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: “The Americans also delivered know-how. For example, at the Doboelman soap works in Holland, American experts showed the Dutch how to cut processing time from five days to two hours with new machinery. In Norway, fishermen used a new type of net made from yarn spun in Italy. In Offenbach in West Germany, Marshall Plan leather revived the handbag industry. In Lille, Marshall Plan coal kept a steel factory in business. 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.