Post-war Marshall Plan aid to Europe and indeed Ireland is well documented, but practically nothing is known about simultaneous Irish aid to Europe. This book provides a full record of the aid - mainly food but also clothes, blankets, medicines, etc. - that Ireland donated to continental Europe, including France, the Netherlands, Hungary, the Balkans, Italy, and zones of occupied Germany.
Starting with Ireland-s neutral wartime record, often wrongly presented as pro-German when Ireland in fact unofficially favoured the western Allies, Jerome aan de Wiel explains why -mon de Valera-s government sent humanitarian aid to the devastated continent. His book analyses the logistics of collection and distribution of supplies sent abroad as far as the Greek islands.
Despite some alleged Cold-War hijacking of Irish relief - and this humanitarianism was not above the politics of that East-West confrontation - it became mostly a story of hope, generosity and European Christian sol
