German history experts
 

I have a question about the currency reform of 1948 in Germany. which I've read about in several sources. I understand that the Russians/Soviets opposed it.

Can anyone explain why they opposed the currency reform?

I think these two do as good a job as any of explaining it:

http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/...?image_id=1018

http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/...nguage=english

Same issue as with the introduction of the euro: who controls the currency, and therefore sets interest rates for loans and thereby influences government fiscal policy?

Or in other words, a currency introduced across the western zones to facilitate the Marshall Plan meant, de facto, an interzonal economic government that either excluded the Soviet Union, or only included the Soviet zone on terms that would prevent them embedding the Soviet system (and therefore sooner or later would mean removing Soviet influence and military presence altogether, in favour of the US - which was why the Communist countries had been pressed to reject Marshall Aid).

Whether or not the SU seriously continued to imagine the whole of Germany might in some way be Sovietised, for them the currency reform meant less and less say in interzonal government of the whole of Germany. Hence the formalised division that came about in the following year, after the Berlin Airlift had foiled their attempt to impose their will on the western Allies.

(The point being, Marshall Aid came with understandable conditions about opening up markets and convertibility of currencies that were inimical to the Soviet system, both economically and in terms of straightforward oppressive political power).

Speaking of The Marshall Plan, if you ever find yourself in Lexington, Virginia do make it a point to visit the George C. Marshall Museum. Absolutely fascinating. (The VMI museum ain't too shabby either ;) )

If the you read the works of Don Camillo you will see the battles between the Italian reds against the terrible Americans of this period in all their glory (and pretty fairly on both sides of the arguement). If you then look at modern helicoptor money theory and sell off of the Russian assets to the people and then onto the big gangsters it shows that education in Economics is still pretty poor.

Thanks, Patrick and Sparkchaser. That clarifies it.

Two problems with bilbo's suggestion: Don Camillo is not an author, he's a character; the "works" are fiction.

Big, you are right, but written by a man of his time writing about what he knew and loved.

I've read all the books, and it's much more a battle between the Italian Communist party (PCI) and the Christian Democrats (DC). There's no mistaking which side Guareschi is on. Don Camillo, the parish priest, always wins, although Peppone, the Communist mayor, is portrayed with great sympathy.

After WWII, there was a lot of violence, not only between fascists and nonfascists, but also between Communist and anti-Communist ex-partisans. It's an important part of the story that both Don Camillo and Peppone were partisans, and fought together as comrades to overthrow the fascists and Nazis.

The Americans barely show up in the books, although we know they were very active behind the scenes in real life. The Soviet Union is, on the other hand, very much in evidence, sending tractors that don't work to the local Communist section, and other things that serve to make the PCI seem comical. There is even an entire book, <i>Il Compagno Don Camillo </i> (Comrade Don Camillo) devoted to a paid trip to the Soviet Union for the local party heads, which Don Camillo, in civilian clothes, and with a red scarf at his neck, manages to infiltrate.

There were several good black-and-white films made from the books.

There was a period, roughly 1947-49, when it seemed seriously possible that both France and Italy might put Communists into serious positions of power (bearing in mind the tactical manipulation of democracy that had enabled Communists to take over Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia). It's not impossible that the Russians also intended (or at least were suspected of intending) to use their excess printing of Occupation Marks to foment enough economic chaos in West Germany that the Communists could take advantage of, in the way they hadn't quite been able to in the super-inflation of the 1920s. Another motive for the West to crack on with introducing the D-Mark.

There were several good black-and-white films made from the books.>>

there were also some excellent radio adaptations by the BBC which is how I know about the books.