The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), sometimes called North Atlantic Alliance, Atlantic Alliance or the Western Alliance, is an international organization for defense collaboration established in 1949, in support of the North Atlantic Treaty signed in Washington, D.C., on April 4, 1949. Its other official name is the French language equivalent, l'Organisation du Traité de l'Atlantique Nord (OTAN).The core provision of the treaty is Article V, which states:
- The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.
This provision was intended so that if the Soviet Union launched an attack against the European allies of the United States, it would be treated as if it was an attack on the United States itself, which had the biggest military and could thus provide the most significant retaliation. However the feared Soviet invasion of Europe never came. Instead, the provision was invoked for the first time in the treaty's history on September 12, 2001, in response to the September 11 attacks on the United States the day before.
1 Member states
Founding members (1949):
- Belgium
- Canada
- Denmark
- FranceThe French Republic or France ( French: Republique francaise or France is a country whose metropolitan territory is located in western Europe, and which is further made up of a collection of overseas islands and territories located in other continents.
- IcelandThe Republic of Iceland is an island nation in the northern Atlantic Ocean, located between Greenland and Scotland, northwest of the Faroe Islands. Lydveldid Island ( In Detail) (Full size) National motto: none Official languageNone. Icelandic de facto''.
- ItalyThe Italian Republic or Italy ( Italian: Italia is a country in the south of Europe, consisting mainly of a boot-shaped peninsula together with two large islands in the Mediterranean Sea: Sicily and Sardinia. To the north, where it borders France, Switzer
- LuxembourgThe Grand Duchy of Luxembourg (also Luxemburg is a landlocked state in the north-west of the continental European Union, bordered by France, Germany and Belgium. Grand-Duche de LuxembourgGrossherzogtum LuxemburgGroussherzogtum (Grand-Duche) Letzebuerg ( I
- NetherlandsDutch redirects here. For other uses, see Dutch (disambiguation). The Netherlands ( Dutch: Nederland is the European part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, a constitutional monarchy. It is located in northwestern Europe and borders the North Sea, Belgium
- NorwayThe Kingdom of Norway is a Nordic country west of Sweden on the Scandinavian Peninsula. It has a very elongated form and has an extensive coastline along the North Atlantic Ocean, where Norway's famous fjords are found. In addition to Sweden, it borders R
- PortugalRepublica Portuguesa ( In Detail) National motto: None Official language Portuguese 3 Capital Lisbon President Jorge Sampaio Prime Minister Pedro Santana Lopes Area Total % water World ranking: 109th 92,391 km˛0. 5 % Population Total ( 2004) Density World
- United KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a state in Western Europe, usually known simply as the United Kingdom the UK Britain or less accurately as Great Britain . The UK was formed by a series of Acts of Union which united the formerly
- United States
The flag of NATO
States that joined subsequently:
Greece and Turkey joined the organization in February 1952. Germany joined as West Germany in 1955 and German unification in 1990 extended the membership to the areas of former East Germany. Spain was admitted on May 30, 1982, and the former Warsaw Pact Countries of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic made history by becoming members on March 12, 1999.
France is a member of NATO, which retired from the military command in 1966 but rejoined in 1992. Iceland, the sole member of NATO which does not have its own military force (the Icelandic Defense Force being the United States Military contingent permanently stationed in Iceland), joined on the condition that they would not be expected to establish one.
Slovenia, Slovakia, the former Warsaw Pact countries of Bulgaria and Romania, and the former republics of the USSR Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, officially acceded to NATO on March 29, 2004. They attended their first NATO meeting in April 2004.
