The Berlin blockade and airlift
On 24 June 1948 Soviet authorities closed the rail, road and canal routes between the western occupation zones of Germany and the western sectors of Berlin, following the introduction of a new currency in the western zones and its extension to West Berlin. The city, in the middle of the Soviet zone, had about two million people in its western sectors and no overland supply. The western response was to fly everything in — food, coal, medicine, machinery — through the three air corridors agreed in 1945, at a tempo that grew until aircraft were landing at intervals of a few minutes around the clock. The blockade was lifted on 12 May 1949 and flights continued for some months afterwards to build stocks. Its importance is what did not happen: neither side used force to test the other's position, and the corridors were not closed, so a confrontation that could have started a war was fought instead as a logistics problem.
Historical — it happened, and the record is settled.
Subjects
- Tempelhof Airport · infrastructure · Germany
- Berlin · city · Germany
- Containment · concept · not located
Evidence
Partly verified — Core facts are sourced; some optional detail is deliberately absent.
The Berlin Airlift, 1948–1949
Named as the source class for the conduct of the airlift — the three agreed air corridors, the fixed-interval approach discipline and the airfields used. V55 verification basis: NOT consulted. No tonnage, sortie count or casualty figure from the airlift is quoted anywhere in this pack, precisely because none could be checked.
United States Air Force historical offices · 1949 · Partly verified
United States Air Force historical accounts of Operation Vittles and the Berlin airlift, 1948–1949
Recorded on Tempelhof Airport
- Truman asks Congress to support Greece and Turkey
- Marshall proposes European economic recovery
- The Berlin blockade and airlift
- The Berlin sector border is sealed
- American and Soviet tanks face each other on Friedrichstrasse
- The first Berlin Marathon, in the Grunewald
- Berlin moves its marathon into the city
- The Berlin Wall opens
- The Berlin Marathon runs through the Brandenburg Gate
Related
Related because they share a subject in the Atlas — never because the text looks similar.
- The Berlin Marathon runs through the Brandenburg Gate · 1990-09-30
- The Berlin Wall opens · 1989-11-09
- Berlin moves its marathon into the city · 1981-09-27
- The first Berlin Marathon, in the Grunewald · 1974
- American and Soviet tanks face each other on Friedrichstrasse · 1961-10-27 – 1961-10-28
- The Berlin sector border is sealed · 1961-08-13
- Marshall proposes European economic recovery · 1947-06-05
- Truman asks Congress to support Greece and Turkey · 1947-03-12