by Benn Steil
Lenin, Vladimir Ilyich (1870–1924). Russian Communist revolutionary and Soviet leader. Led Bolshevik forces to victory in the Russian Revolution of October 1917 and became the first Soviet head of state.
Letourneau, Jean (1907–1986). French MRP (Christian Democrat) politician. Minister for the associated states, 1950–1953.
Lippmann, Walter (1889–1974). American writer and columnist. Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner noted for his analysis of U.S. foreign policy.
Litvinov, Maxim Maximovich (1876–1951). Russian Communist revolutionary and Soviet diplomat. People’s commissar of foreign affairs, 1930–1939; assistant foreign minister, 1940–1946; ambassador to the United States, 1941–1943.
Lodge, Henry Cabot, Jr. (1902–1985). American politician and diplomat. Senator (R-MA), 1937–1944, 1947–1953; ambassador to the United Nations, 1953–1960.
Lomakin, Yakov Mironovich (1904–1958). Soviet economist, journalist, and diplomat. Vice consul in New York, 1941; consul general in San Francisco, 1942–1944; consul general in New York, 1946–1948.
Longo, Luigi (1900–1980). Italian politician. General secretary of the Communist Party, 1964–1972.
Lovett, Robert (1895–1986). American diplomat. Under secretary of state, 1947–1949; deputy secretary of defense, 1950–1951; secretary of defense, 1951–1953. Served as Marshall’s deputy in the State and Defense Departments.
Lozovsky, Solomon Abramovich (1878–1952). Russian Communist revolutionary, labor leader, and Soviet diplomat. Assistant foreign minister, 1939–1946. Executed on falsified charges in 1952 with other members of the Soviet Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee.
Lucas, Scott (1892–1968). American politician. Congressman (D-IL), 1935–1939; senator, 1939–1951; Senate majority leader, 1949–1951. Mocked Republican opponents of the Marshall Plan for aligning themselves with the Communist Party.
MacColl, René (1905–1971). British newspaper writer. Washington correspondent for the Daily Express.
Mackinder, Sir Halford (1861–1947). British geographer and intellectual. A founder of the discipline of geopolitics.
Maclean, Donald (1913–1983). British diplomat. Member of the “Cambridge Five” group of double agents who spied for the Soviets.
MacVeagh, Lincoln (1890–1972). American diplomat. Ambassador to Greece, 1944–1947.
Maier, Charles (1939– ). American historian of the Marshall Plan.
Maisky, Ivan Mikhailovich (1884–1975). Bolshevik revolutionary and Soviet diplomat, historian, and writer. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, 1932–1943; assistant foreign minister, 1943–1946. Arrested in early 1952 and forced to confess to serving as a British spy.
Malenkov, Georgy Maximilianovich (1902–1988). Soviet official. Member of the Politburo, 1946–1957; secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, 1939–1946, 1948–1953; assistant chairman of the Council of Ministers, 1946–1953. Close associate of Stalin.
Malik, Yakov Alexandrovich (1906–1980). Soviet diplomat. Assistant foreign minister, 1947–1953; ambassador to the United Nations, 1948–1952. Engaged in backchannel negotiations with American diplomat Philip Jessup to end the Berlin blockade.
Malone, George (1890–1961). American politician. Senator (R-NV), 1947–1959. Opposed the Marshall Plan on the grounds that it would “finance socialism” in Europe.
Mamedov, Georgy Enverovich (1947– ). Russian diplomat. Assistant foreign minister, 1991–2003; ambassador to Canada, 2003–2014.
Mao Tse-tung (1893–1976). Chinese Communist revolutionary and founder of the People’s Republic of China.
Marshall, George Catlett (1880–1959). American military leader and statesman. Chief of staff of the Army, 1939–1945; secretary of state, 1947–1949; secretary of defense, 1950–1951. His June 1947 speech at Harvard set the stage for the massive European aid program that would bear his name. Received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.
Martin, Joseph (1884–1968). American politician. Congressman (R-MA), 1925–1967; speaker of the house, 1947–1949, 1953–1955. Argued for an American military buildup in the wake of the February 1948 Czechoslovak Communist coup.
Masaryk, Jan (1886–1948). Czechoslovak diplomat. Foreign minister, 1945–1948. Son of the country’s post–World War I founder, he sought to preserve his country’s independence from the Soviet Union.
Massigli, René (1888–1988). French diplomat. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, 1944–1955.
Matthews, Harrison Freeman (1899–1986). American official and diplomat. Director, Office of European Affairs, State Department, 1944–1947; deputy under secretary of state, 1950–1953.
McClellan, John (1896–1977). American politician. Senator (D-AR), 1943–1977. Argued that senators should not support the Marshall Plan unless they were also prepared to support a military alliance with western Europe.
McCloy, John Jay (1895–1989). American official and diplomat. Assistant secretary of war, 1941–1945; president of the World Bank, 1947–1949; high commissioner for Germany, 1949–1952.
McNaughton, Frank (1906–1978). American writer and journalist. Washington correspondent for Time.
Meany, William George (1894–1980). American labor leader. Secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Labor, 1939–1952; member of the President’s Committee on Foreign Aid (Harriman Committee), 1947.
Medvedev, Dmitry Anatolievich (1965– ). Russian lawyer and politician. First assistant chairman of the government, 2005–2008; president, 2008–2012; prime minister, 2012– .
Mendès-France, Pierre (1907–1982). French Radical-Socialist diplomat and politician. Prime minister, 1954–1955.
Merkel, Angela (1954– ). German stateswoman. Chair of the Christian Democratic Union, 2000– ; chancellor, 2005– .
Merrow, Chester (1906–1974). American politician. Congressman (R-NH), 1943–1963. Argued for building up the U.S. Air Force in 1948 as a response to the growing Soviet threat in western Europe.
Miall, Leonard (1914–2005). British journalist. BBC correspondent in the United States, 1945–1953.
Milward, Alan (1935–2010). British historian. Author of The Reconstruction of Western Europe, 1945–51. Argued that Europe could have recovered at least as successfully without the Marshall Plan.
Mitterrand, François (1916–1996). French statesman. First secretary of the Socialist Party, 1971–1981; president, 1981–1995. Pushed for greater European integration after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Modzelewski, Zygmunt (1900–1954). Polish Communist diplomat. Foreign minister, 1947–1951.
Molotov, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich (1890–1986). Bolshevik revolutionary and Soviet Communist Party, political, and government leader. Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars (head of government), 1930–1941; people’s commissar of foreign affairs/foreign minister, 1939–1949, 1953–1956. A doctrinaire Marxist, loyal to Stalin, he was renowned among contemporary statesmen for his stubborn but effective anti-Western diplomacy.
Monnet, Jean (1888–1979). French statesman. President of the High Authority of the European Steel and Coal Community, 1952–1955. Conceived the Monnet Plan for French economic recovery and modernization following World War II.
Morgenthau, Henry, Jr. (1891–1967). American official. Treasury secretary, 1934–1945. One of FDR’s closest confidants. Lent his name to the Morgenthau Plan, which sought to deindustrialize Germany in the aftermath of World War II.
Mosley, Leonard (1913–1992). British journalist. Correspondent for the Sunday Times.
Muggeridge, Malcolm (1903–1990). British journalist. Washington correspondent for The Daily Telegraph during the late 1940s.
Mundt, Karl (1900–1974). American politician. Congressman (R-SD), 1939–1948; senator, 1948–1973. Member of the Herter Committee touring Europe to evaluate reconstruction needs in 1947.
Murphy, Robert (1894–1978). American diplomat. Political adviser for Germany, 1945–1949; ambassador to Belgium, 1949–1952. One of General Clay’s top advisers in Germany, he favored a confrontatio
nal approach toward the Soviet Union.
Nitze, Paul (1907–2004). American official. Deputy director, Office of International Trade Policy, State Department, 1946–1947; deputy assistant secretary of state for economic affairs, 1947–1949; director of policy planning, 1949–1953. Lead statistician and accountant of the “Brown Books,” which detailed the needs and finances of countries receiving Marshall aid.
Nixon, Richard (1913–1994). American statesman. Congressman (R-CA), 1947–1950; senator, 1950–1953; vice president, 1953–1961; president, 1969–1974. Member of the Herter Committee touring Europe to evaluate reconstruction needs in 1947.
Nosek, Jindr˘ich (1896–1984). Czechoslovak diplomat. Ambassador to France, 1944–1948.
Nosek, Václav (1893–1955). Czechoslovak Communist politician. Minister of the interior, 1945–1948.
Nourse, Edwin (1883–1974). American scholar and official. Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, 1946–1949.
Novikov, Nikolai Vasilievich (1903–1989). Soviet diplomat. Ambassador to the United States, 1946–1947.
Orbán, Viktor (1963– ). Hungarian politician. Prime minister, 1998–2002; 2010– .
Otschkin, Boris Romanovich (1921–?). Soviet military officer. Served in Berlin commandant’s office from 1945 to 1949.
Parodi, Alexandre (1901–1979). French diplomat. Secretary general of the French Foreign Ministry, 1949–1956.
Patterson, Robert (1891–1952). American judge and official. Secretary of war, 1945–1947.
Patton, George (1885–1945). American military leader. Legendary World War II commander whose pleas to be allowed to press on to Berlin were rejected by General Eisenhower.
Pauley, Edwin (1903–1981). American businessman and political adviser. Personal representative of Truman on the Allied Commission on Reparations, 1945–1947; special adviser to George Marshall, 1947–1948.
Pavlov, Valentin Sergeevich (1937–2003). Soviet politician. Finance minister, 1989–1991; prime minister, 1991. Helped lead failed coup against Gorbachev in August 1991.
Pearson, Drew (1897–1969). American journalist. Author of syndicated newspaper column entitled “Washington Merry-Go-Round,” 1932–1969.
Peskov, Dmitry Sergeevich (1967– ). Russian official and translator. Press secretary to the prime minister, 2008–2012; presidential press secretary and assistant head of the administration of the president of the Russian Federation, 2012– .
Peterson, Sir Maurice Drummond (1889–1952). British diplomat. Ambassador to the Soviet Union, 1946–1949.
Philby, Harold (Kim) (1912–1988). British intelligence officer. Member of the “Cambridge Five,” a ring of British double agents who spied for the Soviets.
Philip, André (1902–1970). French Socialist politician. Finance minister, 1946, 1946–1947.
Pickering, Thomas (1931– ). American diplomat. Ambassador to the United Nations, 1989–1992; ambassador to the Russian Federation, 1993–1996.
Pieck, Wilhelm (1876–1960). East German politician. Co-chairman of Communist SED party, 1946–1960; first president of East Germany, 1949–1960.
Primakov, Yevgeny Maximovich (1929–2015). Soviet and Russian politician and diplomat. Head of the Soviet/Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, 1991–1996; foreign minister, 1996–1998; prime minister, 1998–1999.
Putin, Vladimir Vladimirovich (1952– ). Russian statesman. Prime minister, 1999, 2008–2012; president, 2000–2008, 2012– . Served as a Soviet KGB officer in East Germany when the Berlin Wall fell. Fierce opponent of NATO expansion.
Queuille, Henri (1884–1970). French Radical-Socialist politician. Prime minister, 1948–1949, 1950, 1951.
Ramadier, Paul (1888–1961). French Socialist politician. Prime minister, 1947.
Ratiani, Georgii Mikhailovich (1917–1978). Soviet journalist, historian, and writer. Pravda journalist and editor.
Rayburn, Sam (1882–1961). American politician. Congressman (D-TX), 1913–1961; speaker of the house, 1940–1947, 1949–1953, 1955–1961.
Reagan, Ronald (1911–2004). American statesman. Governor (R-CA), 1967–1975; president, 1981–1989.
Reed, Philip (1899–1989). American businessman. Chairman of General Electric, 1940–1942, 1945–1958.
Reston, James (1909–1995). American New York Times reporter for fifty years. Won two Pulitzer Prizes.
Reuter, Ernst (1889–1953). German Social Democratic politician. Mayor of West Berlin, 1948–1953.
Revai, Josef (1898–1959). Hungarian Communist politician. Member of the Politburo, 1945–1952; education minister, 1949–1953.
Riddleberger, James (1904–1982). American diplomat. Chief, Division of Central European Affairs, State Department, 1944–1947; director, Office of Political Affairs, Office of Military Government for Germany-U.S., 1947–1949; acting political adviser to the U.S. military governor and later director, Office of Political Affairs, U.S. High Commissioner for Germany, 1949–1950; political adviser, Economic Cooperation Administration, 1950–1952.
Ripka, Hubert (1895–1958). Czechoslovak politician. Foreign trade minister, 1945–1948. Favored closer economic relations with the West and participation in the Marshall Plan. Fled the country after the February 1948 Communist coup.
Roberts, Sir Frank (1907–1998). British diplomat. Minister in Moscow, 1945–1947; principal private secretary to Bevin, 1947–1949.
Robertson, Sir Brian (1896–1974). British general. Deputy military governor of the British zone of occupied Germany, 1945–1947; military governor and commander in chief, 1947–1949; high commissioner for Germany, 1949–1950.
Roll, Eric (1907–2005). British diplomat. Undersecretary to the treasury, 1948–1949; member of delegation to the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation, 1949.
Roosevelt, Eleanor (1884–1962). American diplomat and wife of FDR. First lady, 1933–1945; delegate to the United Nations General Assembly, 1945–1953.
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano (1882–1945). American Democratic statesman. President, 1933–1945. Led the United States through the Great Depression and World War II. His vision of a postwar world order founded on multilateral institutions and cooperation with the Soviet Union unraveled after his death.
Rostow, Eugene (1913–2002). American scholar and diplomat. Dean of Yale Law School, 1955–1965; under secretary of state, 1966–1969.
Rostow, Walt (1916–2003). American economist and official. Assistant chief, German-Austrian Economic Division, State Department, 1945–1946; assistant to the executive secretary, Economic Community for Europe, 1947–1949.
Royall, Kenneth (1894–1971). American official. Under secretary of war, 1945–1947; secretary of war, 1947; secretary of the Army, 1947–1949. Argued for a withdrawal of Western forces from Berlin during the Soviet blockade.
Saakashvili, Mikheil (1967– ). Georgian politician. President, 2004–2007, 2008–2013.
Sabanadze, Natalie (1975– ). Georgian diplomat. Ambassador to the European Union, 2013– .
Sazonov, Sergei Dmitrievich (1860–1927). Russian diplomat. Foreign minister, 1910–1916.
Schumacher, Kurt (1895–1952). German politician. Chairman of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), 1946–1952. An anti-Communist Social Democrat, he strongly supported postwar German reunification.
Schuman, Robert (1886–1963). French statesman. Finance minister, 1946; prime minister, 1947–1948; president of the European Parliament, 1958–1960. Staunch advocate of West European integration and multilateral institutions.
Scowcroft, Brent (1925– ). American military leader and official. National security adviser, 1975–1977, 1989–1993.
Semenov, Vladimir Semenovich (1874–1960). Soviet official. Military counsel, 1945–1946; political counsel for the Soviet Military Administration in Germany, 1946–1949; political counsel for the Soviet Control Commission in Germany, 1949–1953.
Semler, Johannes (1898–1973). German official. Bizonal economics director in occupied Germany, 1947–1948.
Sforza, Count Carlo (
1873–1952). Italian diplomat. Foreign minister, 1920–1921, 1947–1951.
Sicherman, Harvey (1945–2010). American scholar and official. Member of the Policy Planning Staff, 1991–1992.
Široký, Viliam (1902–1971). Czechoslovak Communist politician. Vice premier, 1945–1953; premier, 1953–1963.
Slánský, Rudolf (1901–1952). Czechoslovak Communist politician. Secretary general of the Communist Party, 1945–1951.
Smirnov, Andrei Andreevich (1905–1982). Soviet diplomat. Chief of the III European Department of the People’s Commissariat/Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1943–1949; assistant foreign minister, 1946–1949.
Smith, Frederick (1884–1956). American politician. Congressman (R-OH), 1939–1951. Opposed the Marshall Plan as “outright communism.”
Smith, Lawrence (1892–1958). American politician. Congressman (R-WI), 1941–1958. Member of the Herter Committee touring Europe to evaluate reconstruction needs in 1947.
Smith, Walter Bedell (1895–1961). American general and diplomat. Chief of staff to General Eisenhower, 1942–1945; ambassador to the Soviet Union, 1946–1949; director of central intelligence, 1950–1953.
Smutný, Jaromír (1892–1964). Czechoslovak official. Head of the Presidential Office in Exile, 1940–1945; chancellor of the president in Prague, 1945–1948.
Snyder, John (1895–1985). American banker and official. Treasury secretary, 1946–1953.
Sokolovsky, Vasily Danilovich (1897–1968). Soviet military leader. Commander in chief of the Group of Soviet forces in Germany and chief of Soviet Military Administration in Germany, 1946–1949. Represented the Soviet Union in the Allied Control Council.
Soros, George (1930– ). Hungarian American investor and philanthropist. Founder of the Open Society Foundations.
Spaak, Paul-Henri (1899–1972). Belgian Socialist statesman. Prime minister, 1938–1939, 1947–1950; foreign minister, 1939–1945, 1954–1957, 1961–1966; secretary general of NATO, 1957–1961. Strong supporter of West European integration and multilateral institutions.
Spiel, Hilde (1911–1990). Austrian-Jewish novelist and journalist. Wrote for Die Welt and The New Statesman.
