North Atlantic Treaty Organization is known as NATO in short. It is an
alliance of countries from Europe and North America. It is based on the main
principle that attack against one or several of the NATO members would be
considered as an attack on and against all the member countries.
The North Atlantic Treaty which was signed in Washington D.C. in 1949 is
the legal basis of NATO and this treaty is also popularly known as Washington
Treaty. This treaty comprises of various Articles where the provisions of the
Articles need to be carried out by the parties to the treaty in accordance with
their respective constitutional processes after the treaty is ratified by the
parties.
The term ratification means to formally consent or approve something and
make it officially valid. A Treaty means a formal agreement between two or more
States which has been ratified and thus legally binding the parties to the
agreement.
NATO is an intergovernmental military alliance between the member states who have signed the Treaty where the members agree to defend each other against attack by any other country. Some of the member countries of NATO are Belgium, Canada, Italy, United Kingdom, United States, Netherlands, etc.
