"Wichita" and two divisions of destroyers joined "Tuscaloosa" in the screen of the men of-war. Under the two-starred flag of Rear Admiral Robert C. Giffen, the Denmark Strait patrol worked out of wind-swept, cold Hvalfjörður, Iceland—nicknamed by the American sailors and Marines as "Valley Forge". The similarities between the Continental Army's historic winter campground and the Icelandic region were not just confined to a homonymous relation of their names. The bitter cold, wind, and snow and the wartime operations seemed similar—the latter in the form of daily patrols, unceasingly vigilant for any signs of the "enemy". "Tuscaloosa" and "Wichita" "stripped ship" for war, removing accumulated coats of paint, interior and exterior, floor tiling, and other inflammable and nonessential items before they set out for sea on 5 November. As the task force steamed toward Iceland, its warships were constantly alert to the possibility of an imminent sortie by the German battleship , the sister ship of the sunken "Bismarck". While "Tirpitz" refused to show herself, the American ships continued to conduct "short of war" operations against German shipping and naval forces which became increasingly warlike as time went on. The attempted torpedoing of the destroyer , the damaging of the "Kearny" in October; the sinking of by a German U-boat; and the torpedoing of the oiler all pointed to the fact that American ships were becoming involved in the war. The Imperial Japanese Navy's attack at Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, plunged the United States into a real war at last, in both oceans, because both Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy declared war on the United States on 11 December. On 6 January 1942, "Tuscaloosa" steamed out of Hvalfjörður along with "Wichita" and two American destroyers— and —for a training mission through the Denmark Strait. After returning to port three days later, the heavy cruiser moved on to Boston for a navy yard overhaul from 8–20 February. She conducted refresher training out of Casco Bay and then underwent another brief refit at New York Harbor before joining Task Group 39.1 (TG 39.1), under the command of Rear Admiral John W. Wilcox, Jr., whose flag flew from the new battleship . TG 39.1 sortied from Casco Bay and then it struggled through the gale-whipped seas of the North Atlantic Ocean, bound for Scapa Flow, Scotland, in the Orkney Islands—the main base for the British Home Fleet.