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Glite Dictionary
North Atlantic Council

North Atlantic Council

1 6.0
A group in NATO that makes political decisions and includes permanent representatives from each member country
  • noun
  • Formal
translation icon : Consejo del Atlántico Norte
  • At the North Atlantic Council's meeting, representatives from all member countries debated the new policies.
  • North Atlantic Council (NATO)

NATO's line of accountability is to the North Atlantic Council.

Examples

  • Not until the Cold War was over did NATO itself go into combat on the basis of a formal "Action Order" from the North Atlantic Council, the alliance's governing body in Brussels.

    Academic text (2002)

  • At the level of internal NATO organizational procedures, the alliance should create a Membership Monitoring Committee subordinate to the North Atlantic Council (NAC).

    Academic text (2002)

  • The United States willingly ran all target options through a vetting process within the North Atlantic Council, NATO's political decision-making body, and the French, in particular, slowed down a number of American requests.

    Academic text (2018)

  • The North Atlantic Council meets regularly to discuss security issues affecting member countries.

  • The recent decision made by the North Atlantic Council was crucial in addressing the crisis in the region.

Synonyms

NAC
vsNorth Atlantic Council
  • Jargon
1 7.6

A group that makes the main decisions for NATO with representatives from each member country

is the full official name rather than a shortened abbreviation

Surface Forms

North Atlantic Council singular
North Atlantic Councils plural

Morphology

North + Atlantic + council

The phrase transparently combines a geographic modifier 'North Atlantic' with 'council', so a B1 learner who knows the words can infer it is a council relating to the North Atlantic region. However, the precise institutional status (that it is NATO's principal political decision‑making body with permanent representatives) cannot be derived from the constituents and requires world‑knowledge, so the transparency is partial.

Etymology

North Atlantic Council is a name that tells its story: North Atlantic points to the countries around the North Atlantic Ocean, and Council means a group that meets to decide. So the name came to mean the main political body of 'NATO' where each country sends a representative to make decisions for all members.