Southeast Asia Collective Defense TreatyArticle 6. Any State, whose participation is considered by the
Contracting Parties useful for achieving the purposes of the
present Agreement, may accede to the present Agreement under
the same conditions and with the same obligations as the Con-
tracting Parties.
Any accession shall have legal effect, after the instrument of
accession is duly deposited with the Government of Turkey
from the date of an official notification by the Government of
Turkey to the Government of Pakistan.
Article 7. This Agreement, of which the English text is
authentic, shall be ratified by the Contracting Parties in accor-
dance with their respective constitutional processes, and shall
enter into force on the date of the exchange of the instruments
of ratification in Ankara.
In case no formal notice of denunciation is given by one of
the Contracting Parties to the other, one year before the termi-
nation of a period of five years from the date of its entry into
force, the present Agreement shall automatically continue in
force for a further period of five years, and the same procedure
will apply for subsequent periods thereafter.
In Witness Whereof, the above mentioned Plenipotentiaries
have signed the present Agreement.
Done in two copies at Karachi the second day of April one
thousand nine hundred and fifty four.
For Pakistan:
(Signed) Zafrulla KHAN
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Commonwealth Rela-
tions
For Turkey:
(Signed) S. R. ARBEL
Ambassador of Turkey
4.1357 Southeast Asia Collective Defense
Tr e a t y
Alliance Members:United States, United Kingdom, France, Pakistan,
Thailand, Philippines, Australia, and New Zealand
Signed On:September 8, 1954, in the city of Manila (Philippines). In
force until November 7, 1973.
Alliance Type:Entente (Type III)
Source:United Nations Treaty,no. 2819.
SUMMARY
The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) began as a regional
pact that linked nuclear deterrence to countries ringing the Soviet
bloc, and it existed as an Asian equivalent to NATO (see Alliance no.
4.1347), providing collective defense to all members. U.S. secretary of
state John Foster Dulles pushed for the creation of SEATO as part of a
greater plan to check communist aggression and expansion. The com-
mitment to stymie “external aggression” and “internal subversion”
trumped all other modus vivendi, as economic cooperation made up
only a small part of the treaty.
SEATO began to fall apart in the 1960s when France opposed U.S.
intervention in Vietnam. France completely withdrew from military
cooperation in 1967, and Great Britain subsequently ran down its
bases east of the Suez in 1968. Pakistan officially withdrew from the
treaty in 1972 after disputes with the United States during the Indo-
Pakistani War. France finally suspended all membership payments in
1974, and the alliance effectively collapsed but was not formally ended
until 1977.Alliance Text
The Parties to this Treaty,
Recognizing the sovereign equality of all the Parties,
Reiterating their faith in the purposes and principles set
forth in the Charter of the United Nations and their desire to
live in peace with all peoples and all governments,
Reaffirming that, in accordance with the Charter of the
United Nations, they uphold the principle of equal rights and
self-determination of peoples, and declaring that they will
earnestly strive by every peaceful means to promote self-gov-
ernment and to secure the independence of all countries whose
peoples desire it and are able to undertake its responsibilities,
Desiring to strengthen the fabric of peace and freedom and
to uphold the principles of democracy, individual liberty and
the rule of law, and to promote the economic well-being and
development of all peoples in the treaty area,
Intending to declare publicly and formally their sense of
unity, so that any potential aggressor will appreciate that the
Parties stand together in the area, and
Desiring further to coordinate their efforts for collective
defense for the preservation of peace and security,
Therefore agree as follows:
Article I. The Parties undertake, as set forth in the Charter of
the United Nations, to settle any international disputes in which
they may be involved by peaceful means in such a manner that
international peace and security and justice are not endangered,
and to refrain in their international relations from the threat or
use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of
the United Nations.
Article II. In order more effectively to achieve the objectives
of this Treaty, the Parties, separately and jointly, by means of
continuous and effective self-help and mutual aid will maintain
and develop their individual and collective capacity to resist
armed attack and to prevent and counter subversive activities
directed from without against their territorial integrity and
political stability.
Article III. The Parties undertake to strengthen their free
institutions and to cooperate with one another in the further
development of economic measures, including technical assis-
tance, designed both to promote economic progress and social
well-being and to further the individual and collective efforts of
governments toward these ends.
Article IV. I. Each Party recognizes that aggression by
means of armed attack in the treaty area against any of the Par-
ties or against any State or territory which the Parties by unani-
mous agreement may hereafter designate, would endanger its