[Leica] was slightly drunk Dutchman now Marshall Plan etc.

["Oliver Bryk" <oliverbryk@attbi.com>]

Martin wrote:

"Greg J. Lorenzo wrote:

> I wonder in what stateWestern Europe would be without the billions of 
> dollars invested by the Marshall Plan after WW2.

Economies are linked, despite many people's efforts to pretend that 
they are not.  The money spent by the US in the economic rebuilding of 
Europe *was* an investment, because Europeans where then able to start 
buying American goods sooner than they would have otherwise.  In other 
words, not investing in the rebuilding of Europe after WWII would have 
affected the US economy too.  The question "I wonder what state the US 
would be in without the billions of dollars invested by the Marshall 
Plan after WW2" is equally valid -- and, of course, equally impossible 
to answer.
The world is not a simple, linearly casual place."

Allow me to add my 2 cents worth, having lived through that period. The
Marshall Plan was a brilliant strategic move to finally thwart Stalin's
limitless and ruthless efforts to bring all of the continent under Soviet
control. Neither Roosevelt nor Eisenhower saw what Joe was up to. Churchill
never trusted him. Many books have dealt with this issue. In "The Fall of
Berlin 1945" Anthony Beevor describes Stalin's machinations to exclude the
western Allies from Berlin. 
Oliver Bryk


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