{"id":16828,"date":"2022-08-16T17:05:32","date_gmt":"2022-08-16T15:05:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historyextra.com\/?p=213902"},"modified":"2022-08-16T17:18:14","modified_gmt":"2022-08-16T15:18:14","slug":"what-was-the-marshall-plan","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbchistory\/rss_feed\/what-was-the-marshall-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"What was the Marshall Plan?"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By Emma Mason\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Tuesday, 16 August 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

\n\n

\u201cIt is logical that the United States should do whatever it is able to do to assist in the return of normal economic health to the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace. Our policy is directed not against any country, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

When United States secretary of state George C Marshall delivered these words, in a speech<\/a> at Harvard University on 5 June 1947, he was sketching out the framework of a widespread package of aid to a Europe devastated by six years of war. The Marshall Plan carried echoes of Franklin D Roosevelt<\/a>\u2019s New Deal, which had accelerated the US\u2019s economic recovery after the Wall Street Crash<\/a> and the subsequent Great Depression<\/a>. This time, the focus was the re-establishment \u2013 both economically and politically \u2013 of the war-battered great states of Europe.<\/p>\n

Marshall\u2019s speech emphasised that economic prosperity was the foundation for political peace, explaining that the US was keen to provide \u201cfriendly aid\u201d to help rebuild both infrastructure and economies. He even left the door open for the Soviet Union and its satellite states in the eastern bloc to be recipients of the programme. \u201cEurope as a whole\u201d should benefit, he declared, while also advocating the removal of trade barriers.<\/p>\n