jan 1, 1952 - Creation of the ECSC

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The European Coal and Steel Community was an expansion of Benelux with the addition of France, West Germany, and Italy. Though the ECSC wasn't as important or inclusive as the following EEC, it still set a basis of free trade for essential goods which would help in the rebuilding on infrastructure in the largely destroyed France, West Germany and Low Countries. Coal and steel were the most important commodities to the recovery of industrial infrastructure, and providing free trade of these products reduced much of the strain of tariffs and taxes would would have made the WWII recovery era much more difficult.

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