More on the Marshall Plan

An interesting tidbit from the Marshall Foundation's history of the development of the Marshall Plan, about the lead-up to the speech in the summer of 1947:

By the end of May, State Department planning was beginning to jell; all Marshall’s advisers were by now agreed that the United States had to launch a massive aid program. They were all too aware of the U.S.’s too-little-too-late response to West Europe’s economic crisis of 1929-31 and that it had contributed to the rise of Adolph Hitler.

It might come in handy next time you find yourself in discussion with someone who claims not to understand how our handling of Afghanistan and Iraq might make us less safe.