What Were the Consequences of the Berlin Airlift?
In spite of the USSR’s attempts to prevent the political consolidation of Western Allied-occupied Germany, the Berlin Blockade and the ensuing Berlin Airlift actually accelerated this development. The Western Allies decided that swift and decisive action had to be taken to strengthen the part of Germany outside the Soviet orbit. Hence, the foreign ministers from each of the Western Allies’ three countries completed plans to combine their sectors into a Federal Republic. The Berlin Airlift also meant that in the eyes of the Western Allies, the USSR had come to replace Germany as the chief threat to peace in Europe. Overnight, Berlin went from being perceived as the bastion of Prussian militarism and Nazism to the first outpost of freedom and democracy, to be protected at all costs. The Berlin Airlift also produced a spirit of co-operation between the Western Allies and the German citizens who lived in their sectors. By the end of the Berlin Airlift, these former enemies had become partn
