ABSTRACT
The experience of the seven countries in the last months of the war had common features and differences. The Germans systematically exploited the countries they had defeated, showing a special ruthlessness in Poland. Far more important, however, for both countries was the obligation to maintain the Soviet forces in transit and occupation. Economic disaster came first in Hungary. Devastation, Soviet demands and dislocation of trade produced their effects. The main cause of economic strain was the Soviet occupation, to which in the winter of 1946-1947 was added a really disastrous drought, involving starvation in parts of Moldavia and great shortages in all but the western provinces. German property had become Soviet by the armistice terms, and could only be controlled by the governments on whatever terms the Soviet authorities allowed. During 1951 there was much public discussion in Yugoslavia of the faults of the Soviet system of planning, which it was admitted had been uncritically imitated.
