Quote Originally Posted by Kralizec View Post
That the USA and the USSR were by far the biggest players left in 1946 doesn't mean that the "midgets" France and west Germany couldn't still have a brawl between the two of them. The coal and steal community created a forum where countries could make shared decisions about natural recources and general economic policy. It ended Germany's exclusion from the world theatre as a pariah state. The ECSC and successors undeniably did stabilise Europe. Being hemmed in by two superpowers was an important motivation to pursue stability and European cooperation - I'd hesistate to label it a "cause".

Eastern Europe - look at the various conflicts these countries waged between years 1918 and 1938. It's an extremely unstable region that was only kept in line by Austro/German/Russian domination and later on by Soviet repression. These tensions were anything but resolved in 1991, in fact they still manifest them today on occasion. Since 1991 it's been largely quite though because these countries all wanted to enter the EU, and the EU frowns upon use of force to settle petty border disputes.
The Flattened French and the Occupied Germans starting a brawl? Between them, cutting words and sticks would have been the tools.

Eastern Europe has been transiently bought into peace. There is almost no area of the planet that throwing large sums of money will not encourage stability for as long as the money flows.