{"id":2991,"date":"2007-08-22T01:05:46","date_gmt":"2007-08-22T01:05:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zmetro.com\/?p=2991"},"modified":"2007-08-22T01:05:46","modified_gmt":"2007-08-22T01:05:46","slug":"dollar_diplomac","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/?p=2991","title":{"rendered":"Dollar Diplomacy: How much did the Marshall Plan really matter?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"berlinairliftmemorialzmetro.jpg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/berlinairliftmemorialzmetro.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"600\" border=\"1\" TITLE=\"Berlin Airlift Memorial at Tempelhof Airport U-Bahn Platz der Luftbrucke 52.484141 13.387412\"><br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/clusty.com\/search?input-form=clusty-simple&#038;v%3Asources=webplus&#038;query=%22Berlin+Airlift+Memorial%22\">Berlin Airlift Memorial<\/a> at Tempelhof Airport U-Bahn Platz der Luftbrucke 52.484141 13.387412<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/arts\/critics\/books\/2007\/08\/27\/070827crbo_books_ferguson?printable=true\">Niall Ferguson<\/a>: <\/p>\n<blockquote><p><i>t was \u201cthe most generous act of any people, anytime, anywhere, to another people,\u201d its chief administrator declared. It was \u201camong the most noble experiences in human affairs,\u201d its representative in Europe said. It was \u201cthe most staggering and portentous experiment in the entire history of our foreign policy,\u201d the young Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., who served on its staff, wrote. Foreigners concurred. It was \u201clike a lifeline to sinking men,\u201d according to the British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin. It \u201csaved us from catastrophe,\u201d a manager at Europe\u2019s largest tire factory declared. Sixty years after Secretary of State George C. Marshall outlined the need for economic aid to stimulate European recovery, in a speech at Harvard University\u2019s commencement on June 5, 1947, the plan named after him continues to be fondly remembered in donor and recipient countries alike. In our own time, liberal internationalists have periodically called for new Marshall Plans. After the collapse of Communism, some economists maintained that the former Soviet Union was in need of one. More recently, there has been desultory talk of Marshall Plans for Afghanistan, Iraq, and even the West Bank and Gaza. When critics lament the allegedly modest sums currently spent by the American government on foreign aid, they often draw an unfavorable contrast with the late nineteen-forties. Yet some people, at the time of its inception and since, have questioned both the Marshall Plan\u2019s motivation and its efficacy. Was it really so altruistic? And did it really avert a calamity<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Berlin Airlift Memorial at Tempelhof Airport U-Bahn Platz der Luftbrucke 52.484141 13.387412 Niall Ferguson: t was \u201cthe most generous act of any people, anytime, anywhere, to another people,\u201d its chief administrator declared. It was \u201camong the most noble experiences in human affairs,\u201d its representative in Europe said. It was \u201cthe most staggering and portentous experiment [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,36,12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2991"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2991\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}