Berlin Airlift
The Berlin Airlift was a massive humanitarian effort led by the Western Allies to supply West Berlin with food, fuel, and other necessities after the Soviet Union blockaded the city in 1948. Over 200,000 flights delivered supplies, demonstrating the resolve of the Western powers during the early stages of the Cold War and ultimately forcing the Soviets to lift the blockade.
4 Key excerpts on "Berlin Airlift"
- John Steven Brunhaver(Author)
- 2015(Publication Date)
- Normanby Press(Publisher)
...CHAPTER 3—THE Berlin Airlift “Morale in all of Western Europe has been lifted to inspirational levels. The people see proof in the Airlift of our determination not to abandon them to totalitarian domination. The Airlift has become a symbol of hope.”—Lucius D. Clay, General, US Army Commander in Chief, European Command The Berlin Airlift was an immense undertaking to furnish supplies, food, and fuel to the 2.5 million civilian and military inhabitants of West Berlin during the Soviet blockade of ground supply routes. The airlift lasted from 26 June 1948 to 1 August 1949. During that time, airlift forces flew 266,600 sorties and delivered more than 2,223,000 tons, demonstrating that airlift could be an effective instrument in international diplomacy. {62} This chapter will examine what doctrinal imperatives can be gained from studying the Berlin Airlift. The first part of the chapter will be devoted to the discovery of the facts. The analysis will then trace effects back to their causes in terms of factors that influenced the airlift effort. Finally, we will investigate and evaluate the means employed leading to a determination of the doctrinal precepts derived from the Berlin Airlift. Analysis of the evidence for the Berlin Airlift focuses on Berlin’s general situation, the requirements to capabilities ratio, the Soviet threat to the Allied resupply efforts, the airlift operation’s support infrastructure, and the weather’s influences on the operation. Berlin’s General Situation Intimidating West Berlin into relinquishing its freedom was the first step of the Soviet plan to gain control of Germany, which conflicted directly with the Allied objective to retain control of West Berlin and the three western zones of Germany. For the better part of 1947, the Russians gradually imposed a surface blockade of the western sectors of Berlin...
eBook - ePubThe Forgotten German Genocide
Revenge Cleansing in Eastern Europe, 1945–50
- Peter C Brown(Author)
- 2021(Publication Date)
- Pen and Sword History(Publisher)
...The airlift became ever more efficient and the number of aircraft increased, and at the height of the campaign, one plane landed every forty-five seconds at Tempelhof Airport. The joint operation transported more than 2.3 million tons of supplies and 227,655 passengers by 189,963 flights in the fifteen months of the airlift. It saved the city without war, but the cost was 126 accidents, seventy of them major, and the USAF lost twenty-eight airmen during the operation. At the same time, the Allied counter-blockade on Eastern Germany was causing severe shortages, which, Moscow feared, might lead to political upheaval. The Soviets, fearing that the Western powers would force the creation of a single capitalist Germany by joining their zones together and overpowering the East, officially ended the blockade on 12 May 1949. The Allies continued the Berlin Airlift through to 30 September to stockpile fuel, food, and medicine in Berlin in case Stalin changed his mind. The Soviets had sought huge reparations from Germany in the form of money, industrial equipment, and resources. The blockade imposed by Stalin turned out to be a terrible diplomatic move, while the United States emerged from the confrontation with renewed purpose and confidence. The Berlin Crisis of 1948–49 solidified the division of Europe. Shortly before the end of the blockade, the Western Allies created the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). Two weeks after the end of the blockade, the state of West Germany was established, soon followed by the creation of East Germany. The incident solidified the demarcation between East and West in Europe; it was one of the few places on earth that the US and Soviet armed forces stood face-to-face...
eBook - ePub- James Ciment, Kenneth Hill, James Ciment, Kenneth Hill(Authors)
- 2012(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...If the Soviets wished to stop the planes, they would have to actually attack them, putting the responsibility for starting a war upon their own shoulders. The Americans and their allies were gambling that this was a risk that Stalin would be unwilling to take. The first planes started landing in Berlin on June 26, 1948. To supply a city the size of Berlin by air was an extremely difficult endeavor. Aircraft cannot transport nearly the same weight in supplies as can trains or trucks. And the Americans had to supply not just their own soldiers, but also the 2.4 million civilians in West Berlin. To transport the necessary weight in cargo, the Americans, helped by the British and French, were forced to bring in cargo planes from all over the world. To handle the increased capacity, the allies, with the help of West Berlin civilians, had to build a third airport, in order to supplement the two already in West Berlin. At the height of the airlift, planes were taking off and landing in Berlin every minute. The American gamble paid off: the Soviets decided not to risk war by attacking any of the planes bringing supplies into West Berlin. In May 1949, realizing that it had been a failure, the Soviets begin lifting the Berlin Blockade. The airlift continued to supply Berlin for four more months, until normal transportation routes could be brought back to their pre-blockade capacity. From June 26, 1948, to September 30, 1949, the allied airlift made 277,264 flights and brought 2,343,315 tons of food and coal into Berlin. Seventy-five British and American airmen lost their lives in crashes over the course of the entire campaign. The Berlin Wall was erected in the summer of 1961 by East German authorities with Soviet support...
eBook - ePubPlaces of Encounter, Volume 2
Time, Place, and Connectivity in World History, Volume Two: Since 1500
- Aran MacKinnon, Elaine McClarnand MacKinnon(Authors)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...1949 In 1949 the three occupation zones of the French, the British, and the Americans merged to form the Federal Republic of Germany, or West Germany. It covered more than twice the area of the German Democratic Republic, or East Germany, which was formed from the Soviet occupation zone. Note the location of Berlin, deep inside of East Germany and close to Poland, and how this made the city a useful location for conducting Western surveillance and propaganda behind the Iron Curtain. But Russian leader Joseph Stalin’s move backfired, for it only served to solidify the determination of West Berliners to resist incorporation into the Soviet sphere. The United States responded by organizing the remarkably successful “Berlin Airlift,” also known as “Operation Vittles,” during which time a nearly constant stream of American and British airplanes carried at least two million tons of food and other goods into West Berlin; the children of West Berlin endearingly referred to the planes as the “candy bombers” or “raisin bombers” because the pilots would drop sweets, particularly chocolate bars, as they landed. At one point late in the airlift a fully supplied plane was landing in West Berlin every sixty-two seconds, each one a beacon of hope to the hungry and cold citizens, much of their city still in ruins from the war. The Berlin blockade became a defining moment in the Cold War, for it not only confirmed but deepened the US commitment to remain in Berlin, which then became a signpost for its capacity and intention to stand up to Soviet expansion, as well as a matter of American prestige. During the blockade Berlin became a divided city, well before the wall was built, as each side set up separate administrative structures that remained intact even after the Soviet Union lifted the blockade in May 1949. The ordeal secured the bond between West Berliners and Americans, and amplified the fears of many in Western Europe that the Soviet Union was a threat to security...
