Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. [Vol. 5.] Eger Journal of American Studies. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 25)

Studies - Tamás Magyarics: From the Rollback of Communism to Building Bridges: The U.S. and the Soviet Block Countries from the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 to the Prague Spring in 1968

attached a clause to the Foreign Aid Act in March 1948: Section 117(d) excluded countries from the Marshall-aid which exported material under export embargo in the U.S. to any European countries which were not beneficiaries of the aid-program. As for the list of goods forbidden to be exported to the Communist countries, the Export Control Act of February 28, 1949 provided for a unilateral American commitment; it was later supplemented by an international list of embargoed items on November 22, 1949. The CG-COCOM list (Consultative Group Coordinating Committee) of January 1, 1950 was accepted by 15 Western countries by 1953. Furthermore, these countries put together the CHINCOM-list, i.e. the list of embargoed goods with relation to China during the Korean War, while in the U.S. another act forbade the import of woolen goods from Eastern European countries, which maintained contacts with North Korea or China or which re-exported the goods of the latter countries. The Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives under the chairmanship of Laurice C. Battle proposed an act about a more extensive list of embargoed goods than the COCOM-list; President Truman signed it on October 26, 1950. The Battle Act of 1951 (Mutual Defense Aid Control Act) threatened any country with an embargo which was regarded as a security risk to the U.S. The same year, the most favored nation status was revoked from all the Communist countries and all economic ties with the Soviet Union were broken. This long list of prohibition was somehow broken only in 1954. in the wake of the death of Stalin, when Congress passed the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act (commonly known as PL 480), which made the export of agricultural surplus possible. At the same time, Prime Minister Winston Churchill suggested in the House of Commons on February 25, 1954 that substantial relaxation be effected in the field of supplying raw material and manufactured goods to the Communist countries.

1

0 The restrictions in the East-West trade hurt the West-European countries more than the U.S.: while the former depended on the import of energy from and the export of manufactured goods to the EastEuropean countries, the U.S. trade with this region was below 1% of the total. 1

0 DSB. Vol. XLII, No. 1087. April 25, 1960. 670-673.