On April 3, 1948, US President Harry S Truman signed the Economic Aid Act that enabled the United States to help build the devastated European countries of World War II.
This familiar step as the Marshall Plan aims to stabilize the economy and politics in Europe so that it will not be interested in communist persuasion.
For this plan, the US government disbursed $ 13 billion or approximately Rp 179 trillion, which today is roughly equivalent to Rp 1,500 trillion.
Before this aid plan was signed, on 5 June 1947 US Secretary of State George C Marshall had called for help for Europe in his speech at Harvard University.
He proposed that the European countries to design a program of economic improvement that will be assisted by the United States.
In mid-June 1947, Britain and France invited European countries to Paris to discuss a joint economic recovery plan.
The Soviet Union refused to attend. Similarly Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Poland are already under the influence of Iron Curtain States.
The results of the meeting in Paris was then brought the European Economic Cooperation Committee (CEEC) to the US Congress which then passed the Economic Cooperation Act on April 2, 1948 that signed President Truman a day later.
Under the Marshall Plan, the Economic Cooperation Agency (ECA) poured $ 13 billion over 1948-1951.
Most of the funds are given in the form of grants and the remainder are long term soft loans.
A total of 17 countries in western and southern Europe, England, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, France, Sweden, Iceland, Ireland, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Switzerland, Turkey, and West Germany received this assistance.
The move also aims to improve European agricultural and industrial productivity as well as revive the chemical, machinery and steel industries.
This US aid seems to have a direct positive impact with the gross product recipient countries increase by 15-25 percent.
Rebuilding post-war Europe was the most challenging foreign policy of President Truman's reign that replaced Franklin D Roosevelt in April 1945.
A few months after taking office, Truman decided to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end World War II.
In the so-called Truman Doctrine, he asked Congress to approve aid for Greece and Turkey under the pressure of the Soviet Union and communism in 1947.
The Marshall Plan was originally scheduled to end in 1953, but efforts to extend this policy failed because of the growing costs of the Korean War.
In the period 1948-1952, the European economy soared and reached the highest level throughout history.
The industrial sector jumped by 35 percent, while the agricultural sector outpaced the pre-war production.