Founding of Western European Union

The Western European Union was a European defence organization created by the Modified Brussels Treaty, which added West Germany and Italy to the five states of the 1948 Brussels Treaty: Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. It was part of the settlement that allowed West Germany to rearm and join NATO. Its treaty contained a mutual defence clause, but in practice NATO took over most military planning during the Cold War, and the union stayed largely dormant. It was revived in the 1980s as a forum for European defence cooperation and later carried out small missions. As the European Union developed its own security and defence policy, the union's functions were transferred and it was closed down in 2011.

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