It was one of the U.S.'s illusions at the time that Britain could assume leadership of Europe. In fact, Britain was bled white. The empire was stirring with revolt against colonial rule, and Britain simply lacked the resources to play a big-power role. In a moment of hard truth, Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin told the House of Commons, "The day when we ... can declare a policy independently of our allies is gone."
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Old pretensions of national grandeur got short shrift from public opinion. Cranky voters in Britain and France turned against their war heroes. Only two months after celebrating victory, the British rejected Winston Churchill. Charles de Gaulle, facing rising opposition in the National Assembly, simply resigned, fed up, he said, with the political parties' petty games. In Italy, defeat was blissful liberation. Recalled veteran news broadcaster Ruggero Orlando: "Everything that had been prohibited for 20 years was now allowed-elections, communism, liberalism, free enterprise, everything. You could almost feel it in the air." The problem was communism. In world capitals all eyes were focused on the fateful electoral showdown in 1948 between Italy's Communist Party, the most powerful one in Western Europe, and Prime Minister Alcide de Gasperi's Christian Democrat government. The governing parties won with 48.5% of the vote; the Communists and their allies received 31%. That was the high-water mark of Moscow-directed electoral strength in Western Europe. Even so, an opinion poll taken for TIME by the Elmo Roper organization showed that most Europeans believed the Russians, not the Americans, were winning the cold war.  2 of 5
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In shattered Germany, government had ceased to exist; one-third of the country had been wrenched away and occupied by the Russians. By April 1947, the daily German ration had fallen to 1,040 calories, one-third less than the minimum considered necessary to sustain life. Workers collapsed at their jobs for lack of food. The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Cologne had earlier declared that it was not a sin to steal food or coal to get through the winter. 