This Thursday, NATO headquarters in Brussels hosts the ceremony for the 75th anniversary of the Atlantic Alliance, which was attended by the foreign ministers of the 32 allied countries. In his speech, his Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, celebrated that NATO is “the strongest, longest and most successful alliance in the world.” Faced with the common threats it faces – with Russia's aggression against Ukraine at the gates of Europe – Stoltenberg has appealed for unity: “Europe needs North America and North America also needs Europe,” he stressed.
The Norwegian briefly reviewed the history of the Alliance, starting with its founding treaty, signed in Washington in 1949. “Twelve nations joined then and NATO has kept our citizens safe since then.” The treaty barely has fourteen paragraphs, spread over several pages, “but never has such a short document meant so much to so many people in terms of security, prosperity and peace,” he highlighted.
Today NATO has grown and has recently welcomed Sweden as an ally country. «We have grown to 32 members. “We have helped spread peace and prosperity,” said Stoltenberg. The Alliance was created after World War II and continued during the Cuban missile crisis, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the wars in the Balkans. “In 2001, after 9/11, Article 5 was invoked for the first time, which stipulates that an attack on an ally is an attack on the entire Alliance,” he recalled.
In 2014, Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea took place, “another turning point” in NATO history. Since then and after the start of the invasion in Ukraine, the Alliance has reinforced its defensive capabilities and its secretary general has highlighted that the majority of countries will comply with the commitment to invest at least 2% of their Gross Domestic Product in Defense to end of this year.
History shows, Stoltenberg has assured, that unity is strength and that “North America cannot prevail alone.” “Together in NATO we are stronger and we gain security,” he concluded. The president of the NATO Military Committee, Petr Pavel, has assured that the military organization is the “shield between freedom and oppression” and has pointed out that “it is the combination of political and military power of the Alliance that makes us insurance.”
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