With 31 members today, NATO includes a large majority of European states. With the question of Ukraine’s potential membership, enlargement could continue a little further east.
They were only 12 at the beginning, they are now 31. Member States of NATO meet at a summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, to discuss in particular the financing of defense or Ukrainian membership. Created in 1949, NATO has indeed expanded gradually to the countries of Eastern Europe at the end of the Cold War.
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Twelve founding members in 1949
At the end of the Second World War, the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of twelve Western countries met in Washington to sign the North Atlantic Treaty on April 4, 1949: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, the United States, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, the Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom. The text creates a political and military alliance between the signatories in the context of the Cold War. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was born.
Four new states until 1991
A first enlargement was decided three years later, in 1952. Wishing to strengthen its presence in south-eastern Europe, NATO welcomed Greece and Turkey. The Federal Republic of Germany, at the heart of tensions with the Eastern bloc, officially joined the alliance in 1955. It was then necessary to wait until 1982 for a new state, Spain, to be integrated.
Enlargements towards the East after the fall of the Wall
The end of the Cold War paved the way for an enlargement towards the former countries of the Eastern bloc. Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic thus joined the alliance in 1999, before a new wave of accessions in 2004: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. After Slovenia, NATO is gradually integrating several other Balkan countries, all of which have followed the “membership action plan” created in 1999. Thus, Albania and Croatia joined in 2009, Montenegro in 2017 and North Macedonia in 2020.
Bosnia and Herzegovina is engaged in a Membership Action Plan. In addition to the case of Ukraine, at the heart of discussions at the Vilnius summit, another former Soviet republic, Georgia, has initiated discussions to join NATO.
Finland, the last to come… before Sweden?
Already involved in operations led by NATO, Finland and Sweden have long maintained their desire for “non-alignment”. The Russian aggression in Ukraine has moved the lines: the two countries apply for membership barely three months after the start of the war, in May 2022. Finland officially becomes a member of the alliance in April 2023. After the blocking of its candidacy by Turkey, Sweden seems to be the next signatory state, with the green light given Monday, July 10 by Ankara.