Hi, guys--

There's an interesting article (book review, actually) in The New Yorker magazine on the topic-- it's called "Dollar Diplomacy
How much did the Marshall Plan really matter?"

Check it out at: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critic...

Cheers,

-The Cultural Office

Look theres alot of people saying that America applied the Marshall Plan in order to effectively bribe Europe into staying out of communisim and the USSR in a selfish act of world domination. Well its true they wanted influence over Europe. But why hate America for wanting Europe to remain capitilist. There are some very good points to communism but seriously u would not have wanted to live under a Stalinist regime. Thats different to communism. If u want a good example of a good communist form of governing look at Yugoslavia under General Tito. That worked well. But the USSR didnt. It was corrupt and Stalin was a lunatic. Communism in the USSR was more of a dictatorship and I mean a dictatorship not ur American 'dictatorship', but a proper one. Many of us might not be alive today if the USSR overran Europe. The Marshall Plan was the best bet at the time to get us back on our feet while still holding on to our freedom and self governance.

I sincerely hope that any Americans reading some of the nonsense that's been posted here don't think it's representative of British opinion as a whole.

The United States, for whatever reason, donated MASSIVE amounts of money to reconstruct Europe in the wake of the most destructive war the world had ever seen. Now, we can debate the exact motivation for it, but at the end of the day it happened. Britain was rebuilt with American money, all motivations/alterior motives aside. Would some of our more demonstrably left wing posters have PREFERED to live in a Britain without the Marshall Plan? Or hell, a Europe where the Communist Bloc ended at the Atlantic? I certainly wouldn't.

This isn't about the United States' current foreign policy. It's about remembering the most incredible feat of rebuilding in history, and being thankful for it. America literally saved our arses in TWO world wars, and whatever else the United States may be, she is our friend and ally.

We hope your films are coming along well. We can't wait to see them! If you're having trouble uploading yours to the site, please let us know. And if you haven't started filming yet, hop to! The contest ends in October, and the top filmmaker will win a trip for two to the U.S.

the marshall plan was not a selfless act, it was way for the american economy to tie europe closer to it and indeed into subserviency, also following straight after the truman doctrine they would have known the USSR would never have accepted it from an idealogical standpoint even thought the eastern bloc was devastated by the war, making it seem like they were being unreasonable.
it also rebuilt west germany almost straight away, something that had been agreed by the allies not to happen at either potsdam or yalta which added to the grouping of the non-soviet alled zones of germany broke another promise which heightened the mistrust and misunderstanding that was characteristic of the cold war period.

As someone who was born in the Sixties, I recall lots of bomb-sites and new buildings going up in London when I was small, even though I was born well after the Marshall Plan and the last of rationing.
However, as I am a professional Drag Entertainer, I know of several 'Veterans' still going strong in the Drag Show industry here and abroad, including one from Birmingham who won a competition last year, aged 73, another one called Vanity, who is 74, one called Shiela Fitz who was born in 1956, one called Penny, in Sheffield who is about the same age, and one called Kitty who use to be very big in London and has just reached her 60th.

Would it be worth contacting some of these pals to find out if they had any memories of the early post-war years? Quite a few of these veteran performers also started in theatre when very young, while others such as myself only started performing when grown-up. Some of them might even have come from theatre families, and might have interesting tales!

the best thing after the war......
all the yanks went home !!!

my grans dead old. when i ask her she says she loved it. she just went out dancing. i dont think she's understanding the question.

Even when Glasgow was the second city, there still was considerable levels of deprevation, as far as I'm aware.

my p.c dont let me upload my vid, what shall i do?

The Marshall Plan was a joke!
It was put in place simply to make the Soviets and Communism look bad, it had nothing to do with generosity, it was the fact that America feared that post war, poverty stricken Europe would turn to Communism to recover from damage done in the the World Wars.

hmm sudam hussein he is history

Yer man michael gallagher down ther has a point about Britain and Frances demands on germany paying reprimands after ww1. But u have to remember that its economy was wrecked during and after ww1 just like Britain and Frances because of the war. True their reprimands on Germany didnt help the economy but its hard to say that this was the sole factor contributing to Germany's economic destruction, social upheavel and ultimately the rise of the Nazis. They had a poor economy to begin with after the war. This combined with the wall street crash that affected most countries in the world woudnt have helped Germanies economy. U also have to remeber that after the Kaiser abdicated their was a political vacuum with Commies, fascists liberals and conservatives all seeking to form a govt.But its mormally idiot extremists that take power cos they normally shout the loudest and shoot people. So germany not payin ww1 reprimands may not have prevented the nazis, hence ww2 hence marshall plan.

lol commander of the war, yea u must be one of those educated types then eh?

We have not long come back from the 10th anniversary of the Oklahoma Dday Paintball Re-enactment.

14 Brits representing the elite of the UK paintball scenario scene went out to take part in the event in Oklahoma USA.

We made up most of the British 6th paratrooper's who parachuted in to take Pegasus bridge.

There a quite a few video's on youtube of this event and some photo's on my bebo site, more to be uploaded shortly.

Some short stories written by a few who went can be found on

http://walkonzone.com/vboard/forumdi...

There are 24 of us confirmed for next year.

The american's put on a great show lasting a full week, mini games including dunkirk and the fall of stalingrad leading up to the big game on the Saturday.

A lot of attention to detail has been put in and if you have ever played paintball, you have never played properly until you have gone up against tanks.

Details of the event can be found at www.oklahomadday.com

if i was commander of the war i woulda of hit the uk with a nuke

Because this website is being promoted to all age groups, we are sorry but the moderator will be forced to remove comments with inappropriate language. Please feel free to continue to use this as a forum for ideas in language that is appropriate for all ages. More importantly, we urge you all to work on your videos and ask your fellow citizens who were present in Britain during the post-WWII era about their experiences with the Marshall Plan and reconstruction so that a record of first-hand information can be created and shared on this site!