Berlin Airlift

Examples of Berlin Airlift in the following topics:

• The Cold War Begins

  • In response, the Western Allies organized the Berlin airlift to carry supplies to the people of West Berlin, a difficult feat given the city's population.
  • The Soviets did not disrupt the airlift for fear this might lead to open conflict.
  • By the spring of 1949, the airlift was clearly succeeding, and by April it was delivering more cargo than had previously been transported into the city by rail.
  • On 12 May 1949, the USSR lifted the blockade of West Berlin.
  • Berliners watch an aircraft take part in the Berlin Airlift, which was a successful attempt to circumvent the Soviet blockade of non-Soviet Berlin.

• Conclusion: Truman and the Beginning of the Cold War

  • On June 25, the Allies initiated the Berlin Airlift, a campaign that delivered food and other supplies, such as coal, using military aircraft on a massive scale.
  • The airlift worked; ground access was again granted on May 11, 1949.
  • Nevertheless, the airlift continued for several months after that.
  • The Berlin Airlift was one of Truman's great foreign policy successes; it significantly aided his election campaign in 1948.
  • C-47s unloading at Tempelhof Airport in Berlin during the Berlin Blockade.

• The Truman Presidency

  • Truman oversaw the Berlin Airlift of 1948, which was one of his greatest foreign policy successes, and the creation of NATO in 1949.

• Peacetime Politics

  • Truman oversaw the Berlin Airlift of 1948 and the creation of North Atlantic Treat Organization (NATO) in 1949.

• Crisis in Berlin

  • The Berlin Crisis, which concerned the occupational status of the German capital city, Berlin, resulted in the erection of the Berlin Wall.
  • The U.S.S.R. provoked the Berlin Crisis with an ultimatum demanding the withdrawal of Western armed forces from West Berlin, culminating with the city's de facto partition with the East German erection of the Berlin Wall.
  • Accordingly, Berlin became the main route by which East Germans left for the West.
  • This presented a delicate problem for the Soviet Union because the four-power status of Berlin specified free travel between zones and specifically forbade the presence of German troops in Berlin.
  • Describe the background and escalation of the 1961 crisis in Berlin, and the erection of the Berlin Wall that followed.

• The Collapse of Nazi Germany

  • The joined efforts culminated in the final defeat of Germany at the Battle of Berlin.
  • The Battle of Berlin, designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, was the final major offensive of the European theater.
  • When the offensive resumed on April 16, two Soviet fronts (army groups) attacked Berlin from the east and south, while a third overran German forces positioned north of Berlin.
  • A devastated street in the center of Berlin, just off the Unter den Linden, July 3, 1945.
  • The Battle of Berlin, designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, was the final major offensive of the European theater.

• "The Hour of Maximum Danger"

  • Kennedy conveyed to Khrushchev his stance on the most sensitive issue before them: a proposed treaty between the USSR and East Berlin.
  • Kennedy made it clear that any treaty which interfered with U.S access rights in West Berlin would be regarded as an act of war.
  • Shortly after Kennedy returned home from the Vienna Summit, the USSR announced its intention to sign a treaty with East Berlin, abrogating any third-party occupation rights in either sector of the city.
  • In the weeks immediately after the Vienna summit and the USSR treaty with East Berlin, more than 20,000 people fled from East Berlin to the western sector in reaction to statements from the USSR.
  • The following month, the Soviet Union and East Berlin began blocking any further passage of East Berliners into West Berlin and erected barbed wire fences across the city, which were quickly upgraded to the Berlin Wall.

• The End of the War

  • By April 30, 1945, deep in his underground bunker, with the Battle of Berlin raging above him, the German dictator Adolf Hitler realized that all was lost.
  • Meanwhile, the Battle of Berlin was ending and German forces in Berlin surrendered unconditionally to the Soviet army.
  • On the same day the officers commanding the two armies of Army Group Vistula north of Berlin, General Kurt von Tippelskirch, commander of the German 21st Army and General Hasso von Manteuffel, commander of Third Panzer Army, surrendered to the western Allies.
  • After the Battle of Berlin, Soviet soldiers hoist the Soviet flag on the balcony of the Hotel Adlon in Berlin.

• Neutral Rights and Submarines

  • Berlin explained that submarines were so vulnerable that they dared not surface near merchant ships that might be carrying guns and so small that they could not rescue crews.
  • Berlin acquiesced, ordering its submarines to avoid passenger ships.
  • The civilian government in Berlin objected, but the Kaiser sided with the military.

• The Allied Drive Toward Berlin

  • Summarize Eisenhower's drive toward Berlin, including the crossing of the Rhine, the encirclement and reduction of the Ruhr, and the sweep to the Elbe-Mulde line and the Alps.