No, nothing to do with the Marshall Plan. More to do with the pleasantly named Lease Lend, aka 'buy now-pay later' and the âloansâ Britain had to have to maintain their game. We never got anything without an invoice, donât delude yourself, Uncle Spam was the only one who made a fortune out of WWII, but if you rely on wiki bollox................
When Spam boss Truman said 'war's over you can all do one now, and don't forget the money you owe us

', to varying degrees we (as in Europe, which is what counts), were totally poleaxed, as in skint, wrecked infrastructure and markets, but, had to rebuild or submit to Stalin and the Sovie way. We were being asked for £3½ Billion (in 1945 money, not 2010 money). As Spam had a sh1t load of profit, when Britain was given her invoice, our top economist, John Maynard Keynes, went to the US to argue our case for, at best, a gift of some of these profits, or at worst an interest free loan of up to $8 Billion â about £2 Billion in real money. He got neither.
Spam Public Opinion polls at the time showed @ 60% of Septics were against even a loan for Britain, as we were Imperialists and now Socialists (Attlee Labour government).
âGee Marm, Iâm real glad weâre not Imperialists, you know, like wanting to control the world.â âThatâs quite right Elmer. Why it would be just like being nazis, invading other peoples countries and killing them till we got our own way. Dâyou want some more pie honey, youâve only had 14 pieces this morning?â
Despite the acclaimed excellence of clarity, truth, economics and logic Keynes expounded for three days, it took three months for Uncle Spam to agree only to a loan of under $4 Billion â with interest. And, the British Exchange Controls (our prevailing Gold Standard) had to go within 12 months. Britain finally paid off this âwonderfulâ loan at the end of 2006.
So the Septics danced around their little insulated boom world raking it in. Uncle Joe, meanwhile, had no intention going home but saw the Med and Western Europe as easy pickings for his Soviet â he already had the East and most of the centre. Britain was in no position to take on the Sovies and continued to struggle to keep its head above water including such measures as dismantling what was left of the Empire and dwindling its Armed Forces.
Bevin eventually told the Septics we were pulling out of Greece and Turkey which would mean them going Red, and if their âIntelligenceâ hadnât already advised them, France and Italy looked poised to follow. Youâre welcome to believe the spin bollox about Uncle Spam stepping in to help his European ancestors, but the reality is if they let Europe go totally Red, all Western Europe had to offer would go to Uncle Joe and Uncle Spam would, at a stroke, lose a major market for all the production over capacity they had built-up since 1940. And, as for all their European markers paying dividends, why theyâd have to collect from Uncle Joe â like heâd pay, and what were they going to do about it if he didnât, as in SFA and they knew it.
Rather than take on the Sovies big time, it was much cheaper and more profitable, long term, to listen to what Europe had been pointing out to them for years, and restore their markets there and develop new ones. The Septics were awash with money so it wasnât any great hardship for them, (itâs not like they intended to initiate some US National Health scheme

), but behind the spin was strewed investment to net further returns and increase their sphere of influence. You can be naïve enough to imagine these âgiftsâ were in the nature of âhereâs a few million, the ship with the gold will arrive next week, enjoy!â, or plough through the myriad of deals where facilities or goods were provided on condition that they were, of course, American and all the other âlittleâ conditions were agreed and observed which, again, served the interests of Uncle Spam. Buy hey, look on the bright side, you donât go Red
So no
chrisg46, I do not mean like the Marshall Plan.
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