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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2013
After the North Atlantic Treaty. The North Atlantic treaty, with its incorporation of the principle that attack on any one of the signatory powers will be considered an attack on all, has done more than any previous measure to strengthen the morale of Western Europe. No longer need any of the participating European countries, whether big or small, be afraid that it might be left alone in the hour of attack. Against that hour, if it should have to come, all will prepare in common.
On the other hand, it is obvious that this firm expression of the “will to defend” has gravely accentuated the dividing line between East and West. More definitely than ever, outside of the two World Wars, Europe has now realigned herself in two antagonistic camps, both heavily armed. This fact will receive further emphasis in the process of implementing the treaty. Each one of the many particular measures that will now be taken to organize and strengthen the common defense, and the concomitant increase in expenditures for armament—much more noticeable in democracies with their public discussion of all military and budgetary issues than in the silent realms of dictatorial censorship—will have the effect of a showing of teeth and rattling of sabers.
1 Message of President Truman, delivered before joint session of Congress on Mar. 12, 1947.
2 Statement before the Senate Committee on Foreigh Relations, Department of State Bulletin, 1947, p. 270Google Scholar. See Sacks, Alexander H., “The Truman Doctrine in International Law,” Lawyers Guild Review, Vol. 7 (1947), pp. 141–177Google Scholar.
3 Since these lines were written, the conflict between the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia has offered a striking illustration for the problem here discussed.
4 Article 21, par. 3, reads: “The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections, which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.” This text fails to stipulate, except by the vague term “genuine,” that parties or groups willing to respect the human rights established in the Declaration may not be prevented from nominating candidates, setting up programs, and campaigning for them.
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