Home > History Fact Finder > War and Conflict: Twentieth Century - What Is Nato?

1. Printable Version
2. Download PDF
3. Cite this Page

What is NATO?

NATO stands for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a military alliance formed on April 4, 1949, when twelve countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty. The twelve original NATO countries are Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Great Britain, and the United States. Each member nation agreed to treat attacks on any other member nation as if it were an attack on itself. Any aggressor would have to face the twelve-nation alliance. This was NATO's policy of deterrence, which was a way to discourage attacks by the Soviet Union or other Eastern bloc countries (Communist countries in Eastern Europe). NATO provided the additional benefit of discouraging fighting among the member nations.

Greece and Turkey joined NATO in 1952, followed by West Germany in 1955 and then Spain in 1982. After the fall of communism (a system of government in which the state controls...

Join eNotes

The above is a free excerpt. Get total access to this content with the:

eNotes Pass

1. European Conflicts
   1. What was Bloody Sunday?
   2. Who was Rasputin?
   3. What was the Bolshevik Revolution?
   4. What was the Red Terror?
   5. What was the Spanish Civil War about?
   6. Who was Generalissimo Francisco Franco?
   7. What was the fighting in Bosnia about?
   8. What was the origin of the term "genocide"?
   9. What is the fighting in Kosovo about?
   10. What is the "Irish Question"?
2. American Conflicts
   1. What does "¡Viva Zapata!" mean?
   2. Who was Che Guevara?
   3. Why did the U.S. government send troops in pursuit of Pancho Villa?
3. Asian And African Conflicts
   1. What was the Russo-Japanese War?
   2. What was the Long March?
   3. What was the Boxer Rebellion?
   4. What was the Second Sino-Japanese War?
   5. Who were the Khmer Rouge?
   6. What were the killing fields?
   7. Why was the United States involved in the Korean War?
   8. Why was the Vietnam War fought?
   9. Why did many Americans protest U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War?
   10. What was the issue in the conflict in Rwanda?
4. Worldwide Conflicts
   1. How did World War I begin?
   2. What alliances were formed during World War I?
   3. How did the United States become involved in World War I?
   4. How did World War I end?
   5. What did the Lusitania have to do with World War I?
   6. Who were the Big Four?
   7. How were European boundaries redrawn as the result of World War I?
   8. How did the Treaty of Versailles lead to World War II?
   9. What was Nazism?
   10. How did World War II begin?
   11. What countries were called the Allies in World War II?
   12. What was the Atlantic Charter?
   13. What happened at Pearl Harbor?
   14. What is D day?
   15. Why was the invasion of Normandy a decisive battle?
   16. What was the Battle of the Bulge?
   17. What are V-E Day and V-J Day?
   18. Were any countries besides Switzerland neutral during World War II?
   19. How did Anne Frank's diaries survive World War II?
   20. What was the Berlin airlift?
   21. What is NATO?
   22. What was the Warsaw Pact?
   23. What was the arms race?
   24. What was the Bay of Pigs?
   25. What was the Cuban Missile Crisis?
   26. What happened in Grenada?
5. Eastern Conflicts
   1. When was Israel formed?
   2. What is the basis of the conflict over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank?
   3. What were the Camp David accords?
   4. What is the Wye accord?
   5. What did U.S. President George Bush mean when he said the United States had to "draw a line in the sand"?
   6. Why was the Persian Gulf War important?

1. World War II