Article 5 is the cornerstone of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and states that an attack on one member of NATO is an attack on all of its members. Despite its importance, NATO has only invoked Article 5 once in its history, in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
NATO created after World War II
NATO and Article 5 were created in 1949 in the aftermath of World War II, when communist movements backed by the Soviet Union posed a serious threat to democratically elected governments across devastated Europe. In 1948, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia overthrew that nation’s democratic government, while in Germany the Soviet authorities blockaded the Allied-controlled section of Berlin in an effort to strengthen their position there.
The Berlin Airlift, when American and British planes carried food, fuel and other vital supplies to isolated citizens in West Berlin, marked a first victory for the West in the Cold War. And with the launch of the Marshall Plan, which provided economic aid to war-torn European countries, the United States had resolutely abandoned its previous isolationist policy.
But at such a vulnerable moment, it seemed clear that Europe needed not only economic aid, but also military support, in order to counterbalance the power of the Soviet Union, to prevent the revival of movements nationalist military forces (like Nazism) and to allow political development on democratic bases.
VIDEO: The formation of NATO
Tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union led to the formation of key alliances that would endure throughout the Cold War.
In April 1949, representatives of 12 nations – the United States, Canada, Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Luxembourg, Iceland, Italy and Portugal – gathered in Washington, DC to sign the North Atlantic Treaty.
“Courageous and visionary men can still determine their own destiny,” President Harry S. Truman said at the signing ceremony. “They can choose slavery or freedom, war or peace… If there is anything certain today, if there is anything inevitable in the future, it is the will of the peoples of the world for freedom and peace.”
Text of Article 5: “An attack on a…”
The key provision of the treaty was Article 5, which began: “The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be deemed an attack against them all…” So While this collective defense commitment was at the heart of NATO, it was left to each member state to decide its exact contribution.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO opened its doors to include the former Warsaw Pact states (the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland) and the former Soviet republics (Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia). ). The alliance has also expanded its role. Member States sent peacekeepers to Bosnia in the 1990s and bombed Serbia in 1999 to defend Kosovo. Several former Soviet republics, including those in the Baltic region, have begun to join the NATO alliance.
Article 5 invoked after the attacks of September 11
On September 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, NATO invoked Article 5 for the first time in its history, committing its members to stand with the United States in its response to the attacks. In a unanimously adopted four-paragraph resolution, the organization expressed its understanding that global security threats had changed dramatically in the 52 years since the alliance was founded.
AUDIO: NATO offers aid to US after 9/11 attacks
On October 2, 2001, NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson held a press conference to discuss the events of September 11 and pledged the support of NATO’s 18 allies in the campaign against international terrorism.
“The commitment to collective self-defense embodied in the Washington Treaty was entered into under circumstances very different from those that currently exist,” the statement said. “But it remains no less valid and no less essential today, in a world subjected to the scourge of international terrorism.
In addition to participating in the war in Afghanistan, NATO’s response to the September 11 attacks under Article 5 included Operation Eagle Assist, in which NATO aircraft helped patrol the United States skies for seven months between 2001 and 2002, and Operation Active Endeavour, in which NATO naval forces were sent to conduct counter-terrorism activities in the eastern Mediterranean. Operation Active Endeavour, which started in October 2001 and later spread to the entire Mediterranean region, did not end until 2016.
NATO has taken collective defensive action in other situations, including deploying missiles on Turkey’s border with Syria in 2012. Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the rise of Islamic State in recent years have led the organization to implement a dramatic increase in its collective defences, including tripling the size of the NATO Response Force.
In 2014, NATO member states agreed to try to spend 2% of their GDP on defence, although most member states fall short of this non-binding target.
US-NATO relations under Trump and Biden
President Trump has criticized NATO, calling it “obsolete” in a 2017 interview and criticizing other NATO members for not spending enough on defense. But he also affirmed the United States’ commitment to Article 5 in June 2017, during a press conference with the President of Romania: “I commit the United States to Article 5, and we’re definitely there to protect, and that’s definitely one of the reasons I want people to make sure we have a very, very strong force by paying the kind of money to have that force.
In February 2022, President Joe Biden ordered US troops to Eastern Europe to bolster the NATO Response Force as Russian military forces surrounded Ukraine. As troops surround the Ukrainian border, Russian President Vladimir Putin has insisted the former Soviet republic will never be allowed to join NATO.
As Pentagon Press Secretary John F. Kirby said during a February 2, 2022 press briefing, “Our commitment to NATO Article 5 and collective defense remains rock solid. “.
