Secretary General of NATO - Establishment

Establishment

Under Article 9 of the North Atlantic Treaty, the members of NATO agreed to "establish a Council, on which each of them shall be represented." As a result of this article of the treaty, the NATO states established the North Atlantic Council. Initially, the Council was composed of the foreign ministers of the NATO members and was scheduled to meet only once annually, but the members soon recognized the need for closer coordination on a day-to-day basis. To deal with this need, the NATO members agreed in May 1950, to appoint "Council Deputies" who meet continuously in London, and oversee the workings of the alliance. The deputies were given full decision making power within the North Atlantic Council, but their work was supplemented by occasional gatherings of the NATO foreign ministers. Under the resolution passed to authorize the deputies, the Chairman of the deputies was also assigned to take responsibility "for directing the organization and its work," including all of its civilian agencies.

The Council Deputies met for the first time on July 25, 1950, and selected Charles Spofford, the United States deputy, as their chairman. Soon thereafter at a meeting of the Council in Brussels, several other important changes to the structure of NATO were undertaken, most notably the establishment of a unified military command under a single Supreme Allied Commander. This unification and the growing challenges facing NATO led to rapid growth in the institutions of the organization. Thus, in 1951, NATO was reorganized to streamline and centralize its bureaucracy. As part of the organization, the Council Deputies were given the status to fully represent their governments in all matters, including those related to defense and finance, rather than just foreign affairs, greatly increasing their power and importance.

As the power of the Deputies increased, and the size of the organization grew, it became clear that a single leader was needed for NATO. To tackle the problem, NATO established the Temporary Council Committee, chaired by Averell Harriman. This group soon established an official secretariat of NATO in Paris to command its bureaucracy. The committee also recommended that "the agencies of NATO needed to be strengthened and co-ordinate", and emphasized the need for someone other than the Chairman of the North Atlantic Council to become the senior leader of the alliance. In response to this recommendation, the North Atlantic Council agreed in its February 1952 Lisbon Conference to create a Secretary General to run all civilian agencies of the organization, control its civilian staff, and serve the North Atlantic Council.