COMMINFORM

BY SEPTEMBER 1947 THE SOVIET LEADERSHIP INVITED EUROPEAN COMMUNIST PARTIES TO A MEETING
IN POLAND AND ESTABLISHED THE COMMUNIST INFORMATION BUREAU (COMINFORM). THE SOVIETS:

• divided the world into two antagonistic camps but excluded countries
such as India and Indonesia.
• claimed the United States was the chief power of the imperialist camp
and bent on a new imperialist war.
• argued the Marshall Plan was American capital’s desire to expand and its
aim was ‘the enslavement of Europe’.
• stated the ‘anti-imperialist and democratic camp’, led by the Soviet
Union, had to fight against this with all their might.
• Communists, in countries not dominated by the Soviet Union, must
break with social democratic parties bring together alliances against the
United States.
• suggested a resurgent Germany would eventuate if the US had its way.
• argued that those Communist parties who had taken ministerial roles in
post-war governments in France and Italy should be taken to task, even
though they were following Moscow’s orders at the time.
ORGANISATION FOR EUROPEAN ECONOMIC CO-
OPERATION

 The Organisation for European Economic Co-operation;

(OEEC) came into being on 16 April 1948. It emerged
from the Marshall Plan and the Conference of Sixteen
(Conference for European Economic Co-operation),
which sought to establish a permanent organisation to
continue work on a joint recovery programme and in
particular to supervise the distribution of aid.
ORGANISATION FOR EUROPEAN ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION
(CONT)

 Main Principles:
 promote co-operation between participating countries
and their national production programmes for the
reconstruction of Europe,
 develop intra-European trade by reducing tariffs and
other barriers to the expansion of trade,
 study the feasibility of creating a customs union or free
trade area,
 study multi-lateralisation of payments, and

 achieve conditions for better utilisation of labour.

 THE BERLIN BLOCKADE
(24 JUNE 1948 – 12 MAY 1949
 The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first
major international crises of the Cold War and the first resulting in casualties.
During the multinational occupation of post-World War II Germany, the
Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway and road access to the
sectors of Berlin under Allied control. Their aim was to force the western
powers to allow the Soviet zone to start supplying Berlin with food and fuel,
thereby giving the Soviets practical control over the entire city.

 In response, the Western Allies organized the Berlin Airlift to carry supplies
to the people in West Berlin. The United Kingdom's Royal Air Force and the
recently formed United States Air Force, flew over 200,000 flights in one year
that provided 13,000 tons of daily necessities such as fuel and food to the
Berliners. By the spring of 1949, the effort was clearly succeeding, and by
April, the airlift was delivering more cargo than had previously flowed into
the city by rail.
BERLIN BLOCKADE
 The success of the Berlin Airlift brought humiliation to the Soviets
who had refused to believe it could make a difference. The blockade
was lifted in May 1949 and resulted in the creation of two separate
German states. The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany)
and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) split up
Berlin. In remembrance of the airlift, three airports in the former
western zones of the city served as the primary gateways to
Germany for another fifty years.
THE TRUMAN DOCTRINE

 The Truman Doctrine was a policy set forth by U.S. President

Harry S Truman on March 12, 1947 stating that the U.S. would
support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to
prevent their falling into the Soviet sphere.
 Truman stated the Doctrine: it would be "the policy of the United
States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted
subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." Truman
reasoned, because these "totalitarian regimes" coerced "free
peoples," they represented a threat to international peace and the
national security of the United States. Truman made the plea amid
the crisis of the Greek Civil War (1946–1949). He argued that if
Greece and Turkey did not receive the aid that they urgently needed,
they would inevitably fall to communism with grave consequences
throughout the region.
THE TRUMAN DOCTRINE (CONT)

 The policy won the support of Congress and involved

sending $400 million in American money, but no
military forces, to the region. The effect was to end the
Communist threat, and in 1952 both countries joined
NATO, a military alliance that guaranteed their
protection.

 The Doctrine shifted American foreign policy toward the

Soviet Union from détente (friendship) to, as
George F. Kennan phrased it, a policy of containment of
Soviet expansion. Historians often use it to mark the
starting date of the Cold War.
MARSHALL PLAN
 The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program,
ERP) was the primary program, 1947–51, of the United States for
rebuilding and creating a stronger economic foundation for the
countries of Europe. Marshall spoke of urgent need to help the
European recovery in his address at Harvard University in June
1947.

 The reconstruction plan, developed at a meeting of the participating

European states, was established on June 5, 1947. It offered the
same aid to the USSR and its allies, but they did not accept it. The
plan was in operation for four years beginning in April 1948. During
that period some US $13 billion in economic and technical
assistance were given to help the recovery of the European countries
that had joined in the
Organization for European Economic Co-operation.
MARSHALL PLAN (CONT.)
 The ERP addressed each of the obstacles to postwar recovery. The plan
looked to the future, and did not focus on the destruction caused by the
war. Much more important were efforts to modernize European
industrial and business practices using high-efficiency American
models, reduce artificial trade barriers, and instill a sense of hope and
self-reliance.

 By 1952 as the funding ended, the economy of every participant state

had surpassed pre-war levels; for all Marshall plan recipients, output in
1951 was 35% higher than in 1938. Over the next two decades,
Western Europe enjoyed unprecedented growth and prosperity, but
economists are not sure what proportion was due directly to the ERP,
what proportion indirectly, and how much would have happened
without it. The Marshall Plan was one of the first elements of
European integration, as it erased trade barriers and set up institutions
to coordinate the economy on a continental level—that is, it stimulated
the total political reconstruction of western Europe.
 Interpretative question –
 Why Russia rejected the Marshall Plan?
 THE SCHUMAN DECLARATION THAT CREATED THE
ECSC HAD SEVERAL DISTINCT AIMS;
• It would mark the birth of a united Europe
• It would make war between Member States impossible
• It would encourage world peace
• It would transform Europe by a 'step by step' process (building
through sectoral supranational communities) leading to the
unification of Europe democratically, including both East and
West Europe separated by the Iron Curtain
• It would create the world's first supranational institution and the
world's first international anti-cartel agency
• It would create a single market across the Community
• This, starting with the coal and steel sector, would revitalize the
whole European economy by similar community processes
• It would improve the world economy and the developing
countries, such as Africa.
1950 JUNE
France, Germany,
Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemburg
begin the negotiations on the ECSC competencies,
institutions and decision making procedures
1951 April - End of intergovernmental bargaining on the ECSC
The ECSC institutional framework agreed
 The High Authority responsible for formulation a common
market in coal and steel, cooperating closely with the national
bureaucracies to implement community legislation;
 The Court of Justice to ensure compliance of the member
states with the Treaty terms and examining disputes;
 The Council of Ministers representing the member states
interests;
 A Common Assembly of national parliaments delegates.

The ECSC becomes operational in August 1952 in Luxembourg

after the ratification by the member states parliaments.
EDC – EPC – AN OPPORTUNITY LOST?