EDIT of February 24, 2022: Emmanuel Macron wants a NATO summit to be held “as soon as possible”, in reaction to the start of the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army, announced the Elysée. In the process, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson expressed the same request. A NATO summit will therefore be held this Friday by videoconference. On this occasion, the editorial staff of 20 Minutes offers you to reread this article (accompanied by a nice explanatory video) which takes stock of the role and means of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
What is NATO?
It's the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
NATO can also be called Nato (acronym for “North Atlantic treaty organization”), the Alliance or the Atlantic Alliance.
Concretely, NATO is an alliance of countries from Europe and North America.
It currently has 28 member countries, including France, the United States, Canada, Germany and Turkey.
The last countries to join NATO were Albania and Croatia in 2009.
What is his goal ?
Maintain peace on the American and European continents and ensure a common defense against external threats.
Above all through diplomacy and political collaboration.
But if these means are not sufficient, NATO has military capabilities that allow it to conduct “multinational crisis management operations”, that is to say armed interventions.
Note that NATO obeys a major principle: the attack of one or more of its members must be considered as an attack directed against all, which implies responding with a “collective defense”.
This is article 5 of the Washington Treaty, or North Atlantic Treaty, the founding treaty of NATO.
This article 5 has only been invoked once, in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11th.
What is his story ?
The Alliance was created in 1949 to ensure the security of the European continent after the Second World War.
Two states then preoccupied NATO: Germany and the Soviet Union.
In 1991, the Soviet empire no longer exists, Russia is in economic agony, the Cold War is over.
But that year marked the beginning of the Yugoslav wars, ten years of conflict, first in Slovenia, then in Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia.
NATO intervened in Bosnia in 1995 and in Kosovo in 1999. In 2001, the September 11 attacks gave NATO a new role, which engaged in a “war against terrorism”.
How does NATO work?
To act, NATO must take “decisions” which must achieve “consensus”.
In other words, a decision must be adopted by each of the members.
In fact, there is no vote in NATO.
The States discuss among themselves until a decision acceptable to all is taken.
Sometimes member countries agree not to agree on a particular point.
To help members in their decision-making, hundreds of experts and civil and military officials come to NATO headquarters in Brussels every day to exchange information and share ideas.
Vladimir Poutine
Donbass
Russia
20 minute video
Ukraine
NATO
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A fault ?
To print