Interdependence and Collective Security in the North Atlantic Area

1947 was a crucial year in the period preceding the creation of the North Atlantic alliance. It was a year which saw the formulation of the Truman Doctrine (which was to become the first large-scale programme of US military aid to free peoples resisting aggression), the launch of the Marshall Plan, the creation of Cominform and the collapse of the Council of Foreign Ministers in London. The British withdrawal from Greece in 1947 led to the first major move by the United States away from its traditional policy of isolationism, when it took upon itself the responsibility for the Eastern Mediterranean through the Truman Doctrine. This new direction in American foreign policy was reinforced by the advent of the Marshall Plan, which saw a further external commitment on the part of the United States, this time to the reconstruction of the Western European economy. All these events served to mark the transition from a multipolar to a bipolar world system.