Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers (March-April 1947)
모스크바 외상회의 (1947년 3-4월)
The fourth session of the Council of Foreign Ministers, held in Moscow from 10 March to 24 April 1947. Foreign ministers George Marshall (US), Ernest Bevin (UK), Vyacheslav Molotov (USSR), and Georges Bidault (France) negotiated peace treaties for Germany and Austria and the political-economic restructuring of Germany, but reached no agreement after 43 recorded meetings. A personal meeting between Marshall and Stalin on 15 April also yielded no breakthrough. Convinced that European recovery could wait no longer, Marshall declared in his 28 April radio address that 'the patient is sinking while the doctors deliberate,' setting the stage for his Harvard speech roughly five weeks later.
In depth
Background
At the Potsdam Conference in August 1945, the Allies agreed to establish a Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) composed of the foreign ministers of the US, UK, USSR, China, and France to draft peace treaties. The spring 1947 Moscow session was the fourth meeting of the CFM and the first to tackle the core European questions (Germany and Austria) in depth.
The Conference
The conference held 43 formal sessions at the Aviation Industry House in Moscow. Marshall was accompanied by John Foster Dulles, Charles Bohlen, and Lucius Clay, among others. Negotiations deadlocked on four main issues: (1) the degree of centralization of a future German state: the USSR favored a strong central government, the US and UK a federal model, and France even greater decentralization; (2) the economic system: the Soviets insisted on industrial reparations in kind, while Marshall objected that reducing food imports would mean mass starvation; (3) the scale and method of reparations; (4) allocation of coal and steel production and exports. Marshall charged that the USSR had departed from Potsdam; Molotov countered that the US bore responsibility for the failure.
Outcome and Significance
The sole agreement reached was the formal dissolution of the Free State of Prussia. No progress was made on peace treaties for Germany and Austria. Upon his return, Marshall told the American people that 'the patient is sinking while the doctors deliberate,' and on 5 June 1947, at Harvard University, he proposed a comprehensive European recovery program. That speech launched the Marshall Plan, with the Moscow deadlock as its immediate trigger. When the Soviets rejected the plan and blocked Eastern Bloc participation at the Paris follow-up talks in July 1947, the dividing line across Europe hardened definitively.
Sources
- Wikipedia (EN) Overview of the March 1947 Moscow CFM: attendees, dates, failure to agree on Germany/Austria treaties, agreement to dissolve Prussia
- Wikipedia (EN) The Moscow conference as the immediate trigger for Marshall's Harvard speech; Marshall's conclusion that 'a solution could not wait any longer'
- marshallfoundation.org George C. Marshall Foundation: detailed day-by-day account of 43 meetings, participants at the table, Marshall's meeting with Stalin on 15 April, and the 28 April radio address
- avalon.law.yale.edu Yale Avalon Project: full text of Secretary Marshall's 28 April 1947 report to the American people on the Moscow Conference, including 'the patient is sinking while the doctors deliberate'