Marshall, George Catlett

Marshall, George Catlett (b. 31 Dec. 1880, d. 17 Oct. 1959). US Army Chief of Staff 1939–45; US Secretary of State 1947–9; US Secretary of Defense 1950–1 Born in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, of a long-established Virginian family, he graduated at the Virginia Military Institute in 1901 and had a distinguished record in World War I with the US 1st Army on the Western Front. Rising rapidly in rank between the wars, he was appointed as Chief of Staff on 1 September 1939 to an army of some 200,000. When he left office in 1945 the army he commanded had risen to its greatest strength ever, at eight million. He attended all the major wartime conferences and was a strong advocate of an Allied landing on the Normandy coast, which eventually happened on D-Day. In November 1945 he was asked by President Truman to attempt to mediate in the renewed Chinese Civil War, but had to report that US aid to the Guomindang was being dissipated by wholesale corruption and that he had failed to achieve a pacification. As Secretary of State he initiated massive aid to Greece and Turkey, and announced the European Recovery Program, which became known as the Marshall Plan. He helped to create NATO and supported the firm line taken by the Western powers over the Soviet blockade of West Berlin. Ill health obliged him to resign in 1949, but he returned to office in 1950 when war in Korea broke out. He remained a distinguished government consultant throughout the 1950s. Marshall and Rabin are the only generals ever to have received a Nobel Peace Prize.