The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, better known as NATO, turns 70 years old today [1]. It is an anniversary to be celebrated.
Indeed, there will be a joint session of Congress [2] Wednesday morning at 11:00 to welcome Jens Stoltenberg, Secretary General of NATO.
NATO … 2 member states from North America and Europe, established in 1949, stating that if an armed attack took place against one of the member states, it would be considered an attack against all and that all would join to protect the attacked member.
The original twelve countries in 1949: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Other countries have been added over the years including Greece, Turkey, West Germany, Spain, Unified Germany, Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Albania, Croatia, and Montenegro.
NATO’s partner countries form the Partnership for Peace (PfP) are Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Georgia, Ireland, Kazakhstan, Kyrghyz Republic, Malta, The Republic of Moldova, Russia, Serbia, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. PfP is a NATO program to create trust between NATO and non-NATO countries in the former Soviet Union and Europe.
NATO stood with America after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 when it invoked Article 5 for the first and only time in its history, committing its members [3] to stand by the United States in its response to the attacks.
Cover photo: Jens Stoltenberg, Secretary General of NATO