stratos stratos:
We got our last ones, The US Virgin Islands, from England during WWII for a few ships and an agreement to take over the patrolling of the Caribbean. We obviously needed a base so presto change-o we now have control over what is now called the US Virgin Islands.
The United States took possession of those islands from Denmark in 1917. The US feared that the islands might be seized by the Hun as a submarine base.