Question

Why did Stalin refuse aid from the U.S.-sponsored Marshall Plan?

Answer 1

He did not want the U.S to have a hold on the USSR or any of it's allies form the U.S rebuilding the countries.

Answer 2

The Marshall Plan was an initiative of the United States to help Western Europe, in which the Americans gave economic aid worth about 14 billion dollars for the reconstruction of those countries in Europe devastated after World War II.

Although it was offered to the Soviet Union, it refused to participate in the program for fear of losing economic independence; with its refusal it also blocked the possible participation of Eastern European countries, such as East Germany or Poland.

In a speech to the United Nations in 1947, the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs, Andrei Vyshinski, said that the Marshall Plan violated the principles of the United Nations. He accused the United States of trying to impose its will on other independent states, while at the same time using aid with its economic resources for nations in need as an instrument of political control.