James H. Armstead
In 1952 General Hastings Lionel Ismay, the first NATO Secretary General, was asked why the North Atlantic alliance was necessary and responded with an acerbic quip oft repeated in the intervening years. “To keep the Soviets out, the Germans down and the Americans in,” Churchill’s former military secretary wryly explained.
That original formula, with a few modifications and a lot of diplomacy, has essentially remained unchanged and been successful throughout the remainder of the 20th Century and into our current era.
The Atlantic alliance has forestalled a land war in Continental Europe between major powers for eight decades and has also provided the strategic space for the development of the European Community into the European Union (EU), the world’s most successful international federated economic union.
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