The Cold War, which began with the US and the Soviet Union working together to defeat Nazi Germany in World War II, came about as a result of NATO’s establishment in 1949. NATO’s second secretary-general Hastings Ismay reportedly said that NATO was created to “keep the Soviet Union away, the Americans in, and the Germans down”.
As part of Washington’s isolation policy, NATO worked not just to support its member states, but also to examine the spread of communism.
Not everyone was convinced. European President Charles de Gaulle withdrawn France from NATO’s integrated military command in 1966 because he desired more freedom from the US. Emmanuel Macron, the present French president, sees a European military that is American-uniform, despite Paris ‘ return to NATO in 2009.
Many people believed that NATO’s anti-communist vision was superfluous after the end of the Cold War with the political upheavals in Eastern Europe in 1989 and the Soviet Union’s breakdown in 1991.
Strangely, NATO reinvented itself to support democracy and stability despite the presence of significant Russian threats, including military activities in the Balkans, the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa.
Despite this, many in Europe also question whether the US can be trusted to fulfill its NATO agreements, especially if Donald Trump is elected president once more after the November US election. The beach country of Japan, Japan, and the United Kingdom continue to be the most fervent supporters of NATO.