Germany would give a 'strong' response should a member of NATO be attacked, its foreign minister said on Thursday in response to a question by a British lawmaker at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg. Frank-Walter Steinmeier was asked by Mark Pritchard, a Conservative member of the British delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, whether Germany would be 'weak or strong' if a member of NATO was attacked, and whether under the organization's Article 5 it would consider launching military action against, for example, an aggressive action by Russia. 'I can answer you very briefly and say: strong,' Steinmeier said. Article 5 is the Western military alliance's collective self-defense mechanism under which all NATO countries must help any member which invokes it.
(photo credit: The Jerusalem Post)