deterrent against any future harassment of British fishing crews by the Icelandic craft, resulting in direct confrontations between Icelandic patrol vessels and British warships, which again included ramming incidents. After a series of talks within NATO, British warships were recalled on 3 October 1973. An agreement was signed on 8 November which limited British fishing activities to certain areas inside the limit, resolving the dispute that time. The resolution was based 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. The Third Cod War lasted from November 1975 to June 1976. Iceland had declared that the ocean up to from its coast fell under Icelandic authority. The British government did not recognise this large increase to the exclusion zone, and as a result, there were again almost daily rammings between Icelandic patrol vessels and British trawlers, frigates and tugboats. The dispute eventually ended in 1976 after Iceland threatened to close a major NATO base in retaliation for Britain's deployment of naval vessels within the disputed limit. The British government conceded, and agreed that after 1 December 1976 British trawlers would not fish within the previously disputed area. NATO and the Cold War Iceland's main contribution to the NATO defence effort, during the Cold War was the rent-free provision of the "agreed areas"—sites for military facilities. By far the largest and most important of these was the NATO Naval Air Station Keflavík, manned by American, Canadian, Danish, Norwegian and Dutch personnel. Units from these and other NATO countries also are deployed temporarily to Keflavík, and they stage practice operations. Many of these practices were anti-submarine warfare patrols, but these exercises were halted when the P-3 ASW aircraft were withdrawn from Keflavík. Iceland and the United States regarded the U.S. military presence since World War II as a cornerstone to bilateral foreign/security policy. The presence of the troops was negotiated under a treaty known as the Agreed Minute. Talks about the American presence were restarted as of 2005, since the U.S. government was keen on deploying its troops and equipment to parts of the world with more pressing need for them. Proposals by the Icelandic government included a complete Icelandic takeover of the Airbase, as well as replacing the Pavehawk rescue helicopter unit with a detachment from the aeronautical half of the