Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm editor Candice Keener, joined by staff writer Jane mcgran Hey, Hey, Jane.
Speaker 1: I think in today's society it wouldn't be so crazy
Speaker 1: if the government issued a statement and said a lot
Speaker 1: of our friends are in financial distress, and we're going
Speaker 1: to give them a whole bunch of money to bail
Speaker 1: them out and make it better. It seems pretty familiar today,
Speaker 1: but something exactly like that happened um right after World
Speaker 1: War Two. Yeah, And ironically enough, we know that today, uh,
Speaker 1: Europe's economy is doing I think a hair better than ours.
Speaker 1: We know at least that their unit of currency has
Speaker 1: a little bit more punched than the American dollar. But
Speaker 1: after World War two ended in n the situation in
Speaker 1: Western Europe was really, really dire. We're talking about a
Speaker 1: quarter of Germany's housing and the cities was just demolished.
Speaker 1: There had been a decline and the gross domestic products.
Speaker 1: And when they seemed to be slowly getting their acts
Speaker 1: back together, the winter of six was so harsh that
Speaker 1: the wheat harvest was completely knocked off. And what's more,
Speaker 1: you have Western Europe's neighbors over to the East trying
Speaker 1: to tempt them with the fruits of communism and socialism. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's true. And um not to belabor the point of
Speaker 1: how bad they were doing over in Europe, but about
Speaker 1: a third of the more than a third actually the
Speaker 1: European industry was destroyed, which is just sort of crazy
Speaker 1: to think about. And a sixty million unemployed, a hundred million,
Speaker 1: we're going hungry. And there were a lot of efforts
Speaker 1: to try to improve this that didn't it wasn't doing enough.
Speaker 1: For instance, United uh Nations tried to help with the
Speaker 1: U n r A by offering supplies, but these supplies
Speaker 1: were basically food and medical supplies, and this wasn't exactly
Speaker 1: helping them get back on the industry back on track, right.
Speaker 1: It would sustain them, but not help them thrive and
Speaker 1: flourish to pre war levels. And we know that President
Speaker 1: Truman had extended the Truman Doctrine, which said that the
Speaker 1: United States would offer support to any nation resisting authoritarian regimes.
Speaker 1: So that was significant too. But again we're talking about
Speaker 1: people who very desperately needed money to get things rolling again.
Speaker 1: And so on June five, there was a commencement ceremony
Speaker 1: at Harvard and George Marshall was going to be receiving
Speaker 1: an honorary doctorate degree from Harvard, and he had been
Speaker 1: asked to say a few words, and he sort of
Speaker 1: cryptically wrote in a letter that he would say a
Speaker 1: few words and maybe more. Yeah, and he his speech.
Speaker 1: I read it um when I was preparing for the podcast,
Speaker 1: and it's really good. It just lays things out very
Speaker 1: clearly for someone to understand. And he what he says
Speaker 1: is actually pretty familiar to stuff that you here today
Speaker 1: in the news of political speeches, and that he was
Speaker 1: explaining how the economic situation was enormously complex and that
Speaker 1: the average man on the street couldn't really understand what
Speaker 1: was going wrong and how to fix it. And he
Speaker 1: laid it all out, and he said the breakdown of
Speaker 1: the business structure of Europe. Europe was complete, and basically
Speaker 1: explaining that raw materials and fuel were in short supply,
Speaker 1: the Europeans machinery for their farming and everything like that
Speaker 1: was lacking and worn out. So basically, what you have
Speaker 1: in the situation where the farmer he can't buy the
Speaker 1: materials he needs for ready money. So what's the good
Speaker 1: of selling his produce if he can't buy what he needs?
Speaker 1: And Marshall even famously said, our policy is not directed
Speaker 1: against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation
Speaker 1: and chaos. And who is anyone to argue with that?
Speaker 1: And he chose the perfect forum to do it too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting people love quoting that, and I think it's
Speaker 1: a great quote because it shows that Marshall's trying to
Speaker 1: sort of distance himself from the effort, from the argument
Speaker 1: that this plan will contain communism. He wants to sort
Speaker 1: of distance himself from the politics involved in it and
Speaker 1: just sort of focus on the hunger and just the
Speaker 1: horrible poverty that was going on exactly. And he knew
Speaker 1: that it was going to take a lot of effort
Speaker 1: to get people in Washington to get on board with
Speaker 1: the Marshall Plan what later came to be known as
Speaker 1: the the European Economic Recovery Plan that right, Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it was known as the Marshall Plan in the news.
Speaker 1: I think I read that Marshall himself didn't really like
Speaker 1: calling it the Marshall Plan. Obviously, it was a joint effort.
Speaker 1: There were lots of people involved. He didn't exactly write
Speaker 1: every word of it. It was known as Marshall's Plan
Speaker 1: because he did advocated and and uh campaign for it
Speaker 1: so vigorously. Right. So, on that very famous day at
Speaker 1: Harvard during the commencement ceremony, he knew who he was
Speaker 1: going to be talking to. He was going to be
Speaker 1: talking to a captive audience, people who were you know,
Speaker 1: pretty friendly and the media. So the idea was to
Speaker 1: get them on board with this plan first, and then
Speaker 1: any adversaries in Washington. And of course people balked when
Speaker 1: they heard the numbers involved with this plan, and the
Speaker 1: United States actually asked Europe how much money do you
Speaker 1: think you need over how many years to get things
Speaker 1: back on track? And Europe had said billion dollars and
Speaker 1: they didn't really have a set system as to how
Speaker 1: they were going to delineate these funds and how it
Speaker 1: was actually going to work to support the European economies.
Speaker 1: What the Marshall Plan was doing was saying that thirteen
Speaker 1: billion dollars in aid would be given to Western European
Speaker 1: countries over the span of four years. And that was
Speaker 1: still a pretty tough pill to swallow. Yeah, Marshal after
Speaker 1: he got this agreement from from the European countries who
Speaker 1: got together to do it. Like Candice mentioned, um it
Speaker 1: was it was a part of a condition that the
Speaker 1: European countries had to say what they wanted, rather than
Speaker 1: the US coming in saying we're gonna give you x amount.
Speaker 1: So once that I got figured out, Marshala to come
Speaker 1: back to the US and are you in front of
Speaker 1: Congress to say for them to pass this this uh
Speaker 1: this bill. And so he went on a tour around
Speaker 1: the country. In addition to speaking in testimony in front
Speaker 1: of Congress, he wanted to win over the public, and
Speaker 1: he gave a of speeches promote the plan the unions
Speaker 1: like businessmen and farmers, etcetera. And I was reading on
Speaker 1: a website that was established for the fiftieth anniversary of
Speaker 1: the Marshall Plan, and was a website sponsored by us AID,
Speaker 1: And the website was explaining that basically you had two
Speaker 1: different camps of people who were opponents of the Marshall Plan.
Speaker 1: You had people on the right who thought it was
Speaker 1: a type of global new deal, and then he had
Speaker 1: people on the other side who thought that the United
Speaker 1: States was going to go into Europe and acts like
Speaker 1: it was trying to control the countries, trying to colonize them,
Speaker 1: trying to impose its powers and its ways of doing things.
Speaker 1: But I think that's what's so significant about Marshall being proactive.
Speaker 1: He didn't just offer people helping hand and say hey,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna scoop you up. He made the countries do
Speaker 1: the work and say how exactly they were going to
Speaker 1: formulate their own plans once they had the financial assistance
Speaker 1: to do so. Yeah, and the isolation has had a point.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously we had this tradition in America ever
Speaker 1: since Washington's speech, the we shouldn't get entangled in foreign affairs,
Speaker 1: and and the isolationists were afraid of this happening, and
Speaker 1: so were the Soviets actually, and that's definitely yeah, the
Speaker 1: Soviets were very scared of this. Initially, um, the US
Speaker 1: was going to include the uss are in this aid,
Speaker 1: but the Soviets pulled themselves really early in the plan
Speaker 1: because they didn't They saw this whole plan is basically
Speaker 1: the US trying to exert its own influence over Europe,
Speaker 1: and they didn't want to be involved in it. They
Speaker 1: didn't want to be controlled by us holding their purse strings,
Speaker 1: basically right. And I think the Soviets trying to think
Speaker 1: from their perspective for a minute here. You know, their
Speaker 1: country had been ravaged as well, and according to the
Speaker 1: the ideal principles of communism, speaking just theoretically here for
Speaker 1: a moment, the idea to work for the common good,
Speaker 1: to share what resources there were. It wasn't a terrible idea.
Speaker 1: It's just that communism and practice as we know, didn't
Speaker 1: work out so well for the Soviet Union. And I
Speaker 1: think that these ideologies were filtering west. And we know
Speaker 1: for sure that there were communist uprisings and check a
Speaker 1: slavaw uck, yeah, and then even a small one in
Speaker 1: France and Italy, and there was one that uprose in Greece,
Speaker 1: and the Greek government was so fast and strong to
Speaker 1: squel chip that that's what really got the United States
Speaker 1: thinking we should be helping out Western Europe. They are
Speaker 1: making an effort to contain communism, and we do need
Speaker 1: to give them aid. Yeah. And there was a series
Speaker 1: known as the Domino theory that when one country felt
Speaker 1: under communist rule, that the surrounding neighboring countries would succumb
Speaker 1: to it. Basically that the influence would spread um geographically.
Speaker 1: And you have to think, because these countries are so
Speaker 1: tightly packed together on the European continant, they're trading with
Speaker 1: each other, you know, they're all passing through one another.
Speaker 1: They're all in a really bad situation. So it was
Speaker 1: entirely plausible that that could happen. But in Washington, I
Speaker 1: think a pretty big development came when a Senator named
Speaker 1: Arthur Vandenberg, he was a chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.
Speaker 1: He got on board with the Martial plan, and he
Speaker 1: was known for being someone who took a strict isolationist policy,
Speaker 1: and he was quoted as saying, in the name of peace, stability,
Speaker 1: and freedom, it deserves prompt passage, in the name of
Speaker 1: intelligent American self interest and envisions a mighty undertaking worthy
Speaker 1: of our faith. And that presented a unique perspective, the
Speaker 1: idea that if you are truly an intelligent, hard working
Speaker 1: American who wants to see the fruits of your labor,
Speaker 1: you're gonna want to piece Europe back together because in
Speaker 1: the end it's going to benefit you know. And that's
Speaker 1: the kind of math that Americans like to hear. Am
Speaker 1: I right, Yeah, that's true, and it's important to note
Speaker 1: some of the hard things that even you know, everyone
Speaker 1: was will intention they didn't want to see this hunger
Speaker 1: and poverty go on in Europe. But at the same
Speaker 1: time Marshall had to answer questions to Congress, like can
Speaker 1: American farmers even supported? Do do we have the facilities
Speaker 1: we have to sustain ourselves and Europe? So ultimately the
Speaker 1: plan was put into practice and it was meant to
Speaker 1: continue for four years, and I actually got shut down
Speaker 1: a little early on December thirty, first ninety one, because
Speaker 1: that's when the Korean War really took off, and also
Speaker 1: Europe was showing such improved progress that the United States
Speaker 1: felt like it was time to sort of shut it down,
Speaker 1: and we'd at that moment established a precedent of the
Speaker 1: United States foreign relations. Yeah, and it's curious some of
Speaker 1: the reverberating effects of the martial plans, some good, some
Speaker 1: not so good. For instance, the Soviets, when they pulled
Speaker 1: out UM, they started offering their own version, called the
Speaker 1: Molotov Plan to their eastern blocks, and they sort of
Speaker 1: lifted the curtain or the the iron curtain, the famous
Speaker 1: UM term that refers to their control of the Eastern
Speaker 1: Block nations, and so US offering this martial plan to
Speaker 1: try to contain communism also contained communism in that block
Speaker 1: in a way. But there are some really good effects
Speaker 1: as well. I mean, arguably the martial plans at the
Speaker 1: stage for military cooperation of things like the European Union
Speaker 1: and North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Definitely, and we saw West
Speaker 1: Germany starting to rearm again, to restock its arsenals and
Speaker 1: to read build its housing, and um, no European nations
Speaker 1: ever fully succumbed to communism. And then we see that
Speaker 1: the gross domestic product is back up, industries are producing again,
Speaker 1: and so overall the Martiall Plan will not fully realized
Speaker 1: in its length and its original parameters. It was a success,
Speaker 1: and Marshall went on to be awarded the Nobel Prize too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and there's very few things that I think we can
Speaker 1: say about, you know, these political plans in the twentieth
Speaker 1: century that there were huge success Like, nobody ever says
Speaker 1: that about anything but the Martial Plan. Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was a pretty huge success. And ironically enough, if
Speaker 1: you look at today and um right now as we're
Speaker 1: recording this podcast, we know that the g twenty summit,
Speaker 1: is is occurring um over in Europe, and conditions in Europe,
Speaker 1: like we said, are arguably a little better than they
Speaker 1: are the United States. We had said back during the
Speaker 1: time of post World War two that we wouldn't talk
Speaker 1: to a nation to who were involved communism, and now
Speaker 1: one of the biggest players and the world economy is China,
Speaker 1: a communist nation. So it's really important, I think, to
Speaker 1: know the history of foreign relations and foreign aid so
Speaker 1: that we can understand the choices in the events that
Speaker 1: are happening around us today and how significant it was,
Speaker 1: for instance, when Nixon started recognizing China and even under
Speaker 1: the communist rule exactly was huge compared to the hell
Speaker 1: soon after this was the after the Martial Plan. And
Speaker 1: I think there comes a point when you have to say,
Speaker 1: I don't agree with your politics, but I can't deny
Speaker 1: any longer that you're making a huge contribution in the
Speaker 1: world markets. So we tackle modern issues like this on
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Speaker 1: If you want to be more about the Marshall Plan,
Speaker 1: or World War two, or any of the communist leaders
Speaker 1: who tried to shut down the Marshall Plan, be sure
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