A classic error in US foreign policy.

Post-WW2 US foreign policy disasters date from the Marshall Plan of 1948, which saw the United States lending $128 billion (in today’s money) to Britain (28%), France (18%) and Germany (11%).

The Marshall Plan was a replacement for the never enacted Morgenthau Plan – named after FDR’s foreign secretary – which proposed that Germany should be stripped of all its weapons-making and related industrial capacity. This aligned with Churchill’s preferred approach which had him not only stripping Germany of all its industrial might but also returning the nation to a collection of pre-Bismarck agrarian states, no threat to anyone other than to one another.

America excused aid to a race which had murdered 6 million Jews and countless millions of others on the grounds that forgiveness beat the creep of communism. Meanwhile, England, without which there would have been no D Day invasion, meaning that all of Western Europe would be speaking German today, had to endure another decade of rationing and only finally repaid its war debts to the US just three years ago. Such was the allied spirit of the cold war.

There’s a fine pictorial in the UK Daily Telegraph showing many images of celebrations on VE Day on May 8, 1945, which makes this Friday the 75th anniversary of our contemplated recapitalization of the murderous German race. Not surprisingly, many Britons asked who had actually won the war the Germans started.

Click the image for the article and photographs.

Not satisfied with this foreign policy disaster, America went on to give us modern, nuclear North Korea (34,000 Americans dead), Viet Nam (58,000) and countless more in its ill considered forays in the Middle East. The sole success, Reagan’s defeat of the Russians, was destroyed with the installation of a dipsomaniac Yeltsin, only to be replaced by the murderous Czar Putin and his oligarch buddies.

After VJ Day (8/15/1945), which saw a feudal Japan destroyed and recreated by the genius of Douglas MacArthur into a peaceful, democratic ally, America’s foreign policy since WW2 is one of unmitigated failure, reflecting the nation’s loss of the will to win. The oft repeated State Department preference that the US should not engage in ‘nation building’ saw one success when it did (Japan) and only failures when it refused to do so (all the other wars).

No backpack set.

It has long befuddled me that the greatest western European cities are so ignorant of the basic economic concept of supply-demand elasticity. Along with the airlines they seem unaware that there’s a choice between having ten tourists spending $1,000 each compared with one spending $10,000. While the revenue garnered is identical, the high cost version comes with immense benefits. Less pollution, less wear and tear on plant, equipment and infrastructure and, crucially, a state of affairs where the city is beautiful and approachable once more. And legroom is restored on the flying sardine cans passing as aircraft. There are no crowds and disease spread is far lower owing to healthy affluence and shortage of sources. And as for those comparing this elitism with that of Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, I aver that the $10,000 spender has likely earned his way to this rich reward, one to which his poorer cousin is not at all entitled. First he has to earn it. Then he can enjoy it. Otherwise he can simply check National Geographic.

A recent NYT article grudgingly admits that an empty Paris is infinitely preferable to one crowded with masses of unwashed tourists, each determined to get a glimpse of the Mona Lisa through the crowds and protective glass.

Before immigrating to the United States in 1977 I made it a point of visiting this most beautiful of western cities and while it may not have been as empty as it is today, it was certainly very approachable and livable, as my images disclose:

On the Champs-Élysées.

The colors of France on the Métro.

Sunset in the Tuileries Gardens.

Wedding in Parc Monceau.

At the Holocaust Memorial.

The oldest profession.

All images on a Leica M3 with 35mm Summaron and 90mm Elmar (the chair) lenses, using Kodachrome and TriX films.