How did the Berlin Airlift affect East-West Relations (Essay Sample)

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How did the Berlin Airlift affect East-West Relations?
One of the major crises of the Great Cold War internationally was The Berlin Blockade and it happened from 1st April, 1948 to 12th May, 1949. The Soviet Union decided to block the roads, railway lines, and also the canal links that passed between West Germany and West Berlin and the Western was controlling these links and the two parts of Germany. The blockade was on 23rd June, 1948. The Soviet Union said they would drop the blockade when the westerners occupying West Berlin decided to withdraw from the city. In response to this, the allies of the western Germany decided to organize the Berlin Airlift so that supplies could be carried to the inhabitants of West Berlin but this decision was so difficult to perform since the population of West Berlin was immense.
The measures that were taken since the blockade and airlift brought consequences to many superior countries and also to the people living in West Berlin, East Berlin, and West Germany. It also brought hatred in the inhabitants of Berlin towards the western countries and also towards the Russians. This paper discusses in details the facts behind the Berlin Airlift and how this decision operated. It also discusses the details of the consequences and impacts of the Berlin Airlift to the relationship between the countries involved and the Berliners themselves.
After announcing the new currency of West Berlin, the Deutsche Mark, which was not acceptable by the Soviet Union, the guards of Soviet Union stopped every activities being carried out by the passenger trains and the traffic to Berlin. The three countries; Britain, France and the United States of America, united to form one zone in West Berlin and they came up with one currency for West Germany. The Soviet Union did not want Germany to be rebuilt and so they also delayed freight shipments for the Western countries and also Germany (Miller 31).The Soviets ordered that any water transport that was to happen would require one to ask permission from them. They also stopped military supplies for the United States army in Berlin and they introduced their new currency, Ostmark. The Soviet Union had one aim in the blockade, which was to forcefully make the West to get out of the city. They knew this would work by reducing the life in the city to starving. Berlin had enough fuel and food that covered the people for only six weeks maximum (Miller 31).
The western powers knew that if they retreated from West Berlin due to the starvation point they were going to be reduced to, then the Russians would attack West German. So the western powers held on and never retreated. The countries that were in charge of West Germany included France, the United States of America, and Britain. The general in charge, General Lucius Clay, who was an American commander, knew that if Berlin fell, the next victim would be West Germany, and then Europe will be threatened (Air Bridge to Berlin, Chap. 11).General Lucius Clay knew that the Russians also did not dare risk to start a third world war and the Russians only wanted to take over the whole of Berlin. The only way the other western countries could access Berlin, was by air. The Soviets could not block an aircraft carrying only cargo since there was no proof to stop a passenger plane which had no threat. The only way to stop the plane was by shooting it down, and this would break the agreements the Soviet Union made. The western countries found this as an advantage over the Soviet Union, so they decided to try the airlift (Air Bridge to Berlin, Chap. 11).
The Americans joined forces with the British, Royal Air Force, who had already started supplying their British citizens with the airlift idea. They calculated the total the amount of supplies they needed in order to fit all the inhabitants of Berlin. They came up with 5000 tons a day, but they knew they had to increase the amount once more planes were brought from France, United Kingdom, and the United States of America (Miller 30). The supplies were being flown into Berlin by using three air corridors that were permitted to America, France and Britain. The western allies knew that the Soviet Union will not dare to try shooting down the planes since there would be a rise in a new war. They therefore managed to supply two million tons in ten months after the start of the airlift. The city of Berlin that was blocked was therefore given supplies and they were saved from starvation (Laird 343- 364).
The Soviets were becoming scared that the westerners would succeed because they were able to supply foods to the whole citizens of West Berlin only by air. They therefore decided to give free food to people who crossed over to East Berlin but their offers were rejected. This divided the West Berliners with the East Berliners since the ones from the East Berlin were restricted access to West Berlin(Turner 29). This hatred was made to grow worse by the German Communists and the Soviets occupying the East Berlin, who threw insults to the West Berliners and harassed them over the radio. The life of East and West Berlin was affected greatly since the real Berliners were not the ones in charge and they were being controlled by other countries.
The airlift took 15 months and came to an end on May 1949.The Berlin airlift was a great success for the Western allies unlike the expectation by Stalin who did not want Germany to be rebuilt after the First World War. The western zones of Berlin which were under three different countries; France, Britain, and the United States of America, also united and it became West Germany and the eastern Berlin became East Germany. People began flocking in West Berlin and West Germany and therefore the West offered more job opportunities than East Germany. This affected East Germany who started experiencing political and also economic turmoil (Murphy et al 74). East Germany therefore started building a big wall to separate West Germany from East Germany and also to prevent people from moving to the West. The East Berliners were scared of their government because they were highly monitored by their government. The effect of the wall brought up a wall that lasted twenty eight years and it also affected the cultural practices and also the way the West and East Germans communicated (Smith 69- 70).
The western countries that united their zones in West Berlin so they could offer supplies to the citizens of West Berlin, brought humiliation to the Soviets who thought they would retreat. The world therefore saw it as an opportunity to build allies and grow strong together. This reduced the risk of another war between countries. The three states, France, Britain, and the United States of America brought unity and democracy in West Berlin and this was a good option for the West Berliners and it also prompted the East Berliners to move to the West side of Berlin (Smith 99- 101). The building of the Great Berlin Wall that separated the East Berlin from West Berlin only showed how the East Berliners despised the Soviets and the German Communists. The East Berliners moved to the West and even risked dying only to get to the other side of the wall.
The effect of the airlift which led to the creation of the great wall of Berlin brought about cultural differences and also political differences. These differences separated the East Germans from West Germans and it is even continual where they are divided into two distinctive groups. Nowadays people assume that the Germans from the East are more social, they are respected more at work, they avoid competing, they are spontaneous than the West Germans, and ...