Thread by @ProfPaulPoast

1/ Day 2 of #NATO7for70 to commemorate 70 years of @NATO!

The second installment is "Turkey and Greece: The First Expansion"

2/ Turkey (🇹🇷) & Greece (🇬🇷) joined the alliance in 1952 (with the articles of accession officially signed in October 1951). So NATO's first expansion took place just a little over two years after its founding.

Why these two countries?

3/ When the North Atlantic Treaty was signed in 1949, these were not the immediately obvious countries to be the first new members of NATO.

Ireland (🇮🇪) had been one of the last cuts

(👇 is from the minutes of the March 11, 1949 meeting of the Washington Exploratory Group)

4/ Even Brazil (🇧🇷) seemed like a viable candidate, though it was decided during the 1948-49 negotiations that 🇧🇷could offer assistance via the 1947 Rio Pact

(👇 is from the minutes of the July 26, 1948 meeting of the Washington Exploratory Group)

5/ As for 🇹🇷& 🇬🇷, it was thought in 1949 that they in no way fit the "North Atlantic" geographic scope of the treaty. At least, this is what was decided during the Washington Exploratory Talks.

Instead, a special declaration should be made to state their importance.

6/ Indeed, the special steps 🇺🇸 would take to reassure 🇹🇷 are outlined in this May 1949 State Department Memorandum
history.state.gov/historicaldocu…

7/ So what changed?

First, keep in mind that both countries were considered vital to American national interests. This was made abundantly clear when Truman issued his famous 1947 anti-communist "Doctrine"

8/ Second, it was always going to hard to say that 🇹🇷&🇬🇷were not "North Atlantic" when 🇮🇹was also in the alliance 🤔

9/ Third, the government of 🇹🇷was not shy about it's desire to join @NATO and not, instead, be part of some alternative arrangement (like a "Mediterranean Pact").

Indeed, key to that effort was 🇹🇷ambassador to 🇺🇸 Feridun Cemal Erkin

10/ Fourth, for 🇺🇸, adding 🇹🇷would shift allied defense efforts in the Middle East away from the 🇬🇧focal point of 🇪🇬 and towards the US strategy of containing (via an `Outer Ring') the Soviet Union.

In other words, it would help US efforts to weaken 🇬🇧influence in the region.

11/ So there was essentially an unlocked door to NATO for 🇹🇷.

It just needed a push!

🇹🇷 did exactly this when the UNSC authorized force in Korea. 🇹🇷sent a Brigade to fight along with the 25th 🇺🇸Infantry Division.

(👇image of 🇹🇷 General receiving Silver Star from 🇺🇸 General)

12/ So the 🇺🇸 now felt it was time to bring in 🇹🇷, but along with 🇬🇷.

Leaving one out would be problematic due to (1) long standing tensions b/w the two countries, & (2) it would signal to the Soviets that only one of them matter.

13/ Here is the memorandum where Erkin thanked the US officials after receiving word of 🇹🇷& 🇬🇷entering @NATO:

trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/st…

14/ Accession would not stop there. By 1955, West Germany gained entry. In some ways, this was less surprising. After all, as Lord Ismay famously quipped that the purpose of NATO was:

“to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down.”

15/ That sounds a tad different than what he said is this OFFICIAL NATO video

16/ So that is the (very brief) story of @NATO's first expansion. Needless to say, it didn't stop there (but that's a story for another installment of #NATO7for70 to mark #NATOat70).

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