The Marshall plan

• Marshall Aid


  Spending over $12 billion to help the economies of Western Europe recover after World War Two and make them less likely to be won over by communism
• Marshall Aid was offered to all the countries of Europe


  But Stalin prohibited the countries in his sphere of influence from taking it
• Marshall Aid


  • It was conditional on the country allowing free elections and free trade
  • Stalin was not prepared to permit the Eastern bloc countries to accept such conditions
• Marshall Aid


  A propaganda tool, aimed at convincing countries they would be prosperous with American capitalist support
• Marshall Aid


  Was strongly linked to the Truman Doctrine and was effectively the economic wing of the USA's containment policy
• Soviet objections to the Marshall Plan

  • Declared it to be 'dollar imperialism' and claimed the USA was throwing its economic weight around, using it to gain influence in Europe
  • Forbade the Eastern Bloc countries under its control to apply for Marshall Aid
  • Set up Cominform – the Communist Information Bureau – an organisation which had as its aim to tighten Soviet control in Eastern Europe, to build collective heavy industry in those countries and to create a trade network between communist countries
  • Established Comecon – the Council of Mutual Economic Assistance – to administer its own Molotov Plan of financial aid to keep the Eastern Bloc countries happy