NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization)

Since its foundation in 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO / OTAN), or the North Atlantic Alliance, has had the goal of implementing and enforcing the North Atlantic Treaty, or Washington Treaty, that was signed on 4th April 1949 by its first 12 founding members. Although NATO was first put together having in mind a possible armed attack during the Cold War by the Soviet Union against Western Europe, and was designed to serve as a politico-militar coalition between countries in Europe and North America that would be able to prevent that kind of aggression from taking place, this attack never happened and the mutual self-defense clause contemplated in Article 5, the main section of the accord, by which all members states are required to come to the aid of any of its members states who’s being subject to an armed attack, wasn’t invoked until after the 9/11 attacks, and never has been again. This way, this alliance that at first started with the sole purpose of...

NATO is articulated in 3 different branches: The civilian structure: is composed by all politicians, counselors and scientists that give shape to the commandment center and decision-making and crisis-management departments of the organization. Their goal is the promotion of democratic values and cooperation among all members states, and to build trust so that conflicts may be prevented and global peace maintained. Also, to guarantee the freedom and security of the every day to day lives of the population of all its members. The militar structure: is the one responsible for the development of defence plans and intervention strategies on the armed conflicts that the Organization sees fit to be involved in, if diplomatic efforts were to fail to peacefully solve the situation. It has to coordinate the forces and assets of all different members and be able to evaluate how to proceed in said conflicts in the best way possible to achieve the most satisfactory results in each case...

Of the 29 NATO member countries, two are located in North America (Canada and the United States) and 27 are European countries while Turkey is in Eurasia. All members have militaries, except for Iceland which does not have a typical army (but does, however, have a coast guard and a small unit of civilian specialists for NATO operations). Three of NATO's members are nuclear weapons states: France, the United Kingdom, and the United States. NATO has 12 original founding member nation states, and from 18 February 1952 to 6 May 1955, it added three more member nations, and a fourth on 30 May 1982. After the end of the Cold War, NATO added 13 more member nations (10 former Warsaw Pact members and three former Yugoslav republics) from 12 March 1999 to 5 June 2017. NATO has added new members seven times since its founding in 1949, and since 2017 NATO has had 29 members. Twelve countries were part of the founding of NATO: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, t...

After the II World War, Europe, who historically had always been the most powerful area of the world, was devastated; it had been the scenario of the two biggest wars in history, as well as plenty of ideological tension. Europe lost its power to give it to the new upcoming emergent international order characterized by two great powers: the United States of America and the Soviet Union (one representing Capitalism, and the other one Communism). It is often said that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was founded in response to the threat posed by the Soviet Union. This is only partially true. In fact, the Alliance’s creation was part of a broader effort to serve three purposes: deterring Soviet expansionism, forbidding the revival of nationalist militarism in Europe through a strong North American presence on the continent, and encouraging European political integration.  Fortunately, by then the United States had turned its back on its traditional policy of diplomatic is...

As NATO is an organization formed by such a big quantity of countries, these do not all have the same wealth. Consequently, the budget invested in international security is not the same for all the members. The two countries we will focus in, will be Spain and the United States. The second one is the country that invests more money into the organization, and Spain, despite not being among the best members in terms of money, is a country that spends a considerable amount of its budget in national security, the army, and forces. In 2017, the U.S. accounted for 51.1 percent of NATO’s combined GDP and 71.7 percent of its combined defense expenditure. In short, the US contributed more funds to NATO than Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and Canada combined. Meanwhile, the U.S. spent $685.9 billion on defense. The last figures show the reason why the president of the US has been complaining the latest months: he says that if European countries are going to take advant...

BOOKS Garcia Sebastian, Margarita; Gatell Arimont, Cristina & Risques Corbella, Manel. “Llibre d’Història d’Espanya de Segon de Batxillerat”. Barcelona: VicensVives, 2016. : It explains the integration of Spain into NATO. Ismay, Lord "Nato : the first five years, 1949-1954 ", 2001: The first years of the organizations and the main issues it faced. Preston, Paul and Smyth, Denis. "España ante la CEE y la OTAN". Barcelona: Grijalbo, 1985: The paper of Spain in the NATO. Hoffenaar, Jan. Introduction: The Plans of the Plans of the Warsaw Pact and NATO. Foreign Military Studies. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2012 J.Collins, Brian. “NATO: A guide to the issues”. Santa Barbara, California: Praeger, 2011: This book is an introduction to the current situation of NATO as an international organization and the issues that faces from a geopolitical and military point of view ACADEMIC JOURNALS Correig i Blanchar, Antoni Mª....