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The 'Berlin Blockade' (June 24 1948 to May 11 1949) was one of the first major crises of the new Cold War. It began when the Soviets blocked railroad and street access by the three Western powers (the Americans, British, and French) to the Western-occupied sectors of Berlin, and abated after the Western powers bypassed the blockade by establishing airlifts of foods and other provisions. It was a direct response of the Soviet Union to the secret monetary reform in the three German Occupation zones controlled by the Western powers which was enacted on June 21 1948.

Contents

Postwar division of Germany

Dispute over Berlin

Berlin airlift

British operation

Afterword

See also

Notes

References

External links

Postwar division of Germany

When World War II ended in Europe on May 8 1945, Soviet and Western (U.S., British, and French) troops were located in particular places, essentially, along a line in the center of Europe. From July 17 to August 2 1945, the victorious Allied Powers reached the Potsdam Agreement on the fate of postwar Europe, calling for the division of a defeated Germany into four occupation zones (thus reaffirming principles laid out earlier by the Yalta Conference), and the similar division of Berlin into four zones. Because of the city's location, the French, American, and British sectors of Berlin were surrounded by the Soviet occupation zone. The three Western-held sectors of Berlin quickly became a focal point of tensions corresponding to the breakdown of the U.S.-Soviet wartime alliance.

Dispute over Berlin

The Berlin blockade had its roots in 1945 and 1946, when the breakdown of the Four Power Allied Control Council rendered the reunification of postwar Germany impossible.
The Soviets sought to create a unified but demilitarized Germany under their tutelage, or as Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov told United States Secretary of State James F. Byrnes in 1946, a united Germany that could be neutralized after Russia received industrial reparations from Germany. This strategy was a response to a 150-year history of repeated Western assaults on Russia, including World War I and Napoleon's 1812 invasion. Joseph Stalin considered it essential to destroy Germany's capacity for another war, which conflicted with the U.S. desire to rebuild Germany as the economic center of a stable Europe. (Stalin assumed that Japan and Germany could menace the Soviet Union once again following their postwar reconstruction.)
The United States, however, stressed that postwar reconstruction in Western Europe depended on German economic and industrial recovery. The U.S. stance was that if it could not reunify Germany with Soviet cooperation, the West could develop the western, industrial portions of postwar Germany controlled by France, Britain, and the United States and integrate the areas into a new European sphere.
Led by the United States, the three major Western former Allied Powers reached an agreement on this approach during a series of meetings in London from February to June 1948. The three major Western former Allied Powers held those meetings without incorporating the Soviet Union. As outlined in an announcement on March 7 1948, the London Conference declared support for fusing the three Western zones of Germany into an independent, federal form of government, and bringing the fusion of the three Western zones into the U.S.-led economic reconstruction efforts. The Marshall Plan created a crisis in Soviet foreign policy, which was predicated on a weakened Germany and ensuring reparations payments.
In the meantime the three Western powers had been secretly working on a monetary reform for their three German occupation zones. This reform excluded the fourth German occupation zone controlled by the Soviet Union. On June 21, 1948, the three Western powers secretly introduced the D-Mark which replaced the Reichsmark in their occupation zones.
In addition, the dispute over Germany escalated after U.S. President Harry S. Truman refused to give the Soviet Union reparations from West Germany's industrial plants; Stalin responded by splitting off the Soviet sector of Germany.

Berlin airlift

On June 24 1948, the Soviet Union blocked access to the three Western-held sectors of Berlin, which was deep within the Soviet zone of Germany, by cutting off all rail and road routes going through Soviet-controlled territory in Germany. The Western powers had never negotiated a pact with the Soviets guaranteeing these rights. Amid the fallout of the London Conference, the Soviets rejected arguments that occupation rights in Berlin and the use of the routes during the previous three years had given the West legal claim to unimpeded use of the highways and railroads.
The commander of the U.S. occupation zone in Germany, General Lucius D. Clay, proposed sending a large armored column driving peacefully, as a moral right, down the Autobahn from West Germany to West Berlin, but with instructions to fire if it were stopped or attacked. President Truman, however, following the consensus in Congress, stated, "It is too risky to engage in this due to the consequence of war." Clay was told to take advice from General Curtis LeMay, commander of United States Air Forces in Europe, to see if an airlift was possible. General Albert Wedemeyer, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff, was in Europe on an inspection tour when the crisis occurred. He had been commander of the U.S. China Theater in 1944–45 and had an intimate knowledge of the World War II Allied airlift from India over The Hump of the Himalayas. He was in favour of the airlift option.^[1]
On June 24 1948, LeMay appointed Brigadier General Joseph Smith, commander of the Wiesbaden Military Post, as the Task Force Commander of the airlift. At that time the airlift was expected to last three weeks. General Smith named the airlift "Operation Vittles" because "we're hauling grub." Thirty-two C-47 cargo planes took off on June 26 1948, hauling 80 tons of cargo including milk, flour, and medicine. In order to accommodate the large number of flights, required maintenance schedules, and cargo loading times, General Smith developed a complex schedule and pattern for arranging flights. Three air corridors were created, and aircraft were scheduled to takeoff every three minutes, flying 500 feet higher than the previous flight. This pattern began at 5,000 feet and was repeated five times. ^[2]After it became clear that the airlift was expected to continue for significantly longer than the original three weeks, Lt. General William H. Tunner of the Military Air Transport Service (MATS) took over the operation on July 27 1948. General Tunner had significant experience in commanding and organizing the airlift over The Hump.^[3] Among other measures, he instituted 3 rules; Instrument flight rules would be in effect at all times, regardless of actual visibility; each sortie would have only one chance to land in Berlin, returning to its base if it missed its chance; aircrew could not leave their aircraft for any reason while in Berlin. He improved living conditions for the aircrews and ground crews. He recruited former Luftwaffe aircraft mechanics to help with maintenance and had a school established at Malmstrom Air Force Base to train pilots in procedures specific to the airlift. All C-47s were replaced with the more capable C-54s.^[4]
When the American forces consulted the British Royal Air Force about a possible joint airlift, they learned that the RAF was already running an airlift in support of their own troops. Further, the British informed the Americans that during the Small Berlin Blockade, earlier that year, British Air Commodore Rex Waite had calculated the resources required to support the entire city. His calculations indicated it would be possible. Given the feasibility assessment, the British and Americans agreed to start a joint operation without delay.



On June 25 1948, Clay gave the order to launch a massive airlift using both civil and military aircraft (ultimately lasting 321 days) that flew supplies into the Western-held sectors of Berlin over the blockade during 1948–49. The first plane flew on the following day, and the first British aeroplane flew on June 28. This aerial supplying of West Berlin became known as the Berlin Airlift. Military confrontation loomed while Truman embarked on a highly visible move which would publicly humiliate the Soviets.
The U.S. action was given the name "Operation Vittles," and the British one was called "Plain Fare."
Alongside the British and U.S. troops were pilots from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa running the airlift. The French Air Force, meanwhile, was involved in the First Indochina War, so it could only bring up some old Junkers Ju 52s to support its own troops. However, France agreed to build a new and larger airport in its sector, on the shores of Lake Tegel. French military engineers were able to complete the construction in less than 90 days. The airfield evolved after the crisis into the Berlin-Tegel International Airport.
Hundreds of aircraft, nicknamed ''Rosinenbomber'' ("raisin bombers") by the local population, were used to fly in a wide variety of cargo, ranging from large containers to small packets of candy with tiny individual parachutes intended for the children of Berlin (an idea of a pilot named Gail Halvorsen that soon gained popular support in the U.S.). Sick children were evacuated on return flights. Ultimately 278,228 flights were made, and 2,326,406 tons of food and supplies, including more than 1.5 million tons of coal, were delivered to Berlin.[1]
On April 4 1949, the Western powers signed the North Atlantic Treaty founding NATO, declaring that an attack on any one would be considered an attack against them all.
At the height of the operation, on April 16 1949, an allied aircraft landed in Berlin every minute, with 1,398 flights in 24 hours carrying 12,940 tons (13,160 t) of goods, coal and machinery, beating the record of 8,246 (8,385 t) set only days earlier.
The USSR lifted its blockade at midnight, on May 11 1949. However, the airlift did not end until September 30 1949, because the Western states wanted to build up sufficient amounts of supplies in West Berlin in case the Soviets blockaded it again.
The three major Berlin airfields involved were Tempelhof, in the American Sector, Gatow in the British and Tegel in the French. Operational control of the three allied airlift corridors was given to BARTCC (Berlin Air Route Traffic Control Center) air traffic control located at Tempelhof. Diplomatic approval authority was granted to a secretive four-power organization also located in the American sector. It was called the Berlin Air Safety Center (BASC).

British operation

Initially the British had about 150 C-47 Dakotas and 40 Avro Yorks. By July 18, the RAF was flying 5,538 tons of supplies per day into Berlin. On July 5, the Dakotas and Yorks were joined by 10 Short Sunderlands and later by Short Hythe flying boats, flying from Finkenwerder on the Elbe near Hamburg to the Havel river. The flying boats' speciality was transporting bulk salt, which would have been corrosive to the other planes. In November, Handley Page Hastings were added to the fleet and some crews, and aircraft were removed to train others. By mid-December, the RAF had landed 100,000 tons of supplies. In April 1949, civilian companies involved in the airlift were formed into a Civil Airlift Division (of British European Airways) to operate under RAF control.

Afterword

Tegel was developed into west Berlin's principal airport, and by 2007 had been joined by a redeveloped Berlin-Schoenefeld in Brandenburg. As a result of these two airports Tempelhof is being closed, whilst Gatow is now used by a civilian flying club. During the 1970s and 1980s Schoenefeld had had its own crossing points through the Berlin Wall for western citizens.

See also

★ History of Germany

★ West Berlin

★ RAF Gatow

★ East Berlin

★ Gail Halvorsen (also known as "Uncle Wiggle Wings the Candy Bomber")

★ ''The Big Lift'', a 1950 film about the airlift from an American point of view.

★ Bob Clarke (Historian)

Notes

1.
★ D.M. Giangreco, D.M and Griffin, Robert E.; (1988) ''The Airlift Begins'' on Truman Library website, a Chapter section from: ''Airbridge to Berlin --- The Berlin Crisis of 1948, its Origins and Aftermath.''
2.
★ Launius, Roger D. and Coy F. Cross II ''MAC and the Legacy of the Berlin Airlift.'' Scott Air Force Base IL: Office of History, Military Airlift Command, 1989.
3. D.M. Giangreco, D.M and Griffin, Robert E.; (1988) ''The Airlift Begins'' on Truman Library website, a Chapter section from: ''Airbridge to Berlin --- The Berlin Crisis of 1948, its Origins and Aftermath.''
4. http://www.indianamilitary.org/ATTERBURYAAF/History/BerlinAirlift.html

References

★ Robert E. Griffin and D. M. Giangreco, ''Airbridge to Berlin : The Berlin Crisis of 1948, Its Origins and Aftermath'', Presidio Press, 1988. ISBN 0-89141-329-4

★ Launius, Roger D. and Coy F. Cross II ''MAC and the Legacy of the Berlin Airlift''. Scott Air Force Base IL: Office of History, Military Airlift Command, 1989.

External links

★ The Berlin Airlift - A PBS site on the context and history of the Berlin Airlift.

★ Operation Plainfare

★ Luftbruecke: Allied Culture in the Heart of Berlin

★ Agreement to divide Berlin

★ Memorandum for the President: The Situation in Germany, July 23, 1948

★ Berlin Airlift: Logistics, Humanitarian Aid, and Strategic Success

★ Royal Engineers Museum Royal Engineers and the Cold War (Berlin Airlift)