Founding of NATO

Also called: North Atlantic Treaty Organization, North Atlantic Treaty

The United States, Canada and ten Western European countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty, forming a collective defence alliance; the Soviet Union answered with the Warsaw Pact in 1955.

Alarmed by the Berlin Blockade, the Western powers signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington on 4 April 1949. An armed attack on one member would be treated as an attack on all (Article 5). It was America’s first peacetime military alliance with Europe.

The Korean War led NATO to set up an integrated military command, and when West Germany joined in 1955 the Soviet Union and the Eastern European states formed the Warsaw Pact. Europe became the front line of two opposing military blocs.