Turkey and Greece Get Their Reward
When the question of the admission of Turkey and Greece to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation was last in the news, two months ago, the British Government's official reasons for hesi- tating to consent to this step were that these two countries were • already associated with the Eastern Mediterranean defence arrangements, and that the existing treaty with Turkey and Understanding with Greece were a sufficient bond. Both these arguments were unconvincing—the first because it was irrelevant and the second because it ignored both the urgent wish of the Greek and Turkish Governments and the plain fact that the Atlantic Treaty, as a defence against a westward move by Russia, is incomplete without direct Turkish and Greek participation. Apparently the British Government had not even convinced itself. At any rate, the confidence which always existed, and which the Greeks went so far as to express publicly two months ago, that the British Government would come round very soon to the American point of view (which favoured .the extension of the treaty) has now been justified. Turkey and Greece are to come in—and the Atlantic community will be all the stronger for it.
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