History

The Cold War Takes To The Sky: The Story Of The Berlin Airlift

When thinking of the Cold War, Europeans likely think of the Berlin Wall, or perhaps of nuclear silos capable of ushering in the end of the world. But these are all images from the latter years of the Cold War. The first event to herald its coming is often overlooked in memory, in spite of its titanic size and far-reaching consequences: the Berlin Airlift, one of the most incredible feats of logistics in human history, was also the first chapter in the nascent story of the Cold War.

The World After Hitler

As the devastating war neared its bloody conclusion, the Allies and the Soviet Union met in Yalta, to debate the future of the world after Hitler. There, they stipulated that Germany in general and Berlin separately would be split into four zones of control under Soviet, American, British, and French administration. Additionally, they agreed that all occupied and former Axis powers were to have free and fair elections to determine their own futures. Whether Churchill and Roosevelt were foolish enough to believe Stalin would honour this agreement, or whether they simply felt they could do nothing about it, remains unclear. It does seem Roosevelt actually trusted Stalin, as he later acknowledged being fooled by him. This didn’t last long: the brutality with which the Soviets treated Eastern Europe, such as the mass purges and massacres even in the territories of those who had never aligned with the Axis, awakened the Western Allies to the true nature of Soviet designs of power. Due to these atrocities, Britain passed the Polish Resettlement Act in 1947, to protect Polish troops who would undoubtedly have been in large part murdered or imprisoned by the Soviet backed authorities upon returning home.

Berlin Airlift
From left to right: Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin at the 1945 Yalta Conference

There is little doubt that the Soviets betrayed the Allies’ trust in their treatment of eastern Europe. This heightened tensions, and made it more difficult to reach any positive agreements as to the status of Germany – which even in defeat remained a strategically critical country. The Soviets, in particular,  diligently followed Lenin’s maxim that “whoever has Germany has Europe”. Ultimately, negotiations were hampered by the fact that both sides feared that a unified Germany could end up on the opposing side and therefore hand them a huge amount of power. This is particularly clear when compared to Austria: while occupied in the same four part system for some time, the country was reunified in 1955 without even a requirement to neutrality, although the Austrians embraced it on their own accord afterwards. In Germany, the higher stakes prevented such harmony: by 1947, it was clear to all involved that Germany would not be united. When preparing for the new year, the United States gave up any hope of influencing the Soviet occupation zone, and began to concentrate fully on helping the three western zones to create a functioning economy. Soon after, the Truman doctrine was announced, revealing American intentions to contain Communism everywhere. The opening moves of the Cold War were beginning.

Gloves Off: Berlin Blockaded

Further negotiations at the Moscow conference involved Soviet proposals for a united but neutral Germany, with the industrial Ruhr area under four-power control. However, in large part due to Moscow breaking trust over the rest of the post war restructuring of Europe, the Americans concluded that this was a scheme to get the western powers out and assert Soviet control over all of Germany. Considering the Soviets’ previous record of making apparently reasonable agreements, only to immediately break them in order to ensure their own wider hegemony, the Americans were most likely right to be suspicious. Following the Czechoslovak coup in February 1948, where Soviet backed forces had seized full control of the country and begun purging the opposition, the plans to create a West German state were greatly accelerated.

Berlin Airlift
U.S. Air Force Lt. Gail Halvorsen, known as The Candy Bomber, reads letters from grateful West Berlin children to whom he dropped candy bars on tiny parachutes during the Berlin Airlift. (U.S. Air Force photo)

The Soviets decided to throw the dice and initiated a partial blockade of Berlin on April 1st 1948. The Soviets aimed to gain a symbolic victory by forcing out the western powers and gaining control of the whole city. The Americans were not intimidated, and doubled down on their plans of economic reconstruction. On the 19th of June, they unveiled the new Deutschmark currency to replace the old Reichsmark. When the currency was allowed to circulate by the Berlin authorities on the 23rd of June, the Soviets cut the power supply to the western zones, marking the start of the open attempt to starve out the city. The Soviets then compounded the blockade by cutting communications links and blocking supplies of food and coal.

The western powers retaliated with an embargo on the Soviet zone, cutting off steel and coal from the Ruhr. The official justification was designed to parrot Soviet bureaucratic excuses for the blockade, and accused Moscow of stealing empty railway wagons. British foreign minister Bevin was reasonably confident that supplies would last long enough for a solution to be found: Berlin’s food stocks were expected to last around a month, and fuel even longer. He outright rejected surrendering the city to the Soviets to the extent that he was willing to have the United Kingdom follow the United States into war if bullets began to fly.

A Miracle In Logistics: The Berlin Airlift

Fortunately, war proved unnecessary, in large part due to what had been intended as a mental exercise in planning by RAF air commodore Rex Waite. On being told that supplying Berlin entirely by air was impossible, he decided to prove the opposite. On June 23rd his plan was rebuffed as not sufficiently detailed, but with more detail added the British and American authorities were inclined to take the idea seriously, at least as a temporary measure. This was largely because nobody else had presented a proposal other than shooting their way to Berlin, which had been vetoed by Washington as ludicrously dangerous as a strategy that relied entirely on the Soviets bluffing.

Very few saw the Berlin Airlift plan as likely to be successful, and with good reason: it required at least 4500 tons of goods to be transported per day, an unprecedented amount by air. And yet, it happened. The operation was a desperate rush to get enough planes carrying enough cargo into the air. Flying and maintenance crews worked tirelessly to ensure this came to be. The western powers had one significant advantage in carrying through such a punishing schedule, the extremely high motivation of the air crews who flocked to the opportunity to carry out such a humanitarian mission. As supplies started to come in, the effects of the Soviet blockade began to inflict negative consequences on the USSR too. The Western Allies embargo of steel and coal, if prolonged, would cripple the Baltic fishing fleet, as well as East German industry in general. As such the Soviets tried various means to frustrate the Berlin Airlift, from physical barriers to buzzing transport planes with fighters.

Berlin Airlift
Berliners look on as a C-554 cargo plane lands at Tempelhof. Photo by Henry Ries / USAF

Despite these obstructions, by September 1948 the target of 4500 tons per day was being hit and, astonishingly, surpassed. On the 18th of September nearly 8500 tons of coal were brought in, and in the end the Berlin airlift transported a phenomenal 2.3 million tons of goods. By January 1949, a full six months after Rex Waite’s original plan, the average of delivered goods rose to over 5500 tons per day. It was an unprecedented display of industrial might and political will, and it sent a very clear message. On the Soviet side, the reaction was one of muted stupor. Demands for a different settlement of postwar Germany were quietly dropped, and the focus shifted on trying to save face. Molotov took much of the blame, being replaced in punishment for his miscalculation. In the end, Stalin capitulated at the cost of face-saving negotiations. He consoled himself by ordering Soviet bureaucracy to keep being a nuisance to German rail traffic.

Berlin Airlift Successful: Round One To The West

The success of the Berlin Airlift allowed the Western Allies to continue their plans to create an independent state in West Germany, which came into being in May 1949, and holding onto the foothold of west Berlin at the same time. In the opinion of Bevin, failure would have been severe as he expected that abandoning Berlin would have made it impossible for the Western Allies to hold the rest of West Germany, leaving the Soviets the undisputed masters of Europe with a united communist Germany under their suzerainty.

Additionally, the crisis bound the West more tightly together, with Bevin requesting nuclear capable US bombers to be stationed in Britain, and launching a concerted P.R. counteroffensive against Soviet communism. It is also worth noting the attitude of Berliners themselves: despite their economic hardship, few defected to the Soviets. Conversely, Berliners living under Soviet administration did their best to flee, and the Soviets had to build walls and barriers to stem the tide of people leaving. The Berlin Airlift thus provided a great victory for the West – and set the demarcation lines of a frozen conflict that would make the world hold its breath for the next four decades.

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