MARSHALL PLAN

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25713, 27 January 1949, Page 5

MARSHALL PLAN

RUSSIA’S ABSTENTION DEPLORED MR BEVIN SPEAKS TO JOURNALISTS (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, January 25. “I was extremely sorry that the Russians could not see or seize the opportunity that the Marshall Plan and the subsequent development of a European group offered to the peace or the world.” said the Foreign Secretary (Mr Ernest Bevin) to-day. “They seem to assume that all we were doing was trying to create a kind ot barrier behind which we could build a force to defeat the Soviet Government some day in the future.

"I assert, with all solemnity, that that has never entered our heads. Our one object is to give happiness, contentment and a decent standard ot life to the masses of Europe.” Mr Bevin was speaking at a luncheon in his honour by the Foreign Press Association, which was attended by 14 Ambassadors, Ministers and Charges d’Affaires. ’’

Referring to General Marshall’! Harvard speech, which set the Marshall Plan in motion, as epoch-making and affecting the whole future of the planet. Mr Bevin said: “We had no resources. The war had left us in a devastated condition and here was this great, wonderful American who, in the simplest language, said: ‘Let Europe get together. Let them put un their plans. Let them organise, and we will see what aid American can give.’

I never imagined at that moment tnat ideological differences would cause a diversion or digression in European considerations. I think we were so thrilled with the offer that we rather exaggerated the intentiona of the United States. We converted it into something far beyond probably what they originally thought, and we produced an organism which has resulted in a greater solidarity of Europe than has ever before been experienced."

Mr Bevin said that the proposed Atlantic Pact offered an assurance to Western Europe. If it could have been devised at the end of the 1918 war and given France the assurance to which she was entitled, the whole course of history might have been changed, and the Second World War might never have started. If Western civilisation could come together in one great organism, not anxious to attack, but ready to talk, others would recognise its power and there was a reasonable chance of getting peace in the world.'

“What I want is a practical organisation in which we shall cease to be English and French, English and Italian, English and Belgian, but will be European with an organisation that ® an _ carr y ° u t a European policy ra the face of new world developments,” he declared. ’