Treaty Of Versailles And The Marshall Plan

As two different influential documents in history, the treaty of Versailles and the Marshall plan are both created during the post war period one after WWI and the other after WWII. Compares with the treaty of Versailles, the Marshall plan worked better due to its effort of preventing another World conflicts, limiting the spread of the communist and also built a healthier economy.

After the allied power gain victory, considering German as the “chief instigator of the conflicts”(the United states), the treaty of Versailles was created “for German leaders to sign on May 7, 1919”(the United states). “The Big Four”, often refers to the United Kingdom, France, the United States, and Italy dominated the creating process of the signing of the treaty.

While reconstructing themselves from WWI, Germany also need to pay other countries as well for starting the war. “These payments, called reparations, would be paid monthly and would total some £6,600 million”(The Impact). By losing resources of raw material due to territory concede and recued labor force due to “lost some 1.7 million men during the war, and a further 4.2 million are listed as being wounded.”（ The Impact）The Germany hyperinflation in 1923 is also related to the treaty. Because much resources of income were cut off, the newly formed German government starts to print paper money under the initial purpose of helping the financial problems. This over print of money eventually leads to inflation; witch “the prices that had doubled from 1914 to 1919 doubled again during just five months in 1922.” (The German hyperinflation) Although the “newly formed German democratic government saw the Versailles Treaty as a “dictated peace” ,“the shame of the treaty give rise to wing parties including Hitler’s Nazi party. Having the thought to regain the control of lost territory and power, the voters “overlook the more radical tenets of Nazi ideology.”(The Paris) With bitterness and hatefulness, Germany eventually started another War, the

Marshall issued a call for a comprehensive program to rebuild Europe [the Marshall plan].” (Marshall Plan) The Marshall plan, constructed during the post war period, instead of destroy Europe further more, it helped the reconstruction of European counties with financial support over 12 billions (Marshall Plan). A large reason of U.S involvement on Europe reconstruction is due to its fear of communist. And that is why the Marshall plan was only applied to Western Europe, which the U.S wants to “precluding any measure of Soviet Bloc cooperation.”(Marshall Plan) Also, by investing money in European country, it opens up the trading network, which not only helped the countries to recover, but also contributed to the growth of U.S economy. (For European