Title: The Marshall Plan
Headings: The Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan
Contents
First post-war aid
The plan unveiled
Negotiating with Europe
Conditions on aid
Advantages for the US and Europe

Content: And in Roubaix, Marshall Plan wood maintained one of the world’s largest textile mills. In 1945, only twenty-five thousand tractors were in use on French farms – four years later, Marshall Plan aid had put another two hundred thousand tractors in the field. Overall, American investment in Western Europe grew apace, and more and more U.S. patents found customers abroad.” As this French image suggests, not all were happy with American aid to post-war Europe
Advantages for the US and Europe
The Marshall Plan would run for four years and cost more than $US13 billion. This aid not only facilitated the recovery of Europe’s national economies, it had obvious advantages for the United States. Not only was the Marshall Plan successful in stabilising many European governments and blocking Soviet expansion, it built a ‘new Europe’ with a political economy was based on open markets and free trade, rather than protectionism and self-interest. This allowed American exporters to enter European markets more easily than was possible before World War II. Other advantages for the United States included: Soviet containment. The Marshall Plan stabilised the economies and political systems in several European nations bordering the Soviet sphere of influence.