What was the purpose in forming the united states

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National Anthem. Share This Page:. Do you have a question? Talk to a live USA. In spite of general agreement on the concept behind the treaty, it took several months to work out the exact terms. The U. Congress had embraced the pursuit of the international alliance, but it remained concerned about the wording of the treaty.

The nations of Western Europe wanted assurances that the United States would intervene automatically in the event of an attack, but under the U. Constitution the power to declare war rested with Congress. Negotiations worked toward finding language that would reassure the European states but not obligate the United States to act in a way that violated its own laws. While the European nations argued for individual grants and aid, the United States wanted to make aid conditional on regional coordination.

A third issue was the question of scope. The Brussels Treaty signatories preferred that membership in the alliance be restricted to the members of that treaty plus the United States. Together, these countries held territory that formed a bridge between the opposite shores of the Atlantic Ocean, which would facilitate military action if it became necessary. The result of these extensive negotiations was the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in In this agreement, the United States, Canada, Belgium, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and the United Kingdom agreed to consider attack against one an attack against all, along with consultations about threats and defense matters.

This collective defense arrangement only formally applied to attacks against the signatories that occurred in Europe or North America; it did not include conflicts in colonial territories. After the treaty was signed, a number of the signatories made requests to the United States for military aid.

The formation of the Warsaw Pact was in some ways a response to the creation of NATO, although it did not occur until six years after the Western alliance came into being. In the aftermath of World War I and World War II, Soviet leaders felt very apprehensive about Germany once again becoming a military power—a concern that was shared by many European nations on both sides of the Cold War divide. In the mids, however, the U. The Soviets warned that such a provocative action would force them to make new security arrangements in their own sphere of influence, and they were true to their word.

This lineup remained constant until the Cold War ended with the dismantling of all the Communist governments in Eastern Europe in and Like NATO, the Warsaw Pact focused on the objective of creating a coordinated defense among its member nations in order to deter an enemy attack. There was also an internal security component to the agreement that proved useful to the USSR. The alliance provided a mechanism for the Soviets to exercise even tighter control over the other Communist states in Eastern Europe and deter pact members from seeking greater autonomy.

When Soviet leaders found it necessary to use military force to put down revolts in Hungary in and in Czechoslovakia in , for example, they presented the action as being carried out by the Warsaw Pact rather than by the USSR alone.

But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. Berlin, the German capital city, was located deep in the Soviet zone, but it was also divided into four However, the relationship between the two nations was a tense one.

In June , the simmering tensions between the Soviet Union