Tag Archives: Marshall Plan

The Marshal versus the Marshall Plan

America has always included an element of “might makes right.” The marshal in the old West meets the villains and defeats them. Order is restored. The good people are able to get on with their lives.

Typically, however, the good comes more slowly but also more peaceably. Child labor is defeated: perhaps by a combination of ballot box and shame. Corrupt political bosses are voted out of office when a free press shines light on their activities.

Nazi Germany was defeated by military might. Yet the structures which have prevented a return to world wide conflict are of a more peaceable sort.

The Marshall plan directed American aid to countries ravaged by World War II (including our enemies) and helped them rebuild. The U.S. used trade and commerce instead of war.

International bodies set rules about fair trading. Scholarships were given to foreign students for study in American universities so they might return and benefit their countries with new knowledge and skills, as well as spread American influence.

Certainly, the attacks of September 11, 2001, called for a military response in Afghanistan. Yet the war in Iraq drew us into a quagmire more because of our desire for cheap oil than anything else. It was might for our own economic benefit rather than a true desire to rid a small nation of a cruel dictator.

War is expensive in both lives and fortune. The United States is still strong enough to win by bolstering its working and middle classes. It can keep alliances with allies, especially democratic allies. It waited out the Soviet Union by such policies. It can do the same now—if it doesn’t yield to the pre-World War II kind of America First syndrome. That was the slogan of Nazi sympathizers before Pearl Harbor silenced them.

Winning the War Is Only a Beginning

Today, we thrill at victories portrayed by movies like Dunkirk and Darkest Hour. We laud the victory of allies over axis powers in World War II, as we should.

But we have forgotten what came afterward, the quieter victory. We have forgotten the work that led to the triumph of democracy, lessons that we might use today in dealing with current crises.

In June, 1947, U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall outlined a plan to help a devastated Europe recover from the ruins of World War II. Called the European Recovery Plan, it was popularly known as the Marshall Plan.

The Marshall Plan was symbolic of the United States’ decision to choose a different path from the one the country took after World War I. After the first war, the U.S. retreated into isolation. After the second one, The U.S. chose a new path to avoid future “world” wars. From that standpoint, the Marshall Plan worked.

Democratic European and North American countries succeeded beyond anyone’s dreams. They became the promised land for victims of oppression, war, and poverty. Indeed their success has fostered the current gigantic waves of desperate people, straining the ability of democracies to take them in.

But reasons for the numbers go beyond the usual failure of some societies to care for their people—the ever present corrupt governments and regional conflicts.

Too often since the end of the Cold War, the United States has led coalitions against newer enemies and then quit.

The wars, in fact, in Iraq and in Afghanistan, have made the world less safe for democracy. They have contributed to much of the refugee flow.

Hal Brands, in a Bloomberg opinion piece, summarizes the Marshall Plan: “The U.S. would ultimately provide a major infusion of money, along with technical expertise, diplomatic support and other assistance, to make possible a collective recovery program.” (“The Marshall Plan Taught Lessons Trump Refuses to Learn, June 5, 2018)

In his article, Brand contrasts the outlook of those who carried out the Marshall Plan with that of our current government leaders: “There is little recognition by the president of what Marshall and his generation instinctively understood —that things can go south in a hurry if the U.S. does not use its power and creativity to foster a secure and prosperous world.”