History is Our Stories ~ Berlin Airlift ~ 60 years ago
At the end of WWII, Germany was partioned between the four members of the Allied nations. Additionally, Berlin was divided into four parts, even though it sat in the middle of the Soviet Union part. In 1948, the Soviets blocked access by ground and rail to Berlin. The Berlin Airlift commenced as a way to supply Berlin.
C-47's lined up to take off to take supplies to Berlin.
Berlin Airlift MonumentBerlin-Tempelhof
Engraved with names of the 39 British pilots and 31 American pilots
who lost their lives during the Berlin Airlift
and the inscription
"They lost their lives for the freedom of Berlin in service for the Berlin Airlift 1948/49"
The Berlin Airlift took place from June 24, 1948 - May 11, 1949.
This was considered the first act of the Cold War.
5 comments:
Thanks for this, Cynthia. My Dad participated in the airlift...not as a pilot, but as a support guy "behind the lines," so to speak. It was a BIG thing at the time, and absolutely NO ONE was sure it would even work.
But it did.
Thank you for sharing that Buck - without the support guys, the pilots wouldn't be able to fly! I continued to read about this and learned 101 men lost their lives to keep Berlin fed and free. Thank God it did work!
I'm going to link to this.
A great post. The sheer logistics of the airlift were unbelievable...
My mom was a little girl in Berlin during the Airlift. She is still very thankful for the Americans and used to thank them any chance she got while they were still stationed in Berlin. I told her about this post and she asked me to thank the Americans again in her name. So, "THANK YOU".
I am thankful too that it worked for obvious reasons such as: first of all, I was born, then had a chance to immigrate (legaly) to the US and became a citizen. So yeah, THANK YOU!!!
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