The Soviet Union began bilateral trade agreements with Central and Eastern European nations in 1945. This initiative started two years before the American Marshall Plan launched in 1947.
The maximum aims set by the Soviet government included obtaining total economic control over Europe. They sought to adapt the European economy to match their own internal structures and convert these nations into markets for Soviet surpluses.
Italy, Romania, Hungary, and Finland paid regular payments totaling $900 million over 8 years. These countries received aid while simultaneously being forced to pay debts to the Soviet state.
Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and East Germany participated in these exchanges. The system allowed Eastern Bloc countries to reorganize their trade entirely around the Soviet Union instead of relying on American funds.
Vyacheslav Molotov rejected the Marshall Plan which turned his initiative into a permanent organization known as Comecon. This formalized socialist alliance replaced the initial bilateral arrangements with a structured economic grouping that began in 1945.