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Comment by gspetr | Hacker News Reader

Actually those obligations are very carefully worded to allow US to weasel out of it if necessary.

Consider Articles 5 and 6: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_110496.htm#

"At the drafting of Article 5 in the late 1940s, there was consensus on the principle of mutual assistance, but fundamental disagreement on the modalities of implementing this commitment.

The European participants wanted to ensure that the United States would automatically come to their assistance should one of the signatories come under attack; the United States did not want to make such a pledge and obtained that this be reflected in the wording of Article 5."

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Maybe. But the wording you mention[0] is generally thought to avoid having relatively minor and perhaps disputed border conflicts, such as what we're seeing now between Turkey and Syria, from dragging the entire alliance into the fight. The other members saying, in essence, that the border conflict does not threaten the security of the North Atlantic area.

But it definitely wasn't intended as a loophole to allow the U.S. and Canada to weasel out from participating in a major land war with the Soviet Union. This would have been hard to do in any case, what with having two Army corps permanently deployed in Europe during the Cold War...

[0]In italics: The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.

The deployment of forces in theatre close to a potential aggressor is a deliberate strategic process designed to ensure that the alliance will get involved politically. That is why units have been sent to the Baltic states recently. The American, Canadian or British public might not go to war for Estonia, but they will if that initial attack on Estonia involves casualties on their forward deployed forces.

The thinking is in turn that those troops therefore deter aggression because they act as their nation's guarantee of involvement. A similar principle was seen during the age of gunboat diplomacy, especially with the Pax Britannica.

They call(ed) these forces a `tripwire'.

> Actually those obligations are very carefully worded to allow US to weasel out of it if necessary.

The only reason the US keeps 30 000 troops so close to the DMZ in South Korea, is so that they won't be able to weasel out. Make no mistake, those boys and gals' are there as hostages.

If the DPRK decides to launch an attack, under pretty much any scenario those troops will be engaged in battle within 24h and I doubt that the US public would be okay with leaving them there to fend for themselves.

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