Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T13:16:42.807Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Marshall Plan, Britain and the cold war

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2009

William C. Cromwell
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

By mid-1947 the division of Europe had acquired clear momentum and definable contours, yet it had not yet fully congealed. The period was a transitional one, moving away from the contexts of the Yalta and Potsdam agreements which anticipated post war great power collaboration in Europe, and moving toward the complete Stalinizatioh of eastern Europe and the concomitant linking of western Europe to an American led economic and security order. Yet despite the recent Soviet backed ouster of Nagy in Hungary in May, some elements of a pan-European fabric remained intact if uncertain The Four Power negotiations over Germany's future were continuing and the allied occupation machinery remained in place. The establishment of the Economic Commission for Europe in May 1947 provided at least an institutional framework for considering recovery problems on a pan-European rather than an east-west basis. And during this pre-Cominform period the east European states appeared to anticipate some independence in foreign affairs, as suggested by the initial expressions of interest by Czechoslovakia and Poland in responding to Secretary of State Marshall's aid initiative.

Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 8 , Issue 4 , October 1982 , pp. 233 - 249
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 1982

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Ulam, Adam B., Expansion and Coexistence, The History of Soviet Foreign Policy, 1917–1967 (New York, 1968), p. 437Google Scholar.

2. For example, see Arkes, Hadley, Bureaucracy, the Marshall Plan and the National Interest (Princeton, NJ, 1972)Google Scholar; Gimbel, John, The Origins of the Marshall Plan (Stanford, Calif., 1976)Google Scholar; Jones, Joseph M., The Fifteen Weeks (New York, 1955)Google Scholar; Price, Harry B., The Marshall Plan and Its Meaning (Ithaca, NY, 1955)Google Scholar. For a recent account, see Cromwell, William C., ‘The Marshall Non-Plan, Congress and the Soviet Union’, The Western Political Quarterly, xxxii (1979)Google Scholar from which some material has been adapted for the present article.

3. Kennan, George F., Memoirs: 1925–1950 (Boston, 1967), p. 325Google Scholar.

4. Jones, , op, cit. p. 241Google Scholar.

5. Interviews with Marshall, George C., 30 October 1952 and 18 February 1953Google Scholar. Price, Harry B., Oral History Interviews: Marshall Plan, Box 1, Truman Library, Independence, MoGoogle Scholar.

6. Foreign Relations of the United States (henceforth FRUS), 1947, III The British Commonwealth; Europe (Washington, 1972), p. 250Google Scholar.

7. Memorandum of Conversation, Secretary Marshall and Lord Inverchapel, 30 June 1947. Matthews File, Box 10, Memoranda of Conversation, 1964–1947, National Archives (henceforth NA), Washington, DC.

8. Notes for Secretary Marshall, 21 July 1947. Records of the Policy Planning Staff, 1947–1953, Box 33, Chronological File, 1947, NA.

9. Acheson, Dean, Present at the Creation (New York, 1969), p. 232Google Scholar.

10. Ibid. p. 234.

11. For text of Marshall's address, see FRUS, 1947, III, pp. 237–239Google Scholar.

12. Price, , op cit. p. 25Google Scholar.

13. US Aid to Foreign Countries, 11 July 1947. Division of Public Studies, Department of State, Lot 22, Box 27, REP Documents 4–5, NA. See also James Reston in the New York Times, 25 May 1947.

14. Telegram No. 133 from Ambassador Inverchapel to the Foreign Office, 2 June 1947. T236/782, Public Record Office (henceforth PRO), London.

15. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 232Google Scholar (emphasis in original).

16. Memorandum from Clayton to Marshall, 19 June 1947. 840.50 Recovery/6–1947, NA.

17. Ibid.

18. Summary of discussion by Heads of Offices, Departmen t of State, on problems of European recovery, 29 May 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 234Google Scholar.

19. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 229Google Scholar.

20. Memorandum for the Files-Origins of the Marshall Plan, 22 July 1948. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 242Google Scholar. See also James Reston in the New York Times, 9 May 1947 and Walter Lippmann in the Washington Post, 10 May 1947.

21. Report of Foreign Aid Committee, 12 June 1947. Joseph M. Jones Papers, Box 2, Marshall Plan Speech, Truman Library.

22. Letter from Rostow to Acheson, 10 June 1947. Lot 122, Box 27, REP Documents 4–5, NA.

23. Kennan comments on fifth draft of a speech to be delivered by President Truman to the Inter-American Conference for the Maintenance of Continental Peace and Security, 2 September 1947. Records of the Policy Planning Staff, 1947–1950, NA (emphasis in original).

24. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 228Google Scholar.

25. Price interview with Marshall, 18 February 1953, op. cit

26. See Paterson, Thomas G., ‘The Quest for Peace and Prosperity: International Trade, Communism, and the Marshall Plan, in Bernstein, Barton J. (ed.) journal Politics and Policies of the Truman Administration (Chicago, 1970), pp. 98 and 101Google Scholar; Freeland, Richard M., The Truman Doctrine and the Origins of McCarthyism (New York, 1972), pp. 167 and 169Google Scholar; LaFeber, Walter, America, Russia and the Cold War, 1945–1975, 3rd ed. (New York, 1976), p. 60Google Scholar.

27. Financial Times, 13 June 1947.

28. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 227Google Scholar.

29. Memorandum of Conversation, Secretary Marshall and Ambassador Henri Bonnet, 13 June 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, pp. 251–253Google Scholar

30. Price interviews with Marshall, 30 October 1952 and 18 February 1953, op. cit.

31. Minutes of Meeting of Ministers, 13 June 1947. PREM 8/495, GEN 179/3rd Meeting, PRO.

32. New York Times, 13 June 1947.

33. PREM 8/495, GEN 179/9, 16 June 1947, PRO.

34. Attlee, Clement R., As It Happened (NewYork, 1954), p. 239Google Scholar.

35. Memorandum of Conversation between Under Secretary Clayton and British Cabinet Members, 24 June 1947. 840.50 Recovery/7–147, Box 5636, NA.

36. Minutes of Meeting of Ministers, 17 June 1947. PREM 8/495, GEN 179/4th Meeting, p. 2, PRO.

37. Foreign Secretary Bevin's Proposed Note for the Paris Discussions. PREM 8/495, GEN 179/9, 16 June 1947, PRO.

38. Memorandum to Mr. Clayton on First Session of the Economic Commission for Europe. Records of the Office of European Affairs, 1934–1947, Files of John Hickerson, Memoranda 1946–47, Box 3, File – Memoranda, January to June 1947, NA.

39. Foreign Secretary Bevin's Proposed Note for the Paris Discussions, 16 June 1947, op. cit.

40. Caffery telegram to Marshall, 16 June 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, pp. 255–256Google Scholar.

41. Cooper, Duff, Old Men Forget (London, 1953), pp. 374–75Google Scholar.

42. Bevin's report to the Cabinet on his meeting with French officials, 23 June 1947. CAB 129 19, p. 2, PRO.

43. FRUS, 1947, III, pp. 255–56Google Scholar.

44. Bevin's report to the Cabinet, 23 June 1947, p. 1, op. citGoogle Scholar

45. Bidault, Georges, Resistance (New York, 1967), p. 150Google Scholar.

46. Telegram from Caffery to Marshall, 18 June 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 260Google Scholar.

47. Bevin's report to the Cabinet, 23 June 1947, p. 5Google Scholar, op. cit.

48. Ibid. p. 2.

49. Telegram No. 2456, Caffery to Marshall, 20 June 1947. 840.00/6–2047. NA.

50. New York Times, 20 June 1947.

51. Hansard, , Parliamentary Debates, Fifth series, vol. 438, col 2339 (19 June 1947)Google Scholar.

52. Memorandum of Under Secretary Clayton's News Conference, 18 June 1947. Lot 122, Box 27, REP Documents 4–5/, NA.

53. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 284Google Scholar.

54. For text of memorandum, SQQFRUS, 1947, III, pp. 247–49Google Scholar.

55. Memorandum to the Cabinet on Import Programme, 1947–48, 28 May 1947. CAB 129 19, pp. 1 and 9Google Scholar, PRO.

56. CAB 128/10 CM. 52(47), p. 73Google Scholar, PRO.

57. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 269Google Scholar.

58. Minutes of meeting, 24 June 1947. PREM 8/495, GEN. 179/12, PRO.

59. FRUS, 1941, III, p. 271Google Scholar.

60. Ibid. p. 287.

61. New York Times, 26 June 1947.

62. Annex B to Aide Memoire on Meeting of British Ministers with Clayton, 28 July 1947. Matthews File, Box 10, Folder Aide-Memoire, 1947, NA.

63. For documents relating to the tripartite conference, see the French Yellow Book Documents of the Conference of Foreign Ministers of France, the United Kingdom, and the USSR. Held in Paris, 27 June-3 July 1947. (London, 1947).

64. Telegram from Caffery to Marshall, 2 July 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 305Google Scholar.

65. Telegram from Caffery to Marshall, 1 July 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 303Google Scholar.

66. Interview with Averell Harriman, 1 October 1952. Harry B. Price Oral History Interviews: Marshall Plan, Box 1, Truman Library.

67. CAB 129 19, 5 July 1947, PRO.

68. Telegram from Caffery to Marshall, 28 June 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 298Google Scholar.

69. Telegram from Caffery to Marshall, 29 June 1947. FRUS, 1947, III, p. 300Google Scholar.

70. Interview with Marshall, George C., 30 October 1952Google Scholar, op. cit.

71. LaFeber, , op. cit. p. 64Google Scholar.