The North Atlantic Treaty Organization has been a silent partner on the world
stage for more than half of the century and the most successful
political-military alliance in history. The United Nations and their
peacekeeping efforts have had the spotlight for the past few years. However the
driving force behind any successful agreement or, if needed, action on the part
of several countries has been because of the strong foundation and experience of
NATO and its members. The following report will chronicle the events leading up
to the creation of NATO, its first decade, the constant struggle with communism
in the decades that proceed, and finally the challenges for NATO today and in
the future. In the years after World War II, a new threat encroached upon the
leaders of Western Europe and their hopes of a stable peace. This threat would
be from the growing dominance of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
in Eastern Europe. The USSR had an increasing appetite for the smaller countries
to her west. These aggressive demands for territory and the placing of
installations in taken countries fueled the fears of many that the USSR was
marching toward a third world war. Britain and France, not wanting to make the
mistake again of appeasing this new menace until it was too late, developed the
Dunkirk Treaty in 1947. This treaty in essence pledged a common defense against
any aggression. The USSR answered this by creating a European Communist
organization called the Cominform and it rejected the European Recovery Program,
which is commonly known as the Marshall Plan. The Marshall Plan, named for the
US Secretary of State, was basically a financial bailout for the European
nations. These nations were starving because of the slow and near stopping of
the coal and agricultural industries after WWII. The US offered millions of
dollars to all of Europe to aid in rebuilding for four reasons. First, Europe
had been a great marketplace imports and exports for the US. Second,
historically West Germany had been an industrial hub and needed to be brought
back to tip-top shape to buffer the expanding USSR. Third, with its increasing
mass the USSR was becoming a rival to the US. Lastly, without this aid Western
Europe might look to the USSR for help, which would make life a lot tougher for
American interests. The year of 1948 was pivotal for Europe. In February, the
Communists in Prague staged a coup d’etat and the spring brought the beginning
of the Cold War. Immediately after WWII, Germany was divided in to occupation
zones by Britain, France, the US, and USSR. The capital of Germany at the time
was Berlin, which happened to fall in the Soviet zone. The governing
administration located in Berlin fell, because of the obvious reason of “too
many cooks spoil the broth”. When this happened, the USSR demanded that Berlin
become solely part of the Soviet zone, since its status as capital was ruined.
The USSR enforced this ruling by blockading all land routes into and tried to
force the other powers out of its respective sectors of Berlin. Eventually the
Berlin Blockade was squelched by a military airlift that lasted the rest of the
year. The city still remained divided and became known as East (Soviet
controlled) and West Berlin. This transgression on the part of the USSR prompted
negotiations between Western Europe, the US and Canada that resulted in the
North Atlantic Treaty. The language of the North Atlantic Treaty originally
consisted of its preamble and fourteen articles. The preamble states that
members will promote common values and will “unite their efforts for a
collective defense.” The key article of the North Atlantic Treaty is number
five (it’s the one that inspired my title) it reads, “The Parties agree that
an armed attack against one or more of them…shall be considered an attack
against them all.” Another interesting article is the last one, number
fourteen, and it calls for the deposition of the official copies of the treaty
to be kept in the US Archives. The US already was establishing itself as the
dominant member of an organization that is supposed to be based on equal
responsibility. After the ratification of this treaty the structure of the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) began. The highest policy-making body in
NATO is the North Atlantic Council, which met in Paris until 1967. The council
composed of permanent delegates from all members was responsible for general
policy, budgetary outlines, intergovernmental consultation and administrative
actions. There are two main temporary committees that answer directly to the
council. Those are the Secretariat, which handles non-military functions of the
alliance (economic, scientific, cultural, and environmental issues), and the
Military Committee or the Defense Planning Committee (DPC), which consists of
the chiefs of staff of the various armed forces. They meet to discuss military
policies, develop defense plans for their respective areas, determine the force
requirements, and deploy and exercise the forces under their command. The forces
directly below the DPC are the Allied Commands Europe (was first headed by
Eisenhower), Atlantic, and Channel and the Regional Planning Group (for North
America). To assist in carrying out their global roles, the council and the DPC
have established committees to deal with emergencies and the new threat of
nuclear power. They meet only in a dire situation. However, until the outbreak
of the Korean War in 1950, NATO had no real military structure. The Korean War
was at first perceived as part of a worldwide Communist offensive beginning in
the divided Germany. This perspective lead to the NATO military force that was
explained in the preceding paragraph. Within NATO’s first decade the main
military and security forces have come from the US. Along with this the US was
depended on for the revival of Europe’s economy and polity. The Korean War
also brought an overall expansion of the organization. By 1955, Greece, Turkey,
and the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) had entered as members. The
only provisions for West Germany was not allowed to manufacture NBC (nuclear,
biological, and chemical) weapons. With the rearmament of West Germany in
progress, the USSR and her allies decided to created a treaty organization of
their own. The Warsaw Pact, signed in 1955, combined to powers of Albania,
Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and of course
the USSR. The members of this communist alliance were under strict control of
the soviets headquartered in Moscow. Key posts in these satellite countries were
usually ran by soviet-born or soviet-trained officers and all their equipment
was standardized to the regulations of the USSR. The structure of the Warsaw
Treaty Organization (WTO) was similar to NATO. Two major bodies carried out the
policies of the pact. The first was the Political Consultative Committee, which
handled all activities except military, and the Unified Command of Pact Armed
Forces, which had authority over the troops assigned to certain members. On
paper you can see the similarities, but the USSR rule with absolute dominance.
When members tried to break away or try to join NATO, the consequences were
terrifying. In 1956, Hungary tried to withdrawal from the WTO; the USSR took
unilateral military action against the revolt killing 200,000 people. Another
member state, Czechoslovakia attempted to leave and was swiftly forced back by a
soviet invasion. Albania seemed to find a way out, because of their alliance
with China and some other ideological reasons, and broke off in 1968. With the
USSR’s undeniable stranglehold on its neighboring countries in place, the race
began for total superiority on the global scene over the US and her allies. The
main gauge for this was nuclear weapon advances and stockpiles. Who could have
the biggest and best in the shortest amount of time and who would dare to use it
first? These pressing questions tainted the next three decades and worried some
of the other NATO members that the US wouldn’t honor their pledge if the USSR
were to do the unspeakable to Western Europe. NATO members tried to keep a
positive perspective, but several events caused a sense of dissatisfaction of
its worth by the end of the sixties. To begin the decade off the USSR officially
blockaded their side of Berlin by erecting the ‘wall’. At first the Berlin
Wall consisted only of barbed wire, but people were ‘escaping’ to East
Germany, so an actual concrete wall was constructed with all the bells and
whistles, like checkpoints with armed guards and minefields. The people of East
Germany were prisoners in their own country and were not allowed to contact or
visit family. In addition, the withdrawal of France, one of the founding
members, in 1966 by President Charles de Gaulle sent shock waves through the
organization. Although they continued to contribute to the alliance, they left
the governing duties to the other members. Also NATO was pressured by the
smaller nation-states to be come members and that would take a lot of funding,
time, and focus away from the problems in Eastern Europe. One of the main
factors of the late sixties and early seventies was America’s involvement in
the Vietnam War. This horrifying war sapped the US economy, morale, and foreign
policy prowess. Although the 1970s began with the Strategic Arms Limitation
Talks (SALT I), this decade created more disillusionment by world powers as the
Soviets continued to rapidly stock their military and nuclear arsenals. In 1979,
NATO initiated a dual-track program where new defense efforts were coupled with
new efforts in reconciliation and cooperation. Unfortunately, the steps taken by
both sides were small and uneventful and usually were retracted within a short
time. This brings us to the Reagan years, the eighties, and to the closest
watched political tug-a-war in years. This decade opened with a deepening crisis
and in 1983 the USSR failed to prevent the deployment of intermediate-range
ballistic missiles, sent to counteract the ones they had pointed a Europe’s
major cites. It is possible to say that NATO help greatly in dissuading the USSR
from following through on attacking Western Europe. The ‘game’ had gotten
deadly serious and in 1987 both sides agreed to talks. Out of these talks came
the Intermediate-range Nuclear Force (INF) Treaty, which not only gave people a
sense of relief across the world it also began the breakdown of the Warsaw Pact
and the WTO. The change in the wind prompted the Berlin Wall that separated a
people for over twenty-five years to be torn down and Germany was finally
reunified. The late eighties to the mid-nineties finally saw the beginning of
the end to the Cold War. This time also showed the world the success of NATO and
the unified efforts of its members in meeting the challenge of the Communists
and the WTO. NATO had finally shown itself to be a viable source for
communication and resolution between factions instead of war. That became more
evident in the 1990s, with the continued depletion of nuclear arsenals on both
sides, the dissolving of the Warsaw Pact in 1991, and the continued duties to
help return the countries of Eastern Europe to normalcy. An example of this is
evident in Bosnia/Herzegovina and Kosovo. These areas and people have been able
to strengthen their nationalistic feeling with both encouraging and disastrous
results. Through the efforts of the UN and NATO forces a peaceful conclusion may
be in the future for this troubled culture. The organization has already placed
in the works the inclusion of the Czech Republic (formerly part of
Czechoslovakia), Hungary, and Poland. These talks are setting the stage for
NATO’s most significant expansion. These countries will need modern military
training, upgrades on their communications, command, and air defense systems at
an estimated cost of between $25 and $35 billion over thirteen years. The
members of NATO pay out this money, the US share being approximately $200
million over ten years. There was a time that even the thought of these
countries entering NATO peacefully was unheard of. These new members make
NATO’s interests in the Balkans even more timely. Over the past few years, the
establishment of a long-term stability in the Balkans has fallen on NATO’s
already overweighed shoulders. The former Yugoslavia is one area of Europe where
the end of the cold war has not brought about the general trend towards
openness, democracy and integration that we have seen elsewhere. Ending this
anomaly will mean looking beyond the time frame of NATO’s Stabilization Force
in Bosnia. Once the parties realize that settling differences peacefully and
democratically really is the only viable option, then Bosnia and other countries
in the region will have the right to the fullest integration into the
international community. In Kosovo, where the world community is facing
humanitarian, political and legal dilemmas, a solution must be found that allows
the Ethnic Albanians more autonomy within the confines of the Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia. In finding such a solution, we must avoid a situation where moral
considerations are pitted against international law. And we must remember that a
security policy that doesn’t take as its point of reference the needs of
humanity, risks suffering the worst possible fate- a slide into irrelevance. In
Kosovo’s immediate neighborhood, NATO has helped to provide hope and some
stability, as well as assistance in coping with the refugees in Albania and
Macedonia. The latter country is hosting a NATO extraction force, ready to
support the verification mission deployed in Kosovo. Hopefully, the prospect of
long-term stability, coupled with the desire for economic benefits, will draw
the entire Balkans back into the European mainstream. None of this will happen
without NATO continued belief in “collective security”. To deal with these
challenges, there is a need for further improvements in the inter-operability
and sustainability of alliance forces. The future of NATO lies in having rapidly
deployable capabilities to fulfill an increasing range of missions. The military
forces of NATO allies will need to be on the same wavelength; able to move
effectively and quickly, to communicate with one another- service to service, as
well as ally to ally- in a world where information technologies are becoming
part of the modern soldier’s basic kit. Trying to stay as current as possible
on NATO’s movements is not an easy job these days. Every hour seems to bring a
new page to NATO’s illustrious history. We can only sit back and watch the
further developments in the Balkan region and in the other ‘hotspots’ around
the world, like Korea, Rwanda, India, and even within the NATO members
themselves. Other important issues approach on the horizon that will strongly
effect NATO, the unification of Europe, China’s threats to security and the
questions of a possible global peace in the millenium. Can NATO meet these
challenges? Can it evolve in the shadow of the Cold War? The next few years will
unfold an exciting chapter in the history of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization.

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