Immediately after the Second World War diverging perceptions of how the post-war societies had to be adjusted to the new realities became a ground of growing tensions between former allies – Great Britain, United States and France, on the one hand and the Soviet Union – on the other. Notwithstanding the fact that Western democracies de-facto imposed their political will on the administration style of each of the Western-controlled zones, into which Germany had been divided, they gave a hostile reception to the Soviet Union’s desire to impose communism on what was to become Eastern Germany. The latter, in its turn, wanted to do that not only because it was a great political ambition, but a great strategic advantage. The western outpost of communism was to be now in the very center of Europe, potentially able to defend the “center” of the great communist empire. After Churchill’s Fulton speech which he gave in 1946 and in which a clear statement as well as a clear call upon the world to combat communism was worded and Kennan’s “long telegram” it became obvious that divergences between the former allies go too far.
The last stage of institutionalization of the two opposing blocks (the border of which went accurately through the whole territory of Germany) took place after two major steps, taken by the two sides. The first of them was the creation of The Marshall plan, which along with its official mission to support post-war European democracies economically had also a strong political ground as this was a good means to create a good basis for a block which potentially would oppose USSR and would be led by the US. Literally, this was a clever trap designed to make USSR the first hostile step (Gaddis). On the part of the Soviet Union, in its turn, another step was taken – The USSR established Cominform, an international organization which was designed not only to coordinate existing communist parties in Europe but also to try to expand communism as far westwards as possible.
Based on all the prerequisites highlighted above, it becomes obvious that Germany was quite a unique and strategically important place for a conflict to take place. Why was it strategically important? Well, for the first part, as I mentioned before, it was an attempt to create an outpost of communism in Europe so that to design a buffer between the “center” and the hostile Europe. The second reason is purely political – USSR wanted to show that its participation was no less vital and important in the post-war European politics than that of the Western countries. USSR wanted to be consulted with, it wanted to conduct a policy that could show the world that it could not make anything without consent by the global communist force which the USSR was. Such policy could really be a good clue to support communism both politically and ideologically. The third reason might have been the economic one: the more the Western-controlled zones thrived (and they did drastically being generously funded by the USA) the more USSR tried to make any contacts between its own zone of occupation and the western ones impossible. And literally such restrictions made sense: USA provided Western Germany gratis with core products; USA invested huge sums of money into rebuilding Western Germany’s economy. It must be said, by the way that as opposed to this all the USSR did to the Eastern Germany’s economy was just de-installation of factory equipments which was to be considered as reparations for the Soviet Union. Of course, this policy was literally marauding compared to how carefully the West tried to renew the economy in their zones. Another step which led to divergences between USSR and the West was unification of the three western-controlled zones. This unity was obviously designed to oppose UUSR. But the last straw in this race was the introduction of the currency reform in the Western zone. The reform consisted in replacing the old devaluated currency by a new one, which would boost Western Germany’s economy dramatically. Of course this was a pure threat to Eastern Germany’s economy controlled by the USSR as such a reform meant that the market would be filled with the Western goods and services with which Soviet planned economy had no chance to compete. So the last resort measure was to try to reduce contacts between the two economic systems as much as possible. The bottom line is: Kennan was right when he wrote in his telegram that Stalin would tighten his grip not only in response to Marshal plan, but also in response to every further action taken by the West (Gaddis).
In order to demonstrate his opposition to the economic reforms implemented by the Allies and to the probable creation of the Western Germany as a state in the near future USSR decided to break communications between Western Germany and Western Berlin. The first display of a blockade was shown on April 1 1948 when American personnel that traveled en route through the Soviet zone were halted for a document inspection and accreditation. General Gaily, the Chief of Staff of the American military administration manifested his protest against this measure as it contradicted in every possible manner the policy established by the agreements of 1945. However this did not lead to any positive result. Rather to the contrary, the restricting measures on the part of the Soviet began to become more tight and harsh. From that time on no freight train could leave Berlin via railroad. This puzzled the Americans as they did not know whether it was better to act resolutely or to try to avoid a military conflict. They tried to solve the problem on the higher political level – Secretary of State Marshall wrote repeatedly notes to the Soviet ambassador explaining that the Soviet policy undermined literally every agreement reached in 1945 (Judge and Langdon). But nothing worked.
On the 20th of June the currency reform came in force. This made the Soviet react very harshly and swiftly. The Soviet forces blocked all the river and railroad transport, preventing it from entering Berlin. The Soviet stopped energy supply to the Western part of Berlin (officially it was explained by some technical problems by the true reasons were well known to everybody). Even automobiles were prohibited to enter Western Berlin. This measure was designed to prevent cash flow to the Soviet zone via Western Berlin, which had a pernicious effect on the economy of the Soviet-controlled zone. On the 24th of June the blockade became absolute, all-inclusive which was the direct and glaring violation of all the existing agreements between the USSR and the West to that end at that moment. The only way for the West to continue supplies to the West Berlin was transportation by air.
And that turned out to be the way out. A so-called air bridge was created by the Western Allies, via which American and British transport aviation supplied their blocked zones of the city. The blockade was lasting a whole year and it is claimed that every two minutes (!) a plane was landing or taking off from Western Berlin, so intense the supply processes were.
The blockade lasted till the 11th of May 1949 – almost a year. During this period of time 278 228 flights were carried out, by which 2 326 406 tons of freight was delivered to Western Berlin. Incidents happened every now and then during transportations (Berlin Blockade and Airlift). 31 American aviators and 39 British ones died in different incidents, which, however, were the result more of the flight intensity (mentioned above) that of some hostilities on the part of the Soviet. Eventually the blockade was simply withdrawn unilaterally as the Soviet Union understood that it had reached literally nothing by this long-lasting measure.
So, what were the results of the blockade? Well, they can be analyzed from different points of view but I think that political repercussions for the Soviet Union are the ones worth mentioning in the first place. In fact, the blockade only boosted the integration processes between the three Western-governed zones, and it was the result exactly the contrary to the one the Soviet Union wanted to reach. Also, the withdrawal of the blockade became a very infamous political step for the USSR as by it the Soviet literally recognized that their year-long policy was good for nothing except impeding economic development of both Western and Eastern Germany. All the communications and transport corridors were opened again. At the same time food reserves were created as an attempt to prepare for possible recurrences.
In political terms the blockade meant very much. It was a very serious forerunner of the Cold War if not the beginning of it. It was an event that accelerated establishment of the two German states – a factor that would be the object for Cold War confrontation till the very end of this War. But the most important repercussion, according to Gaddis, was that the problem of USSR security became far more troubling for this country especially in the light of the developments which took place soon after the blockade, namely the creation of NATO (Gaddis). Hard times were ahead of the divided Europe.
List of works Cited
- Gaddis, John The Cold War: A New History. London: Penguin Books, 2006. Print. 09 Dec. 2014.
- Judge, Edward H. and John Langdon. The Cold War: A History Through Documents. New York, and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Print. 09 Dec. 2014.
- History. Com Staff. “Berlin Blockade”. History.com. 2009. Web. 09 Dec. 2014.
- „Berlin Blockade and Airlift“. Encyclopedia Britannica. 2014. Web. 09 Dec. 2014.
