Merriam Press Military Monograph 76. Fourth Edition (March 2012). In 1940 a decision was made between the U.S. and Great Britain to build an air base in Greenland. The mission for the airbase was to patrol the North Atlantic shipping lanes, to protect the cryolite mines at Ivigtut, Greenland, from German occupation. (Cryolite is a flux used in the refining of aluminum-the only known source in the world), and to act as a rescue station for any Allied planes that encountered trouble along the route. This is the story of the building of that airbase-codenamed Bluie West One-by 2nd Lt. William...