ABSTRACT
This chapter examines public attitudes in the United States and Western Europe on selected issues related to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), including an analysis of support for the NATO alliance and defense expenditures as well as an examination of attitudes on neutralism, peace, and antinuclear issues. In measuring the United States' commitment to Europe's security, it is relevant to ask the question of where Europe fits into overall US foreign policy priorities. Europe there appears to be a substantial change in political ideas and culture, a change that is more neutralist, more skeptical of association with the United States, less sympathetic to American society, and more favorable to developing a third position separate from alliance with the superpowers. The consensus that prevailed in the United States from 1945 to 1970 on the role of the United States in the world was destroyed in the wake of US involvement in Vietnam and has not been replaced.
