 United States Army present Big Picture, an official report produced for the armed forces and the American people. Now to show you part of the Big Picture, here is Sergeant Stuart Queen. In recent years on the Big Picture television series, we have been privileged to report on the progress of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO. Today we turn to this same subject, only this time in a film originally produced by NATO, narrated by Edward R. Murrow. It is a documentary. It is history in the making. It is a story about the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its accomplishments since its birth more than 10 years ago. In this organization, we have developed a deterrent and retaliatory capability of great destructive power for the prevention of general war. We are all partners and have an appropriate part to play in international security. Today, tomorrow, and for the indeterminate future. December 16, 1957, a date to remember. For the first time, 15 chiefs of government gather around one table. Eisenhower, Bech, Macmillan, Manderos, Dr. Conrad Adenauer. These men in their countries have sometimes been at war with each other. Often, they have been united against a common enemy. But here in NATO, for the first time in history, they are united in peace and for peace. In which men and women can freely exercise their inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Peace is built of hope and faith, dreams and hard work, of paper as well as of steel, and of an infinite capacity for details and organization. And that is the job of the permanent secretariat of NATO. High-ranking ministers meet only rarely, but NATO's work for peace goes on daily in the permanent council. The leaders of NATO are chosen for their own ability and not for the size and power of their countries. Belgium, one of the smallest NATO nations, has provided its secretary general, Paul Arnys Spach. These men represent more than 400 million people. People who are diverse in background and in their way of life. Brussels, capital of Belgium, has become the provisional capital of economic Europe. An alliance within the alliance. Gradually, a series of interlocking communities has developed, giving new vigor to old economies. Town hall of Amsterdam. The Dutch are a hardy people with a sense of history. From the Treaty of Utrecht to the North Atlantic Treaty, they have fought against threats, both man-made and natural. Smallest NATO partner with castles out of a fairy tale. But there's nothing imaginary about its fabulous steel industry. Steel production per capita is the highest in the world. The peoples of these three small countries, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg, have formed a customs union called Benelux, a cathedral. Old France. There's a new France, alive with energy, with the biggest hydroelectric stations in Europe. The fastest trains in the world. Mass production in the land of the artisan. And beauty in modern France. From the joy of life to the preservation of life. France, the country of Pasteur, open to students of all colors and all nations. The oldest democracy in the world, the British Commonwealth, handles nearly half of the free world's trade. Britain is one of the world's leading atomic powers. Things like nothing better than a hard fought game. A symbol of the unity of Britain is the trinity of church, parliament and the crown. The queen opens the session of parliament in Canada with the same authority as at home. The British Commonwealth is the oldest, largest voluntary association of free men in world history. Britain and Germany have fought two terrible wars, but today their peoples are united for peace. And the small town of Bonn is the new German capital. Berlin, the traditional capital, is now a valiant outpost. A beacon to those who live in the grey silence of the eastern plains. 14 years after the war, there are still tens of thousands of homeless refugees in Europe, victims of old and new repression. The entire world has been astonished by the resurgence of Germany, by the urge to live and build that has made Germany one of the most prosperous and stable countries in Europe in the Atlantic decade. Nowhere is the contrast between the old and the new so striking as in ancient Rome, Italy has been building a strong new industry. Italian cars from the most luxurious to the least expensive are in demand throughout the world. Everyone is riding scooters. Italian vehicles of all types speed down the highways of the world. From south to north, from cars to bicycles, from Italy to Denmark with Copenhagen, Venice of the north, one of the most beautiful and hospitable of the NATO capital. Friendliness is not only a virtue, it is a way of life for the Danes and no citizen need fear old age in Denmark or in Norway. High timber and the midnight sun, northern most of the NATO allies. Norway is a rugged country and its people are rugged, strong. Asians are rugged but peaceful, tranquil and unhurried. Just beyond their homes, the Soviet border and the barbed wires of a very different world. Iceland does not have an army but it is an invaluable base in the North Atlantic on the great circle route between the European and American partners in NATO. Icelanders feel strongly about their position and are ready to defend it against foe or friend. Freedom to disagree is one of the basic human freedom, one of the basic freedoms of a free alliance. Slave nations do not quarrel, they do as they are told. NATO nations fly free, nowhere in the world does freedom fly higher or wider than in Canada, one of the youngest NATO nations, a land with vast regions of thick forest and mineral wealth. Canada is fertile and rich and generous. Canadians have sent the fruit of their labor and of their fields to Europe. Canadian defense provides a vital link in the defense of the alliance. The largest land mass in NATO, Canada combines a varied terrain and varied tradition. British and French influences are roots of modern Canada, cross their open frontier, the United States. In America, I sought more than America, wrote an early European commentator. I sought the image of democracy itself, with its inclination, its character, its prejudices, and its passions. The image of democracy is often distorted. The world is fascinated by American power and rarely looks upon the other faces of America. The libraries of its great university, its arts, its rich and diverse culture, the free expression of its citizens, their informality, a religious heritage, and the tradition of sport, a hard pick. America's giant corporations are owned by millions of stockholders, not by a few individuals, nor by the state. The tremendous output of these factories are a vital part of national life and of America's contribution to NATO. Their products of factory, field, river, and rain mean variety and easier life, friends and freedom, energy, movement. These are important to Americans, from the new world to the old, a journey through the ages. Portuguese fishermen have been pulling their boats down to the sea for centuries. From Portugal sailed some of the great explorers of history, opening new routes to the West, through the traditions, but modern roads, modern homes, the modern capital for ancient Portugal, the most ancient capital of Europe, cradle of western civilization, Athens. Beloved, beautiful birthplace of the most glorious culture the world has ever known, this ancient alliance of Greek city-states successfully resisted the threat of aggression from the East, but they quarreled among themselves over trade and fishing rights and islands, and the glory that was Greece died. Today, modern Athens is alive with new life and new vigor. And just across the border, Turkey, southern and easternmost anchor of NATO. Facing directly on the Soviet Union, Turkey is another civilization menaced by old perils, but alive with new vigor, and everywhere one sees people busy learning new ways. Many years ago, Turkey tore off the veil and liberated its women, who now work side-by-side with their men, building a new nation, hoping someday to be free of ancient fear. Fear may have been the cement of NATO, but hope is its superstructure and freedom its fate may argue and quarrel, and buy communist papers like UNITA, which denounce NATO, and they are free to buy it. For in the Atlantic decade, freedom has prevailed. Since NATO was formed, not one foot of free soil has been lost. The post-war world began with a hunger for peace and home, but disillusioned began to set in early after the war, for liberation brought slavery to some countries, but there were some brave men left in the East. Beloved Czech Democrat Edvard Bene and Jan Maserek, who attempted the impossible, after Prague, a new target, Berlin, 1948, a year of fear. The Western peoples had not wanted this, but this time the West acted. This time four-sided men decided to join together in a new alliance, an alliance in which all were equal and the stake Western civilization, NATO, was born. Soldiers in a Cold War reluctantly armed to guard a peace which was threatened and which they pledged not to give up. At their head, the president of a great American university came to establish a top military headquarters outside Paris. Shape, military nerve center for the new NATO alliance. From here began the planning that was to result in a complex of military headquarters to protect the countries of the alliance. In Oslo, Norway, the Northern Command, an integrated international staff, Danes and Norwegians under a British general for the defense of Northern Europe and the exits from the Baltic. At Fontainebleau, France, Central European Command. Here there is a French commander in chief with his three commanders for land, sea and air. They guard the very heart of Europe. Naples, the headquarters of NATO's land, sea and air forces on the southern flank and base for the American Sixth Fleet. Indomitable Malta, historic British base. Today headquarters for the naval forces of five NATO countries and in the United States, a Saqlant, Supreme Allied Command Atlantic, home of the US Navy, but also an international headquarters on American soil, symbol of the new unity of the Western world and on the unconquerable island of Britain, the Channel Command. The Royal Navy, with its continental allies, must keep open the vital supply ports of Western Europe and at the NATO headquarters at Northwood, these naval forces are assisted in their task by the Royal Air Force. Here too is planned under Saqlant's command, the defense of the Western approaches to the British Isles. In 1952, two new nations joined the alliance. Turkey and Greece, recent storm centers of communist Russian threat. And in 1955, the Federal Republic of Germany joined NATO. Eisenhower said farewell and Ridgway succeeded him and then Gunther and Norstad. Each man by his presence and by his uniform, reasserting America's commitment for the defense of Europe. To learn to act and plan together, colonels and captains went back to school. And to learn to work together, men and women of the alliance learned a common language. Now everybody opened the throttle slowly to approximately 28 inches. It was hard going for NATO in the early days of the Atlantic Decade. Men had to break ground to build airfields. They had to lay pipelines to feed the machinery of the alliance. A unique experiment in mutual defense in time of peace. And the result was powerful. Indeed, if he and other children are strong, healthy and free, it is at least in part because NATO was born with him. Picture is an official report for the armed forces and the American people. Produced by the Army Pictorial Center, presented by the Department of the Army in cooperation with the state.