Derived from the renowned multi-volume International Encyclopaedia of Laws, this practical analysis of the structure, competence, and management of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) provides substantial and readily accessible information for lawyers, academics, and policymakers likely to have dealings with its activities and data

In this compelling book, Seth A. Johnston presents readers with a detailed examination of how NATO adapts. Nearly every aspect of NATO―including its missions, functional scope, size, and membership―is profoundly different than at the organization’s founding. Using a theoretical framework of “critical junctures” to explain changes in NATO’s organization and strategy throughout its history, Johnston argues that the alliance’s own bureaucratic actors played important and often overlooked roles in these adaptations. How NATO Adapts explores how crises from Ukraine to Syria have again made NATO’s capacity for adaptation a defining aspect of European and international security.

This compelling history brings to life the watershed year of 1948, when the United States reversed its long-standing position of political and military isolation from Europe and agreed to an "entangling alliance" with ten European nations. Not since 1800, when the United States ended its alliance with France, had the nation made such a commitment. The historic North Atlantic Treaty was signed on April 4, 1949, but the often-contentious negotiations stretched throughout the preceding year.

NATO's decision to open itself to new members and new missions is one of the most contentious and least understood issues of the post-Cold War world.

This book, an unusual and intriguing blend of memoirs and scholarship, takes us back to the decade when those momentous decisions were made. Former senior officials from the United States, Russia, Western and Eastern Europe who were directly involved in the decisions of that time describe their considerations, concerns, and pressures. They are joined by scholars who have been able to draw on newly declassified archival sources to revisit NATO's evolving role in the 1990s.

L'Alliance n'a cesse de s'adapter a son environnement: operations menees sur trois continents, accueil des pays de l'ancien bloc de l'Est, invention d'un dialogue avec l'Union Europeenne ou les Nations-Unies, nouvelles procedures operationnelles​, modification radicale de son organisation ou reponses aux questions nouvelles comme la cyberdefense, le terrorisme ou la defense anti-missile... En mutation permanente, le domaine d'action de l'Alliance Atlantique va bien au-dela de la relation entretenue avec la France. Les enjeux lies a l'OTAN sont bien plus interessants que ce prisme reducteur, et il est temps de comprendre enfin comment s'est transforme ce qui n'etait encore recemment qu'un heritage de la guerre froide.

Born from necessity, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has always seemed on the verge of collapse. Even now, some seventy years after its inception, some consider its foundation uncertain and its structure weak. At this moment of incipient strategic crisis, Timothy A. Sayle offers a sweeping history of the most critical alliance in the post-World War II era. As Enduring Alliance deftly shows, the history of NATO is organized around the balance of power, preponderant military forces, and plans for nuclear war.

L'ouvrage retrace les deux vies de l'Alliance. En 1949 : une alliance classique, fondee sur l'engagement d'assistance des allies, va se trouver confrontee au fait nucleaire, qui introduit une incertitude sur l'engagement de l'allie dans le feu de la crise, et aux contraintes de l'integration militaire. Apres 1989 : une organisation de gestion des crises, qui s'erige en bras seculier de l'ONU puis concurrence l'organisation mondiale. L'auteur analyse la semi-dissidence francaise de 1966 : retrait francais de l'organisation militaire integree, decide par le general de Gaulle, et tentative de retour de la France dans l'appareil de l'OTAN, menee par Jacques Chirac, ainsi que la fascination pour l'OTAN des nouvelles democraties du centre et de l'est de l'Europe. Il s'interesse aussi a un dossier plus obscur : celui des reseaux 'Gladio', qui exprimerent, au plus fort de la guerre froide, la tentation d'une 'souverainete limitee' a l'occidentale. Reste la question essentielle, liee a l'affaire du Kosovo : en agissant sans mandat de l'ONU, l'OTAN n'ebranle-t-elle pas l'architecture de securite de l'apres-guerre froide ?

The most powerful military alliance in history, NATO shaped the geopolitical contours of the Cold War and continues to structure the contemporary international system. The NATO agreement is reprinted here with speeches and essential historical documents concerning the alliance’s founding and subsequent evolution. Accompanying essays by major scholars discuss debates about NATO’s evolving governance, its role in nuclear politics, and its appropriate mission during and since the Cold War.

This book delivers a clear and balanced interpretive history of transatlantic security relations from the late-1940s to the present day. The author writes in the authoritative and highly readable style that has made his work required reading for policy makers as well as academic experts on and students of International Relations on both sides of the Atlantic. The lively text is also highly accessible for the citizen who wants to develop an understanding of how the United States and Europe came to their current, complex security relationship.