DISINFO: Poland and the Baltic states do not fully believe in NATO and Article 5 as they demand additional security guarantees
SUMMARY
It is necessary to point out that Poland and the Baltic states, being enthusiasts of NATO and the USA, have NATO’s Article 5, which guarantees assistance from the entire Pact in a situation of a possible attack. These countries constantly demand additional security guarantees, so despite their trust in NATO, they do not fully believe in this institution, which means that Article 5 is something existing only on paper.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin narrative on NATO and the US military presence in Europe - it claims that the United States may not protect its European allies if it goes against the US national interests.
Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty is the critical component of the Alliance – it assumes that if a NATO Ally is a victim of an armed attack, every other member of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked. In other words, Article 5 is the cornerstone of NATO – it has been invoked only once in history as a response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
The United States is the founding member of NATO and plays a crucial role in European and transatlantic security – since the end of WWII, the US troops based in Europe guaranteed the security of its European allies.
NATO has enhanced its forward presence in the eastern part of the Alliance, with four multinational battalion-size battlegroups in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, on a rotational basis. These battlegroups, led by the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and the United States respectively, make clear that an attack on one Ally would be considered an attack on the whole Alliance.
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