Good research. You're right, I was inaccurate when I said "only Europe". It includes North America, and Turkey.
And it includes Algeria, although, in the event, nobody came to the aid of the French when the Algerians decided they wanted their country back. I wonder what the response by the rest of NATO would have been if, back in the 1955 or so, the Algerians had gotten their hands on a nuclear bomb (given to them by the Soviets, with a plan for plausible deniability?) and vaporized Marseille? Or just threatened to do so, if the French didn't evacuate Algeria?
But it does not include the non-European spheres of influence and/or vital interests and/or colonies of the NATO members. For all that, everyone is on their own.
Notice, also, that the collective defense ("shall be considered an attack against them all"), doesn't happen until after a member has been attacked. Past tense. The treaty is an obligation to react, not act.
So, even if Turkey thinks it might be attacked in the near future, that doesn't obligate France or Germany to do anything.
Has Turkey attacked Iraq? Whose soldiers are in whose country? Only by redefining defense to mean attack, is France failing in their NATO obligations. |
