the explosive situation; both dispatched emissaries to resolve the standoff peaceably. President James Buchanan sent General Winfield Scott to the scene to negotiate with the British Governor of Vancouver, James Douglas. Scott and Douglas began meeting in October to hammer out a resolution of the crisis.

20. The Pig War remained a standoff for over a decade

Scott and Douglas agreed to reduce the military presence of both sides to about 100 men each. The resolution over ownership of the island was deferred to diplomatic discussions. So was the ultimate resolution over the disputed pig. For the ensuing twelve years, American and British troops occupied their respective ends of the island. The troops intermingled socially conducted athletic events with each other and helped each other consume their liberal rations of alcohol. In 1871, after years of diplomatic futility, both sides agreed to submit the dispute over the islands to international arbitration. Kaiser Wilhelm I agreed to act as arbitrator. Wilhelm assigned the issue to a three-man commission, who struggled with their decision for just over a year while meeting in Geneva, Switzerland. Ultimately, they decided in favor of the Americans.

Subsequently, both sides withdrew their troops, having faced each other on the island for thirteen years without ever firing a shot. General Harney earned an official rebuke for escalating the situation to near warfare. Captain George Pickett served the Confederacy as a general and division commander. He gained lasting fame for his ill-fated assault on Union positions at Gettysburg, known to posterity as Pickett’s Charge. Whether Cutlar ever received compensation for his lost potatoes, or Griffin for his murdered pig, remains unknown. The Pig War was, to date, the last time forces of Great Britain and the United States stood toe-to-toe on the verge of war. It was averted because a British Admiral, a veteran of the British campaigns in North America during the War of 1812, decided to ignore his orders. Such are the vagaries of history.

Where do we find this stuff? Here are our sources:

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“El Paso Salt War”. Kathy Weiser, Legends of America. April, 2019. Online

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“Dutch East India Company, Trade Network, 18^th Century”. Jean-Paul Rodrigue, The Geography of Transport Systems. Online

“The Pastry War: Mexico vs France 1838”. Article, Yucatan Times. April 17, 2020

“The Pastry War – 1838” Jed Graham, History of Yesterday. May 20, 2020. Online

“French Intervention in Mexico and the American Civil War, 1862 – 1867”. Article, Office of the Historian, US State Department. Online

“The Lobster War”. Anne-Sophie Grollemund, The National Archives (UK). February 21, 2019. Online

“The Cod Wars and Today: Lessons From an Almost War”. Walker D. Mills, Center for International Maritime Security. July 28, 2020. Online’

“Iceland vs Britain: the Cod Wars begin – archive, September, 1958”. Compiled by Richard Nelsson, The Guardian. September 7, 2018

“The Cod War”. Andrew Herd, The Fishing Museum Online (UK). 2011

“What were the Cod Wars?” Grant Piper, Exploring History. December 22, 2020

“Life of Harney: Controversial peak namesake was both killer and peacemaker”. Seth Tupper, Rapid City Journal. June 28, 2015

“Baynes, Sir Robert Lambert”. Biography, Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Online