In the whole incident of the Ukraine-Russia War, there is a keyword that is constantly mentioned: Although the word "NATO" has a high exposure rate , many people still do not know what NATO is? Why is it the focus of this war? Today, let's talk about "NATO" together! hiho~ Hello everyone, my name is Zhiqi! Welcome to the sea of dictionaries. Mysterious nouns are analyzed and dedicated to those who do not understand. "NATO" is the abbreviation of "North Atlantic Treaty Organization". It is an international organization composed of North American and European countries. Now it has 30 members Countries including the United States, Germany, Canada, France, the United Kingdom, etc. After the outbreak of the Ukrainian-Russian war, the name NATO has been constantly mentioned by everyone because one of the reasons for Russia to start the war is because of dissatisfaction with the "NATO eastward expansion" requesting Ukraine not to join NATO. , Why does Russia care so much about NATO? 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Do n't hesitate any longer, click the information bar below to see more courses Relevant information! [Why was NATO established?] Why was NATO established? Well... Simply put, it is to prevent communism. Let 's go back to the end of the 1940s when World War II had just ended. At that time , European countries Because the war was severely damaged , but because the United States was not devastated by the war, the United States established the position of the world's largest power after the war. After the disintegration of the biggest enemy, the Axis Powers, the United States began to turn its attention to the next possible enemy. That is to say, the gradual rise of communism, and the communist powers at that time: the Soviet Union, because the economic situation of many European countries was not good at that time, the United States was very worried that the Soviet Union would take advantage of the situation, so in order to make Europe quickly cheer up, the United States provided a European version of the U.S. aid, also known as the "Marshall Plan" . In 1948, the Marshall Plan was launched to provide Europe with 13 billion US dollars in support. Considering inflation, it is about 150 billion US dollars today . Of course, only economic aid is not enough. Cooperation is also very important . In 1949, the United States, Canada, and ten European countries signed the "North Atlantic Treaty" and promised to establish a military organization for mutual defense. This organization is what we see today as the "North Atlantic Treaty Organization" for short "NATO" . ”, headquartered in Brussels, the capital of Belgium, when talking about this kind of transnational cooperative organization, everyone may immediately think of another “United Nations” . NATO members are obviously all members of the United Nations. The United Nations also has its own army , so why do you need another What about another NATO? [NATO vs. United Nations] Although the United Nations has troops, the dispatch of troops requires the approval of the United Nations Security Council first. The Soviet Union, the permanent member of the Security Council , has a veto power and can veto any military action they do not like, then Said that if the United Nations wanted to launch a military action against the Soviet Union , the Soviet Union would certainly not agree . So if you want to contain the Soviet Union, you must go through other organizations. NATO is such a military defense alliance . In addition to the respective armies of the member states, NATO also has The number of its own rapid response force is about 40,000 . Today, the number of troops that NATO can mobilize has reached nearly 3.5 million . There is a famous "Article V" agreement in the "Convention". , as long as any NATO member is attacked, it will be regarded as an attack on NATO as a whole , so as long as any NATO member is attacked, the other NATO members will immediately enter the war . Under such conditions, the Soviet Union is more likely to worry about the world The war did not dare to easily send troops to NATO countries . In terms of effectiveness , almost no country has dared to attack NATO member countries . The only case in history that “member countries were attacked, so all NATO members were dispatched ” occurred in 2001. 9/11 Incident NATO also participated in the subsequent war in Afghanistan . Having said that, since NATO is an organization to prevent and block the Soviet Union, how did the Soviet Union respond? [How did the Soviet Union respond to NATO? ] After the establishment of NATO, the Soviet Union was not to be outdone. In 1955, the "Warsaw Pact Organization" was established to compete with NATO. The official name of the Warsaw Pact is "Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance Treaty Organization." Because this pact was signed in Warsaw, Poland, it was called the "Warsaw Pact." The Warsaw Pact, referred to as the "Warsaw Pact". During the Cold War, NATO represented the "Western camp" and the "anti-Communist camp" , while the Warsaw Pact represented the "Eastern camp" and the "Communist camp". The Warsaw Pact is also similar to Article 5 of NATO. The terms of attacking any member of the Warsaw Pact is equivalent to attacking the entire Warsaw Pact . Fortunately, during the Cold War, the Warsaw Pact and NATO did not really conflict , and with the instability within the Communist camp, the Warsaw Pact was signed in 1991 It was abolished in July. In December of the same year, the Soviet Union also disintegrated. The original "Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic" was renamed "Russian Federation" , which is what we now call "Russia". Because the Soviet Union disintegrated very suddenly, none of the Western countries did not. In anticipation of this happening , everyone does not know how the new Russia is different from the previous Soviet Union. Therefore , they let NATO continue to exist in case of emergency . In addition, there are some members of the former Soviet Union and the former Warsaw Pact. Because they are worried that Russia may retaliate against them , they also want to join NATO, so that the number of NATO members will increase rapidly . This phenomenon makes Russia super unhappy [The reason why Russia hates NATO] Why is Russia so dissatisfied with NATO? There are many different explanations for this issue. Some commentators believe that Russia is basically the Soviet Union's "resurrection" . Even if the Soviet Union has disintegrated, they still believe that the territory of the former Soviet Union belongs to Russia's sphere of influence and cannot be easily interfered by "foreign forces" in Europe and the United States. Organizations with the goal of "containing the Soviet Union" certainly made Russia very concerned, so Russia has repeatedly warned that NATO cannot allow the former Soviet Union countries to join, but NATO believes that as long as these countries meet the conditions , it is their freedom to want to join, so from Since the 1990s, the former Warsaw Pact or former Soviet Union countries that joined NATO include the Czech Republic, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, etc. NATO's sphere of influence has also expanded eastward step by step, to the vicinity of Russia and NATO's military presence near Russia. The deployment also makes Russia very dissatisfied . For example, in 2010, NATO deployed missile interception systems in Poland and Romania. In 2014, the Crimean War broke out. NATO also deployed multinational troops in countries close to Russia, such as Poland, Lithuania, and Estonia. The reason is that Russia regards NATO as its number one enemy. At this time, Ukraine in the middle has become a key conflict point. Russia has repeatedly opposed Ukraine's joining NATO because if Ukraine also joins NATO, they will lose a huge buffer zone. , the fear that the military forces of Europe and the United States can directly threaten Russia's territory has finally become one of the fuses of this war. What does Ukraine think? [Why does Ukraine want to join NATO? ] Before the outbreak of the war, Ukraine had a lot of complicated considerations about whether to join NATO or not , because if it can join NATO, the advantage is that it can get military protection and stop Russia, which is eyeing Ukraine, but at the same time, it may anger Russia and increase its military. The risk of conflict puts Ukraine in a difficult choice. For example, since 2008, Ukraine has sought to join NATO , but it has not achieved immediate results. By 2010, Ukraine's president was elected by the pro-Russian "Yanukovych". Ukraine also Therefore, the progress of joining NATO was postponed . After 2014, the two elected presidents were more pro-European. In addition to wanting to join the EU, which focuses on "economic cooperation," they also want to join the EU, which focuses on "military cooperation." NATO Even in 2019, Ukraine successfully amended its constitution and listed "joining the European Union" and "joining NATO" as a national policy. Of course , after the outbreak of the Ukraine-Russian war, the situation has changed differently. At present, although NATO member states condemn Russia They also provide various levels of assistance to Ukraine, hoping to protect Ukraine’s sovereignty. However , NATO countries, including the United States, do not want a direct military conflict with Russia, so they are relatively conservative in their attitude towards allowing Ukraine to join, although Ukraine is also actively Seeking military assistance from NATO members However , according to current reports, in order to ease Russia's mood , Ukraine seems to be more willing to compromise, not necessarily to join NATO, but everything is still in a state of rapid change. What will happen in the future, it remains to be seen Observation At present , what everyone cares more about is whether NATO has a way to play its role? 【Is NATO useful? ] In the more than 70 years of NATO's history , it seems that there are not so many stages that NATO can play. For example, during the entire Cold War, NATO did not really take military action . After the Cold War, some people criticized that NATO became a "world dominated by the United States." The Police Coalition used to "maintain regional peace" and "prevent humanitarian crises" for airstrikes in Yugoslavia, for Kosovo's independence, and for the war in Afghanistan and the civil war in Libya . NATO members are not monolithic, and everyone has their own interests to consider . For example, former US President Trump accused NATO allies of contributing too little military spending , taking the United States as a big advantage, and threatening to withdraw from NATO . Another major country, France, is also dissatisfied with its presence in the alliance. The right to speak in NATO is too low. It once withdrew from NATO and did not rejoin it until 2009. The current French President Emmanuel Macron even criticized that NATO was becoming "brain dead" and became increasingly ineffective. However , after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the Russian threat made The importance of NATO has been awakened again. Many NATO members have promised to increase military spending and strengthen military cooperation . Some countries that were not originally members of NATO, such as Finland and Sweden, which are close to Russia, also released news that they may consider joining NATO. Therefore, there are many comments that the Russian attack, although partly because of NATO, has unexpectedly reunited this gradually declining organization [Our point of view] When we were studying this set of materials Discovery is like many international issues . People's evaluation of NATO is really polarized. On the one hand, some people think that NATO claims to protect regional peace and spends a lot of money every year, but it seems to have no effect. Like this Ukraine-Russia war, It seems that the existence of NATO has also intensified international conflicts. It was originally intended to maintain world peace, but indirectly brews war . Such an organization is better than disbanding. On the other hand, some people think that even if there is no NATO, Russia is not necessarily It will be like this. Obediently give up the interests they want and do nothing. So the threat that everyone feels will not disappear automatically because there is no NATO. At this time , the existence of NATO, even if it does not fully function like many high-lethal weapons, will not work. It can exert a certain deterrent effect and let Russia restrain a little bit . Of course, as mentioned above, NATO member states also have their own considerations . Everyone's roles and attitudes will change with the struggle of international politics, but it is conceivable . The thing is, because of the outbreak of the Ukrainian-Russian war, the status of NATO will receive more attention. We will also observe with you how it will develop in the future. Well , I also want to ask everyone. Finally, if you like today's video, you are welcome to share it for more updates. Many people know what "NATO is"! In addition, you can also click here to watch the videos "Why is Russia attacking Ukraine?" and "Is it useful for Russia's economic sanctions?" So , today's Zhiqi Qiqi will come to an end here, we will see you tomorrow night!
