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Trade and Comecon

The trading pattern of the Eastern Bloc countries was severely modified. Before World War II, no greater than 1%–2% of those countries' trade was with the Soviet Union. By 1953, the share of such trade had jumped to 37%. In 1947, Joseph Stalin had also denounced the Marshall Plan and forbade all Eastern Bloc countries from participating in it.

Soviet dominance further tied other Eastern Bloc economies to Moscow via the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) or Comecon, which determined countries' investment allocations and the products that would be traded within Eastern Bloc. Although Comecon was initiated in 1949, its role became ambiguous because Stalin preferred more direct links with other party chiefs than the indirect sophistication of the council. It played no significant role in the 1950s in economic planning.

Initially, Comecon served as cover for the Soviet taking of materials and equipment from the rest of the Eastern Bloc, but the balance changed when the Soviets became net subsidisers of the rest of the Bloc by the 1970s via an exchange of low cost raw materials in return for shoddily manufactured finished goods. While resources such as oil, timber and uranium initially made gaining access to other Eastern Bloc economies attractive, the Soviets soon had to export Soviet raw materials to those countries to maintain cohesion therein. Following resistance to Comecon plans to extract Romania 's mineral resources and heavily utilise its agricultural production, Romania began to take a more independent stance in 1964. While it did not repudiate Comecon, it took no significant role in its operation, especially after the rise to power of Nicolae Ceauşescu.