70 years later, the Berlin Airlift can still inspire us
An incredibly coordinated air operation of almost 300,000 flights brought in food, milk, fuel and other supplies West Berlin needed to survive.
It was 70 years ago this summer when West Berlin faced starvation from a blockade by the Soviet Union. America’s heroic response to that crisis gives us hope to feed the hungry in conflict zones across the globe today.
Imagine if the roads, rails and waterways into your hometown were suddenly cut off by enemy troops. No supplies could move in under such a blockade. Soon there would be no food, gas, medicine, or anything else you need for daily life. You would have an emergency within days.
This is the situation West Berlin, Germany, faced during the summer of 1948. As the part of Berlin under American control after World War II, it was also deep in the Soviet Union’s occupied area of East Germany. So it was relatively easy for the Soviets to cut off access to West Berlin in an effort to take charge during the Cold War power struggle.
The 2 million people in West Berlin might starve to death if America could not bring in regular supplies. U.S. Army Gen. Lucius Clay wrote, “it was one of the most ruthless efforts in modern times to use mass starvation for political coercion.”
War might erupt over any confrontation with the Soviet blockade. West Berlin was at risk of falling to the Soviets.
The U.S. Air Force came to the rescue. The massive Berlin Airlift began in the summer of 1948 using planes to bypass the blockade and deliver life-saving aid to West Berliners.
An incredibly coordinated air operation of almost 300,000 flights brought in food, milk, fuel and other supplies West Berlin needed to survive. This required a massive scale up of air power.
As explained by Gen. Clay, “Operation Vittles, as the pilots designated the airlift, grew steadily from the few outmoded planes we had in Germany to the fleet of giant flying transports which on the record day delivered almost 13,000 tons to our three airports.”
The airlift lasted for a year. This was a humanitarian marathon for which the United States and its allies had the endurance. Eventually the Soviet Union ended the blockade. West Berlin was saved.
This was a crucial episode in the Cold War. The German people remembered who fed them in their time of need. It was America, the nation of hope and humanitarianism. One of the most striking images of the Berlin Airlift is U.S. pilot Gail Halvorsen dropping candy from his plane for the German children. The “candy bomber,” as he became known, symbolized the generous spirit of America.
When another Berlin hunger crisis occurred in 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower also responded with food aid. America won the Cold War because we fed the hungry in Germany and around the globe. The Berlin Airlift is the most dramatic of examples.
We must remember these principles today as food aid budgets are being undermined by the Trump Administration. The Food for Peace and McGovern-Dole food-aid programs have each been threatened with elimination by Trump in budget proposals.
The United Nations World Food Program, Catholic Relief Services, Save the Children, Mercy Corps and other agencies on the front lines of hunger depend on funding from these programs.
The U.N.’s Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Ursula Mueller, recently highlighted the most urgent hunger emergencies in Syria, South Sudan, Yemen, Nigeria and Iraq. She also spoke of some lesser-known crisis areas including Burundi, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Palestine and Ukraine.
Mueller warns: “Insufficient funding for humanitarian operations costs lives. One hundred million people are looking to us for their hope and survival. We cannot to let them down.”
We did not let down the people of Germany who were starving during the Cold War. The Berlin Airlift reminds us that feeding the hungry and building peace is America’s guiding foreign policy principle.
That food and hope is needed desperately today in Syria, South Sudan, Haiti, Yemen and so many other nations in distress. William Lambers of Delhi Twp. is an author who partnered with the U.N. World Food Program on the book “Ending World Hunger.” He writes on History News Network, The Hill and many other news outlets. He is a writer with Catholic Relief Services.