Command Decisions: Decision to Land United States Forces in Iceland, 1941.Chapter 3

摘要

The chapter describes the decision to land United States Forces in Iceland in1941. In July 1941, five months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the first American task force of World War II departed for Iceland. Until then, the interest and attention of the War Department had for the most part been focused in the direction of South America. As War Department planners saw it, sending troops to Iceland was not an element of the hemisphere defense policy and current military strategy. The decision to undertake the operation was made by President Roosevelt in early June, not as a new course of policy but because the circumstances attendant upon the particular step made the taking of it at that time seem desirable. After the President made the basic decision to send troops to Iceland, the War Department faced the task of appraising the feasibility of the operation in the light of what was being done elsewhere at the same time. The decisions that the War Department was then called upon to make were difficult and crucial.