Berlin Airlift 70th Anniversary Program

Just as historic insight: for most Berliners the airlift was needed to survive (especially in winter) but for my grandparents it meant bankruptcy because the surplus of free food in later stage destroyed the regular local food market. Farmers had no longer a chance to sell their self-grown products. True story.

Thanks for this info! We will be in Berlin June 12th and 13th, and according to Google translate, no drops in Berlin during that time, right?

@Maryam -- You are correct. As the schedule stands now, the planes do not arrive in Berlin until June 15.

@MarkK -- Sorry to hear of your grandparents' misfortune. On the "survive" comment, I've talked to half a dozen people who were kids during the Airlift and caught chocolates from the air drops. One of them indeed looked me deeply in the eyes and with all gravity said, "For us, it was survival."

It's of note that virtually all of Truman's advisors advised against the Airlift and felt that maintaining a free West Berlin was not worth the effort. The sole voice pushing for the Airlift was Lucius Clay, the US military governor of West Berlin at the time who felt if West Berlin was allowed to fall to communism, then the rest of Germany and ultimately the rest of Europe would fall. Truman was convinced by Clay. Source: The Candy Bombers: The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour

@Dave:

I've talked to half a dozen people who were kids during the Airlift
and caught chocolates from the air drops. One of them indeed looked me
deeply in the eyes and with all gravity said, "For us, it was
survival."

I fully believe that and share the gratitude for that support. So, thanks also from my side to everybody who helped a lot of people to survive in Berlin's western part. My mom was born in 1942 and one of the candy catching girls. She still remembers and has the sound of the planes in her ears - and if you talk to this and the older generation the "Blockade" was a much harder challenge than the war. The farm and also a gardening was close to Lichtenrader Dorfteich, so just straight down the T-Damm.

I just wanted to show that all (hi-)stories have two sides - also the positive ones.

Good old Harry upon learning of the blockade by land said, "We're staying put...period." Stalin was basing his strategy of squeezing out the West on what he saw as historical examples...Warsaw and Stalingrad. He miscalculated and underestimated American strategic air power.

@Fred: I see that point differently.

If Stalin would really had wanted Berlin he would had it. Compared to the USSR forces in 1948 the combined conventional weaponed forces of US, UK and France were really weak - so weak that the USSR troop forces were reduced by around 60% until end of 1947 to around 350k soldiers. Also the planes would had been an easy target before landing. But if you have people on the oher side who demonstrated to really make use of an unhuman weapon which kills a few hundred thousand civilists ... "military insanity" was the joker of the USA against Stalin at that time.

Two sides of a medal: from a non US-perspective the USA are a real violent, opportunistic and unpredictable factor, especially in radical use of military forces also against civilists. Neither Berlin airlift nor Marshall plan were following an altruistic humanitarian approach - it was just following the political interests of influence spheres (Truman doktrin and containment policy).

And again: I appreciate each single humanitarian act from humans of every background in these times.

I go by what George Kennan wrote to Truman on his views of the Soviets and Stalin, this is Kennan's "Long Telegram" in 1945, in which he stated that the Russians don't want war with the West, ie the US. Kennan says, they tried that once, ie the war option , in Finland and "got their fingers burned."

Stalin was conservative in using force, risk-adverse. In 1948, the time of the Berlin blockade, his main ideological problem was with Tito and Yugoslavia...Tito defied him and got away with it.

Keep in mind too it was Stalin who convinced Lenin to use the military option against Poland in 1920 thinking that the Polish proletariat would rise up to join the Soviet liberators...fat chance. 1920 shows nationalism was a stronger force than economics.

Bottom line in 1920, the Soviets lost militarily. Why? Several reasons.

Historians don't know exactly how many Russians perished in Finland trying to crack the Mannerheim Line in that Winter War before Hitler unleashed his offensive on the Anglo-French and the Low Countries, not to mention the Danes and Norway.

I go by the assessment of Stalin given by Kissinger in his "Diplomacy" (1994), plus that of Kennan too. General L Clay wanted to shoot his way into Berlin. How does he explain it in his memoirs?