History Main / BindingAncientTreaty

* Same in ''VideoGame/MasterOfOrion 2''. Sign an alliance with one race, and they'll ask you to declare war next month. If you refuse, they declare war on you. Just maintain non-aggression pacts and remain neutral while the other empires kill each other off.
* Naturally, these crop up on occasion in ''CyberNations''. Usually the signatories downgrade a treaty if they're that out of touch with each other.

* Same in ''MasterOfOrion 2''. Sign an alliance with one race, and they'll ask you to declare war next month. If you refuse, they declare war on you. Just maintain non-aggression pacts and remain neutral while the other empires kill each other off.
* Naturally, these crop up on occasion in CyberNations. Usually the signatories downgrade a treaty if they're that out of touch with each other.

** Oh, it did, and New Dehli in fact spent much of the time rehearsing for the possibility that Britain's Pacific colonies (Hong Kong at the least, Malaysia, Australia, and New Zealand at most) would intervene to protect the integrity of Portuguese Goa. That being said, they planned for it but never really held it a strong possibility, due to the (fairly) cordial relations they had with Britain and the solid mile of frost that existed between Lisbon and London (Portugal had learned away from Britain in one degree or another since the late 19th century- which manifested itself earlier as sympathy for Germany so strong that Portuguese-flagged ships probably spent more time in WorldWarOne - when they were officially aligned with Britain and at WAR with Germany- sending supplies to the German holdouts in Southeast Africa than to THEIR OWN MEN on the Western Front, which eventually forced the Western Allies to largely seize the Portuguese fleet), and serious, blood-on-the-ground skirmishes had happened in both. As such, they gambled (correctly) that Britain would not risk war against emerging power India for the sake of decrepit and unfriendly Portugal.

* Britain still has a right to recruit in Nepal. It was included in the peace treaty of a war long ago at the request of officers who had seen the Gurkhas [[WorthyOpponent as enemies]] and were so impressed that they wanted them as allies.
** They use it too, Gurkhas serve in the British army today.
* It's not quite "ancient" yet, but the North Atlantic Treaty that created [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NATO NATO]] was signed over sixty years ago- back when 45 RPM records were the latest thing in entertainment and the first commercial jetliner had yet to make its first flight. The threat for which it was originally designed- the Soviet Union and its communist puppet regimes- has not existed for over twenty years. The only substantial change that has been made since then is a slight reorganization of its command structure, and the inclusion of a several [[{{Ruritania}} small Eastern European states]]. Most people don't really think about or question the treaty very much, but Article Five of the treaty states that an attack on one member is equivalent to an attack on all other members, meaning that if some minor member of NATO (say, Turkey, which joined in 1952) gets into a minor dust-up with a major world power (say, Russia), then it could ignite [[WW3 World War Three]], despite the Cold War having [[TheGreatPoliticsMessUp ended decades ago]]- all because nobody thought to take a good hard look at the provisions of a sixty-year-old treaty which lost its ''raison d'?e'' in 1991. A lot of foreign policy analysts said that the world dodged this very bullet in 2008, when the country of Georgia got into [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_South_Ossetia_war a shooting war]] with Russia. Luckily, Georgia (which has been proposed for NATO membership) had not yet been incorporated into NATO, but ''had'' it been, it would have been a perfect example of this trope.
** From the perspective of the U.S this so far seems to be a subversion because the existence of the treaty means that none of the member states are likely to be attacked for fear of the United States getting involved. Of course from the view of the other member states this may be played straight, especially with the example of Afghanistan.
** Also, the NATO Charter (Article 5, I believe) sets out specific obligations and how they are invoked. I believe an attack must take place in North America (a la September 11th, 2001), (Western?) Europe, or the North Atlantic to invoke most obligations.
*** Article 5 states that an attack on one member is an attack on all. Article 6 specifies what an attack entails for the purposes of the treaty:
--> "For the purpose of Article 5, an armed attack on one or more of the Parties is deemed to include an armed attack:

--> - on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America, on the Algerian Departments of France[[hottip:*:Not applicable after 1962 with Algeria's independence]], on the territory of Turkey[[hottip:*:added when Greece and Turkey joined in 1952, in case the Soviets tried some legal finagling by claiming (most of) Turkey is in Asia and not Europe]] or on the islands under the jurisdiction of any of the Parties in the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer;
--> - on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer. "

Note that "north of the Tropic of Cancer" is in both clauses. This is why TheFalklandsWar did not invoke Article 5 - the Falklands are south of the Tropic of Cancer.

** Of course NATO as a whole is now often used as tool to organize joint military action that involves most of the major western powers. An example of this can be seen in the intervention in the recent Libyan Civil War. How much it is '''useful''' is another question entirely, but that is what it is often used for.
* Brutally subverted in Thucydides telling of the Peloponnesian War. The Athenians wanted the island of Melos. The Melians wanted to be independent. Athens told them that they will submit, or be invaded and crushed. The Melians appealed to Sparta (which Athens was in a sort of Cold War with), with the central arguement that Sparta had such a treaty with them. Sparta told them that such a treaty meant nothing. The Melians held out anyway. Athens invaded, and wiped out the Melians.

** And if you permanently ally with an aggressive AI when you're building a peacetime economy...god help you, because the game certainly won't.
* ''DragonAge: Origins'' uses this as the game's plot framework. The Grey Wardens must use a series of treaties, originally written merely as a formality four hundred years prior when people were happier with Grey Wardens, to [[GondorCallsForAid recruit help against the Blight]]. Somewhat subverted in that ''everyone'' you have a treaty for needs you to bail them out of some sort of trouble before they're in any state to help you; there's a good chance that they would've helped you out even without a treaty after what you do for them.
** Not to mention that the Grey Wardens are calling them to stand together against an ancient threat that'll destroy everyone if left unchecked.
** Also subverted in that the Grey Wardens can come away with different allies than they originally intended - they can have an army of templars instead of mages, golems instead of dwarves, and/or werewolves instead of elves, depending on how the player resolves the quests.

* In ''{{Warcraft}} II: The Tides of Darkness'', [[TheAragorn Andiun Lothar]] recruits the Elven nation of Quel'Thalas into the Alliance of Lordaeron by reminding the elves of a four-thousand-year-old treaty that in exchange for helping the elves in a war, Lothar's family could ask their help at any time.
** YMMV. The details of the Warcraft storyline differ depending on your source material. The game itself has the elves helping after a group of elves are captured by orcs and trolls and the humans help the elves save the captured elves. However, this is really confusing when, if you play as the Horde, the trolls don't start helping you until a group of trolls is captured by humans and elves and the orcs help the trolls save the captured trolls.
*** So, basically, neither faction gets help from the other race until members of that race is captured by the other faction, who is already working with the race that doesn't start helping them until after you and the race you're working with band together and capture some of them.

--> - on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America, on the Algerian Departments of France[[hottip:*:Not applicable after 1962 with Algeria's independence]], on the territory of or on the Islands under the jurisdiction of any of the Parties in the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer;
--> - on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer."

--> - on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer.

- on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America, on the Algerian Departments of France[[hottip:*:No longer applicable after 1962 with Algerian independence]], on the territory of or on the Islands under the jurisdiction of any of the Parties in the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer;
- on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer.

--> Note that "north of the Tropic of Cancer" is in both clauses. This is why TheFalklandsWar did not invoke Article 5 - the Falklands are south of the Tropic of Cancer.

** If ever there were a MissedMomentOfAwesome... England could have rounded up their best RenFaire attendees and [[LiteralGenie technically fulfilled their treaty obligations]].

* In Warcraft 2, Andiun Lothar managed to get the High Elves to join the Alliance by invoking the life debt that the elves owed to the Arathi humans having for helping them win the Troll Wars; Lothar himself is the [[LastOfHisKind last of the Arathi family]].

** This was a little bit shortsighted considering Portugal had already tried this in the 19th century to protest at Britain closing off the slave trade and Britain gave them the reply in Arkell vs. Pressdam.

* The treaties arising out of the Peace of Westphalia (1648) after the thirty years war delineated the makeup of Europe's national boundaries for a rather long time. That's not the important and still binding part. The important part is the specific endorsement of ''National Sovereignty'', meaning that a country cannot be interfered with in its internal affairs, and, for the first time, an explicit universal prohibition against ''Piracy,'' meaning that any country could try any pirate in any court anywhere in the world. Both concepts are still in force today throughout the world.

* One {{Simpsons}} comic invokes this trope when the Simpsons end up living in a mall (Homer refused to sell the house to the development corporation responsible for turning the neighbourhood into said mall, so they built it around the house). Lisa does some research in order to get the corporation to tear down the mall, and discovers that the founder of Springfield signed a peace treaty with some Native Americans who had saved him from the brink of death, giving them sovereignty over their land (which happens to be the land the mall is), only to betray that treaty later on by burning their village to the ground and killing all he found. Luckily, one member of the tribe escaped with her baby, and the treaty states that the land belongs to any living member or descendant of the tribe, which in this case happens to be [[spoiler: Lenny]].

* One {{Simpsons}} comic invokes this trope when the Simpsons end up living in a mall (Homer refused to sell the house to the development corporation responsible for turning the neighbourhood into said mall, so they built it around the house). Lisa does some research in order to get the corporation to tear down the mall, and discovers that the founder of Springfield signed a peace treaty with some Native Americans who had saved him from the brink of death, giving them sovereignty over their land (which happens to be the land the mall is, only to betray that treaty later on by burning their village to the ground. Luckily, one member of the tribe escaped with her baby, and the treaty states that the land belongs to any living member or descendant of the tribe, which in this case happens to be [[spoiler: Lenny]].

* One {{Simpsons}} comic invokes this trope when the Simpsons end up living in a mall (Homer refused to sell the house to the development corporation responsible for turning the neighbourhood into said mall, so they built it around the house). Lisa does some research in order to get the corporation to tear down the mall, and discovers that the founder of Springfield signed a peace treaty with some Native Americans who had saved him from the brink of death, giving them sovereignty over their land (which happens to be the land the mall is, only to betray that treaty later on by burning their village to the ground. Luckily, one member of the tribe escaped with her baby, and the treaty states that the land belongs to any living member or descendant of the tribe is entitled to the land, which in this case happens to be [[spoiler: Lenny]].