In Retrospect: NATO, or Churchill’s Dream of British Hegemony Backed by American Might

For days on end, we have been subjected to soap-opera style reports on Queen Elizabeth’s Jubilee celebrations and the Royal Family . So it’s useful to recall the true nature of the British Empire and its many servants. One aspect of that is provided by Schiller Institute analyst Stephan Ossenkopp in an op-ed titled “NATO remains an imperial anachronism”, published in the China Daily of June 1.

Ossenkopp notes that U.S. President Biden recently stated that a “revived NATO” (with Finland and Sweden) would have “the tools and resources” and the “clarity and conviction” to lead the world. But “where is NATO supposed to lead the world?”, he asks.

Contrary to a popular belief, he points out, NATO was not created as “a defensive alliance” to protect against “an aggressive Warsaw Pact”. In fact, it was created six years before the Warsaw Pact, and just three years after the infamous “iron curtain” speech given by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. What is almost never reported about that speech, given in Fulton, Missouri, is that “the British leader called for militarizing the United Nations!” To quote Churchill himself: “the United Nations Organization must immediately begin to be equipped with an international armed force”. He explicitly explained that “the sure prevention of war” required “a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States.”

Thus, according to the Schiller Institute analyst, the future was to be determined by this world organization “in the cultural tradition of the British Empire, combined with the military-industrial strength of the U.S.”. Great Britain and the U.S. then “concluded a permanent close defense alliance, including worldwide military bases to be used jointly, which was later to become the basis for the founding of NATO.” The Chicago Sun newspaper correctly saw this development as “British world domination by American arms”, and some in the U.S. Senate “rejected the idea of Washington taking on the legacy of British colonial policy”.

While the UN was not militarized as Churchill wished, NATO was created in 1949. But it “was only with the accession of West Germany in 1955 that the Soviet Union formed the Warsaw Pact” with eight East European countries.

Given its expansion, Ossenkopp continues, “it was in the logic of NATO not to dissolve after the disintegration of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union in 1991”, but expand further eastward in six different waves. And “the aggressive and reckless pursuit of NATO’s ultimate purpose, Anglo-American dominance over the world, have brought us to the brink of World War III today.”

In conclusion, the SI analyst notes that the dissolution of NATO and “the establishment of a global security architecture that meets the security and development interests of all countries of the world have become a matter of humankind’s survival”.