A modern marshall plan? - [engineering history]

At the end of the Second World War, the Allies were determined that Germany should never go to war again. Although the country, divided into four zones occupied by Britain, the United States, France and the Soviet Union, was in economic chaos, much of its industrial base had survived. The first 'Level of Industry Plan' envisaged the destruction of what was left of the German war machine by reducing steel and coal production and dismantling the heavy engineering industries. Around 1,500 listed manufacturing plants would be destroyed or removed to Allied countries. Germany was destined for the standard of life that had existed during the Great Depression and, it was hoped, a peaceful pastoral society with a little light industry would emerge. All the Allies took part in this planned post-war plundering of German industry and technology. As well as physically removing factories, the victors seized intellectual property (patents, industrial secrets, scientific and technical knowledge) along with many scientists and technicians, including most famously, Werner von Braun who had worked on the V2 Rocket. An elite British intelligence unit abducted hundreds of German scientists and put them to work in government ministries and private firms in the UK, giving a boost to British business and impeding the German ability to compete. Ironically, the Volkswagen factory was offered to Britain but rejected, the Rootes commission reporting that "the vehicle does not meet the fundamental technical requirement of a motor-car... is quite unattractive to the average buyer... to build the car commercially would be a completely uneconomic enterprise." The revival of the factory was largely down to a British army officer, Major Ivan Hirst, who persuaded the military to buy the car. By 1946 the factory was producing 1,000 vehicles a month and in 1947 commenced exports to Holland.