The anniversary of the US-led defense alliance is marked by tensions with Russia in view of the Russian war against Ukraine and the inclusion of the previously neutral states Finland and Sweden.
What is NATO?
NATO is an international organization for the purpose of political and military cooperation and mutual assistance. There are currently 32 countries in Europe and North America as members. The organization’s headquarters have been in Brussels since 1967. The highest decision-making body is the North Atlantic Council, in which all member states are represented. The chairman of the council is the NATO Secretary General, currently the Norwegian Jens Stoltenberg. Decisions there are made unanimously. The Nuclear Planning Group (NPG) has been set up for high-level consultations on nuclear issues. The organization’s highest authority for military issues is the Military Committee (MC). NATO has two military commanders, the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) in Casteau near Mons (Belgium), who is responsible for military operations, and the Supreme Allied Commander Transformation (SACT) in Norfolk, Virginia (USA), who is responsible for further development and innovation. .
Why was NATO founded?
Shortly after the end of the Second World War in 1945, it became clear that the Soviet Union wanted to establish a communist bloc in the east of the European continent. In the states in the Soviet sphere of influence, with the help of the local communist parties, non-communist political forces were successively disempowered, existing democratic structures were dissolved and the communist Eastern bloc was ultimately established. The United States saw this expansion as a threat to those parts of the world that were under its own political and social influence, such as the countries of Western Europe. The founding of NATO was primarily intended to serve as a military deterrent against the Soviet Union and to bring the North Atlantic states allied with the USA under the protective umbrella of the USA as a nuclear power. For this purpose, on April 4, 1949, twelve states – in addition to the USA and Canada, exclusively countries from Western and Southern Europe – signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, which founded the organization.
What purposes does NATO serve?
The organization sees itself as a defensive alliance with a duty to provide support as well as a community of values based on the Western-liberal system of values. Politically, it should primarily serve to promote exchange and close coordination between allies and, if necessary, also to eliminate bilateral tensions. In military terms, it is primarily about mutual assistance in the event of war, support during operations and the creation of common standards. In practice, the alliance’s main purpose right from the start was to deter third countries from attacking their allies in Europe due to the military superiority of the USA.
Who are the members of NATO and when did they join?
The founding members of NATO in 1949 were two northern European and ten western and southern European countries: USA, Canada, Belgium, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal.
In 1952, Greece and Turkey were admitted to the alliance, followed in 1955 by the Federal Republic of Germany. In response to this expansion, the Soviet Union founded the Warsaw Pact in the same year and at the same time made the state treaty for Austria and the withdrawal of the occupying powers possible with the condition of “perpetual neutrality”. In 1982, Spain, which had become democratic again after the end of Francisco Franco’s dictatorship, was admitted. After the end of the Cold War in 1989-1991, NATO initially sought a new meaning for its existence. She found it to be an integration alliance that was intended to politically and militarily connect Western Europe with the former communist states of Eastern Europe. The first step in 1999 was to admit the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary, followed in 2004 by the largest wave of expansion to date to include Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. In 2009, Albania and Croatia joined the alliance, Montenegro was admitted in 2017, and North Macedonia followed in 2020 after the long-standing dispute with Greece over its state name was resolved.
With Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February 2022, the previously neutral northern European states Sweden and Finland decided to place themselves under the protection of NATO. After a lengthy confusion over the ratification of the accessions by Turkey and Hungary, Finland was ultimately able to join in April 2023 and Sweden in March 2024.
