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On June 5, 1947, George C. Marshall delivered a speech in Harvard that was to change the world. With that speech, the U.S. Secretary of State and close confidant of President Truman ushered in the European Recovery Program (ERP), which soon burgeoned into the most successful political project in U.S. and European history. Underwritten by the American taxpayer, an unbelievable $14 billion was made available between 1948 and 1952 for the Marshall Plan, money that continues to have multiple benefits for Austria´s state, economy and society.

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HANS PETSCHAR is a historian, picture archivist and librarian at the Austrian National Library, where he is the director of the Picture Archives and Graphics Collection. He served as the visiting Marshall Plan Chair at the University of New Orleans (2016/17). He has published on the late Habsburg Monarchy, World War I, and the post-World War II.

GÜNTER BISCHOF was educated in Austria and the United States. He received his PhD in American History from Harvard University. He is the Marshallplan Professor of History at the University of New Orleans and the Director of its "The Austrian Marshall Plan Center for European Studies." He has published in the history of World War II and the Cold War, and more specificially on U.S. - Austrian relations and Austrian immigration to the U.S. in the 20th century.

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