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Berlin Blockade and Airlifts

Berlin Blockade and Airlifts

At the end of World War II, the Allies divided Germany into zones of occupation. The place we want to focus on is Berlin. Berlin is the capital of Germany and at that point of time, was divided into 4 zones of occupation. One for the US, one for Britain, one for France and one for USSR. After the war, Germany's economy and government had been obliverated and there was a question of whether the Allies should rebuild Germany or continue occupying it. USA and Britain wanted to help rebuild Germany and establish Germany as a trading partner.

France lost quite significantly in the war and was indecisive about helping to rebuild or make Germany's defeat absolute. USSR, on the other hand wanted to use Germany as a buffer for further attacks. This is understandable as USSR lost alot of people in the war.
As wartime relationships started breaking down, the world begun to split into two, the Communit bloc and Capitalist bloc. Because of this, France, USA and Britain merged their zones of occupation together to form West Germany while USSR formed East Germany. As time went by, West Germany flourished while East Germany detoriated. Stalin saw this as the West's way of building up power to attack him. When West Germany introduced the Deutschmark, Stalin decided that that was enough and closed off all roads and rail ways into West Berlin. By doing so, Stalin hoped that he could force the Allies out of Berlin and put communist control over Berlin. At that point, the allies had only two choices, withdraw from West Berlin and make Stalin think that he could invade West Germany OR airlif supplies in. After much delibration, the allies decided to airlift supplies. The airlift was extremely successful despite the fact that there was a contsant danger of being shotdown. After one year of airlifts, USSR gave up and lifted the blockade.
The Berlin blockade part of the Cold War was the USSR's fault. After all, all the allies wanted was to help rebuild Germany so that she could get back up and be a potential trading partner instead of a enemy. If Stalin was not so suspicious of the West, this crisis could have been averted.