![]() Factories, equipment, technicians, managers and skilled personnel were removed to the Soviet Union. The SED leaders then called for the "establishment of an anti-fascist, democratic regime, a parliamentary democratic republic" while the Soviet Military Administration suppressed all other political activities. In the eastern zone, the Soviet authorities forcibly unified the Communist Party of Germany and Social Democratic Party (SPD) in the Socialist Unity Party ("SED"), claiming at the time that it would not have a Marxist–Leninist or Soviet orientation. ![]() The only three permissible air corridors to Berlin Soviet zone and the Allies' rights of access to Berlin The United States, United Kingdom, and France controlled western portions of the city, while Soviet troops controlled the eastern sector. As the seat of the Allied Control Council, Berlin was also divided into four occupation zones, despite the city's location, which was fully located 100 miles (160 km) inside Soviet-controlled eastern Germany. These zones were located roughly around the then-current locations of the allied armies. German territory east of the Oder-Neisse line (light beige) was ceded to Poland, while a portion of the easternmost section of Germany East Prussia, Königsberg, was annexed by the USSR, as the Kaliningrad Oblast.įrom 17 July to 2 August 1945, the victorious Allies reached the Potsdam Agreement on the fate of postwar Europe, calling for the division of defeated Germany, west of the Oder-Neisse line, into four temporary occupation zones each one controlled by one of the four occupying Allied powers: the United States, the United Kingdom, France and the Soviet Union (thus re-affirming principles laid out earlier by the Yalta Conference). The red area of Germany (above) is Soviet controlled East Germany. It played a major role in aligning West Berlin with the United States and Britain as the major protecting powers, and in drawing West Germany into the NATO orbit several years later in 1955. The Berlin Blockade served to highlight the competing ideological and economic visions for postwar Europe. A total of 101 fatalities were recorded as a result of the operation, including 40 Britons and 31 Americans, mostly due to non-flying accidents. Seventeen American and eight British aircraft crashed during the operation. At the height of the Airlift, one plane reached West Berlin every thirty seconds. British transports, including Handley Page Haltons and Short Sunderlands, flew as well. Īmerican C-47 and C-54 transport airplanes, together, flew over 92,000,000 miles (148,000,000 km) in the process, almost the distance from Earth to the Sun. ![]() : 338 The French also supported but only to provide for their military garrison. In addition Canadian, Australian, New Zealand and South African air crews assisted the RAF during the blockade. ![]() The US Air Force had delivered 1,783,573 tons (76.4% of total) and the RAF 541,937 tons (23.3% of total), totalling 2,334,374 tons, nearly two-thirds of which was coal, on 278,228 flights to Berlin. The Berlin Airlift officially ended on 30 September 1949 after fifteen months. On, the USSR lifted the blockade of West Berlin, due to economic issues in East Berlin, although for a time the Americans and British continued to supply the city by air as they were worried that the Soviets would resume the blockade and were only trying to disrupt western supply lines. Having initially concluded there was no way the airlift could work, the Soviets found its continued success an increasing embarrassment. Among these, was the work of the later concurrent Operation Little Vittles in which candy-dropping aircraft dubbed " raisin bombers" generated much goodwill among German children. By the spring of 1949, that number was often met twofold, with the peak daily delivery totalling 12,941 tons. ![]() American and British air forces flew over Berlin more than 250,000 times, dropping necessities such as fuel and food, with the original plan being to lift 3,475 tons of supplies daily. The Western Allies organised the Berlin Airlift ( German: Berliner Luftbrücke, lit.'"Berlin Air Bridge"') from 26 June 1948 to 30 September 1949 to carry supplies to the people of West Berlin, a difficult feat given the size of the city and the population. The Soviets offered to drop the blockade if the Western Allies withdrew the newly introduced Deutsche Mark from West Berlin. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control. The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – ) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. ![]()
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