Although the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...

(NATO) was present throughout the Cold War as the opposite to the

Warsaw Pact The Warsaw Pact (WP) or Treaty of Warsaw, formally the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, was a collective defense treaty signed in Warsaw, Poland, between the Soviet Union and seven other Eastern Bloc socialist repub ...

, and conducted joint military exercises, no military operations took place. All military NATO operations have occurred after the Cold War when NATO's influence in a post-Cold War rose to prominence in Bosnia where NATO gradually stepped up its efforts to end the trouble. This culminated with NATO's first air campaign in 1995, Operation Deliberate Force, which targeted the

Army of Republika Srpska The Army of Republika Srpska ( sr, Војска Републике Српске/Vojska Republike Srpske; ВРС/VRS), commonly referred to in English as the Bosnian Serb Army, was the military of Republika Srpska (RS), the self-proclaimed Serb ...

whose presence in Bosnia posed a danger to

United Nations Safe Areas United Nations Safe Areas (UN Safe Areas) were humanitarian corridors established in 1993 in the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Bosnian War by several resolutions of the United Nations Security Council. On 16 April 1993, with t ...

and ultimately the bombing helped to bring about the

Dayton Accords The General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also known as the Dayton Agreement or the Dayton Accords ( Croatian: ''Daytonski sporazum'', Serbian and Bosnian: ''Dejtonski mirovni sporazum'' / Дејтонски миро ...

. The organization played a prominent role in Afghanistan after the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commer ...

, as the United States invoked Article 5 of the

North Atlantic Treaty The North Atlantic Treaty, also referred to as the Washington Treaty, is the treaty that forms the legal basis of, and is implemented by, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The treaty was signed in Washington, D.C., on 4 April 194 ...

which deemed the attacks to be an external attack on all NATO members under the idea of

collective defense Collective security can be understood as a security arrangement, political, regional, or global, in which each state in the system accepts that the security of one is the concern of all, and therefore commits to a collective response to threats t ...

. Aside from efforts in Afghanistan, NATO has participated in a wide range of roles including relief effort, counter-piracy, enforcing no-fly zones and naval blockades.

Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992–2004)

NATO was prominent in Bosnia during the early 1990s, and gradually its role became larger with some operations escalating, for instance

Operation Sky Monitor Operation Sky Monitor was a NATO mission to monitor unauthorized flights in the airspace of Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Bosnian War. The operation began in response to United Nations Security Council Resolution 781, which established a ban ...

turned into

Operation Deny Flight Operation Deny Flight was a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) operation that began on 12 April 1993 as the enforcement of a United Nations (UN) no-fly zone over Bosnia and Herzegovina. The United Nations and NATO later expanded the mis ...

which gave NATO "all measures necessary" to enforce a more stringent no-fly zone unlike Sky Monitor during which the no-fly zone was violated over 500 times. It took 46 years after NATO's inception in 1949 for the organization first ever military intervention took place in 1995, Operation Deliberate Force which was targeted the

in Bosnia whose presence posed a danger to designated United Nations "safe areas". The air campaign helped bring about the

Serbia and Kosovo (1999–present)

2001–present

References

{{NATO Lists of military operations

Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992–2004)

Serbia and Kosovo (1999–present)

2001–present

See also

References