In Harvard Yard, on 5 June 1947, on the steps of Memorial Church, momentous words were said.
It is logical that the United States should do what it can to assist the return of normal economic health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace.
Our policy is not directed against any country, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos.
U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall set in motion the most profitable financial investment in human history: the reconstruction of Western Europe:
The Marshall Plan was part of a wider Western ambition after World War II. To create a World of Rules.
New global institutions were set up, led by U.S. leadership and generosity.
The United Nations. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The International Court of Justice.
Despite harsh Cold War ideological differences, these institutions took root. They grew and flourished.
Why? Because the world -- or at least a part of the world -- had agreed that explicit international military aggression had to stop.
Differences between peoples and nations should be settled by peaceful negotiation.
On one side of the line are countries and peoples free to choose their own democratic destiny.
On the other side are countries in a decaying Twilight Zone. A blighted, unhappy and unstable place outside the World of Rules.
If we get this wrong, our shared Western decades-long strategic ambition to create a Europe whole and free will falter.
Read more: Europe's Challenge: A 'Twilight Zone' in Russia's Shadow, or a 'World of Rules?' | Radek Sikorski
It is logical that the United States should do what it can to assist the return of normal economic health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace.
Our policy is not directed against any country, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos.
U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall set in motion the most profitable financial investment in human history: the reconstruction of Western Europe:
The Marshall Plan was part of a wider Western ambition after World War II. To create a World of Rules.
New global institutions were set up, led by U.S. leadership and generosity.
The United Nations. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The International Court of Justice.
Despite harsh Cold War ideological differences, these institutions took root. They grew and flourished.
Why? Because the world -- or at least a part of the world -- had agreed that explicit international military aggression had to stop.
Differences between peoples and nations should be settled by peaceful negotiation.
On one side of the line are countries and peoples free to choose their own democratic destiny.
On the other side are countries in a decaying Twilight Zone. A blighted, unhappy and unstable place outside the World of Rules.
If we get this wrong, our shared Western decades-long strategic ambition to create a Europe whole and free will falter.
Read more: Europe's Challenge: A 'Twilight Zone' in Russia's Shadow, or a 'World of Rules?' | Radek Sikorski
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