Germany Rises - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 124

The victorious Allies considered a plan to permanently destroy Germany's industrial
base. Doing so would turn Germany into an agricultural country, leaving it without the
means to wage war. Both the British and American governments rejected this draconian
solution, and Germany began the slow process of rebuilding a devastated country. One
measure of devastation is five billion cubic yards of rubble that was piled high in cities
and towns as a result of bombing and shelling. Given Germany's previous intellectual, sci-
entific, and engineering history (its social capital), economic recovery would no doubt have
proceeded without aid. But it was given a generous boost by the American Marshall Plan,
which contributed $12 billion in post-war aid to Europe to speed economic recovery.
Figure 8.6. Divided Germany 1945
TWO GERMANYS: AGAIN, THE PHOENIX
In June 1945, Russian armies swept through Europe. They occupied the eastern portion of
Berlin and all of Germany to the east. A Soviet-style dictatorship was installed, complete
with secret police and dossiers (and arrests) on those tempted to dissent. Stalinist-style
heavy industry produced only a modicum of consumer goods.
To keep East Germans from defecting to the West, borders were sealed, and a wall
eventually separated the two Berlins, East and West, in 1961. West Germany prospered,
while the standard of living in East Germany spiraled downward. Industrial machinery
had been shipped to Russia as war reparations, and rebuilt factories produced shoddy