ABSTRACT
The revolutionary nature and the elaborate machinery of N.A.T.O. created, in the course of time, the impression of a fully effective organization for European defence. Yet, by 1951, there were only 12 N.A.T.O. divisions and 1,000 aircraft in western Europe whereas the Soviets commanded over 240 divisions and 20,000 aircraft; and it would be difficult to assert that N.A.T.O. constituted in the strictest sense a credible deterrent to Soviet expansion. The perpetuation both of N.A.T.O. and of the division between east and west which it expressed resulted from events outside western Europe, none of which directly concerned the United Kingdom.
