IN-DEPTH: NATO Alliance Divides Republicans in Congress, on Presidential Campaign Trail

More than 70 years ago, Republicans broke with “old guard” isolationists to create NATO as a foundation of the post-WW2 “rule-based” international order. Now, “America First” isolationists are gaining traction within the GOP and challenging the party’s internationalists.

Banners displaying the North Atlantic Treaty Organization logo are placed at the entrance of new NATO headquarters during the move to the new building, in Brussels, Belgium, on April 19, 2018. Yves Herman/Reuters

In the spring of 1952, the Republican Party was divided by “old guard” isolationists, led by presidential frontrunner Sen. Robert Taft (R-Ohio), who demanded a refocus to confronting China from defending Europe after the Communist Chinese Party (CCP) intervened in the stalemated Korean War.

Mr. Taft, son of former Republican President William Howard Taft, had opposed the United States aiding the United Kingdom and other European nations a decade earlier—before Pearl Harbor, that is—and lobbied against the post-war Marshall Plan.