A U.S. state outside NATO
A new member joins the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, but did you know there is a U.S. state outside NATO.
Sweden became NATO’s newest member this month, joining 31 nations in the security alliance that includes the United States.
But in reality, 49 of the 50 U.S. states, there is one state outside NATO.
By a quirk of geography and history, Hawaii is not, technically, covered by the NATO pact.
And that is because Hawaii is a U.S. state outside of NATO.
If a foreign power were to attack Hawaii – for example, the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor or the Indo-Pacific Command headquarters northwest of Honolulu – North Atlantic Treaty Organization members would not be obligated to come to the state’s defense.
“It’s the strangest thing,” says David Santoro, president of the Pacific Forum think tank in Honolulu, who adds that even most Hawaiians don’t know that their state is technically adrift from the alliance.
A U.S. state outside NATO
Hawaii is, of course, in the Pacific, and unlike California, Colorado or Alaska, the 50th state is not part of the continental U.S. territory that reaches into the North Atlantic Ocean along its eastern shores.
The exception is contained in the Washington Treaty, the document that established NATO in 1949, a decade before Hawaii became a state.
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So, technically, Hawaii is a U.S. state outside NATO.
Although Article 5 of the treaty provides for collective self-defense in the event of a military attack on any member state, Article 6 limits the geographic scope.
“An armed attack against one or more of the parties is deemed to include an armed attack against the territory of either party in Europe or North America,” says Article 6. It also says that any island territory must be in the North Atlantic, north of the Tropic of Cancer.
A U.S. State Department spokesman confirmed that Hawaii is not covered by Article 5, but said Article 4, which says members shall consult when the “territorial integrity, political independence or security” of any member is threatened, should cover any situation that could affect the 50th state.
The spokesman also stated that any modification of the treaty to include Hawaii would have little chance of gaining consensus because other members have territories outside the boundaries set out in Article 5.
For example, NATO did not join the United Kingdom in the 1982 war against Argentina after Argentine troops invaded the Falkland Islands, a disputed British territory in the South Atlantic.
This is further proof that Hawaii is a U.S. state outside NATO.
Some experts say that times have changed in the decades since the signing of the Washington Treaty, and argue that the current political situation in the Indo-Pacific may require a rethink.
For U.S. military bases in Hawaii could play a vital role both in countering North Korean aggression and in supporting any possible defense of Taiwan.
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Hawaii’s strategic importance also has deep historical significance for the United States.
“This is where Pearl Harbor happened. This is where the attack that got us into World War II happened, and – by the way – this is what also led us to help liberate France,” he says.
NATO is one of the bedrocks of the transatlantic democratic community.
The United States and other NATO members have touted unprecedented unity among the alliance in the face of Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
And NATO has also toughened its shared rhetoric on China in recent years, vowing to address what they describe as the “systemic challenges” posed by Beijing.
