Postwar Recovery, Bretton Woods, UNRRA and Cold War Origins

Main Features and Urgent Tasks

1. 7. main feat. urgent task

Famine (UNRRA) and Responses

Famine (UNRRA):

1. Help freed countries.
2. Use available supplies.
3. Demand lower than production → lower price.
4. Stabilize by selling products to other needy countries.
5. Increase the US image.
6. Fund help for displaced persons.

Economic policies: New policy of government → intervention. Develop new welfare state.

Financial Commitments: Bretton Woods

Financial committees, economics: Bretton Woods Conference (1944):

• Dollar as a key reference currency.
• International Monetary Fund (IMF), 1946.
• GATT, 1948.
• 23 states agreed to reduce tariffs.
• World Bank, 1945.

Cold War Origins

COLD WAR — Origin. Victory against fascism and divisions among the allies from 1945 onward; détente in the 1970s under Nixon and Brezhnev; by 1985 Gorbachev's reforms got out of control for the Soviet system. Key transitional period: 1945–1948 with four main issues:

1. Yalta and Poland.
2. Truman Doctrine.
3. Marshall Plan.
4. Kominform.

Yalta and Poland

Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and early Soviet actions

Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact (1939): division of Poland in a secret protocol. The Red Army occupied eastern Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. Repression 1939–1941 by Soviets against Poles. The Polish government-in-exile was marginalized.

There was disagreement about Poland. Stalin altered the Polish government. Roosevelt and Churchill defended Poland but needed Stalin against Hitler.

Soviet military advances and Warsaw consequences

Strong Soviet battles: 1942 Stalingrad — the Soviet victory began to turn the war. By 1944 the Red Army reached Warsaw. The government-in-exile received no help from the Soviets and Soviet aircraft were not authorized to land. Consequence: the Warsaw Uprising — 42 days of fighting in which Polish forces suffered heavily; Stalin was not perceived as liberator and the weak government-in-exile was effectively eliminated and its military forces destroyed.

Yalta Conference (1945) — key points:

1. Divergent interests: USSR feared Germany and desired a "cordon sanitaire"; US and GB had different security interests and defended the government-in-exile.
2. Decisions on Poland: the presence of Communists (Lublin) after the war and the question of free elections; a problem remained.
3. Border issues with Germany: division of Germany, dismantling of industry, demilitarization, trials against Nazis.
4. United Nations: move toward democracy in the postwar order.

Truman Doctrine (Kennan)

Kennan's analysis and Truman Doctrine:

1. Kennan argued that Stalinist politics derived from Marxist-Leninist ideology.
2. Aims: acquisition of power and elimination of opposition.
3. Menace: establishment of dictatorships.
4. Need to protect societies threatened by communism.
5. Proposal: containment to stop Soviet expansion.
6. Results: weaken the USSR, invigorate opposition, strengthen the United States.
7. 1947: Truman accepted the policy.
8. Military and economic aid to countries under communist threat.

Marshall Plan

Main thesis: Stop communism not by military means but by strengthening the European economy and improving the US image.

Principles & aims:

1. Overcome hunger and poverty.
2. Any government could participate.
3. Active participation by recipient countries.
4. International conference in Paris — Stalin rejected participation.
5. Governments under Stalin wanted aid but Stalin rejected that possibility.
6. Western states supplied funds.

Interpretations of the Cold War

Orthodox and traditional: Emphasizes the direct connection between communism and the Cold War. Points to precedents such as the Russian Revolution of 1917 and US actions during WWII. Criticizes Roosevelt for treating the USSR in an idyllic manner and for failing to recognize the communist threat.

Revisionist (1960s): Argues that the period could have been more peaceful and that US capitalist interests provoked confrontations to secure access to international markets. In this view the USSR became an obstacle to the "open door" and the United States emerged as the sole superpower.

Other interpretations: Criticize earlier theories and propose a more pluralistic point of view. They highlight unrealistic analyses of the enemy, myths and prejudices, and the functional role of an external enemy. An "imaginary war" and a closed-door approach to politics could have helped avoid the Cold War.