USA's involvement in Europe

The USA’s involvement in Europe: policy towards Britain and Europe; the launch of the Marshall Plan; US attitudes to Germany and Berlin

Marshall Plan, June 1947

**turning point along with Truman Doctrine**

* European Recovery Program to recover European economies
* **provided $13.6b in money and goods to 16 countries**, on condition that recipients spend a proportion of it on American goods, allow American companies access to its market

= **accelerated division of Europe and signified the end of possible relations between the 2**

Reaction to Marshall Plan 1947

* **USSR refused economic aid and called it ‘dollar imperialism’**
* X Article, July 1947: ‘US policy toward Soviet Union must be that of long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies’ = public explanation of containment
* ‘most unselfish act in history’ - Churchill
* **USSR established Cominform, Sept 1947**

USA’s policy towards Britain and Europe

* wanted Europe to become reconstructed democratic region
* Acheson (US Secretary of State under Truman) in July 1945: warned that issue in Europe mirrored a wider international problem that threatened capitalism
* stable pro-American blocs
* US and Britain’s relationship was co-dependent (26% of Marshall Plan went to UK)
* steps towards divided Germany
* March 1947: Moscow Council of Foreign Ministers broke up, failing to reach agreement on peace treaty with Germany
* May 1947: increased responsibility for Germans in Bizonia for own economic development

USA’s attitudes to Germany and Berlin

* Bizonia (merging US and UK zones) represented unification Truman wanted in Europe
* US policy makers rejected reunified Germany in fears they would align with USSR

Paris Peace Conference, July-Oct 1946

* aimed to draw up peace settlements for defeated European powers (Bulgaria, Italy, Romania etc) including territorial adjustments and reparations
* settlements not reached over Germany or Austria

Conference on European Economic Cooperation, 12 July 1947

* discussion of reconstruction aid with European countries (Marshall Plan)
* Soviet delegation walked out in protest at ‘dollar imperialism’
* Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland expressed interest in Marshall Aid but ordered to reverse their decisions

Cominform, 22 Sept 1947

* following USSR walking out of Paris Peace Conference 2 months prior
* purpose was to coordinate actions between Communist parties under Soviet control
* Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania (**Yugoslavia expelled in 28 June 1948**)

Comecon, 25 Jan 1949

to strengthen economic relationship of communist countries who were increasingly isolated from traditional markets

* EE was to be collectivised, industrialised and centralised, states expected to trade with Cominform members and contacts with non-communist countries were discouraged

Czech coup (defenestration of Prague), Mar 1948

10 March 1948: Jan Masaryk, Czech foreign minister, found dead below his bathroom window

= **how Stalin gained control of Czechoslovakia as the last state to fall to communism**

Why did France cause concern?

Big communist party in the West which worried/threatened the West