Book description
The Berlin blockade brought former allies to the brink of war.
Britain, France, the United States and the Soviet Union defeated and
began their occupation of Germany in 1945, and within a few years, the
Soviets and their Western partners were jockeying for control of their
former foe. Attempting to thwart the Allied powers' plans to create a
unified West German government, the Soviets blocked rail and road
access to the western sectors of Berlin in June 1948. With no other
means of delivering food and supplies to the German people under their
protection, the Allies organized the Berlin airlift.
In Berlin on the Brink: The Blockade, the Airlift, and the Cold War,
Daniel F. Harrington examines the "Berlin question" from its
origin in wartime plans for the occupation of Germany through the
Paris Council of Foreign Ministers meeting in 1949. Harrington draws
on previously untapped archival sources to challenge standard accounts
of the postwar division of Germany, the origins of the blockade, the
original purpose of the airlift, and the leadership of President Harry
S. Truman. While thoroughly examining four-power diplomacy, Harrington
demonstrates how the ingenuity and hard work of the people at the
bottom -- pilots, mechanics, and Berliners -- were more vital to the
airlift's success than decisions from the top. Harrington also
explores the effects of the crisis on the 1948 presidential election
and on debates about the custody and use of atomic weapons. Berlin on
the Brink is a fresh, comprehensive analysis that reshapes our
understanding of a critical event of cold war history.
""This book surpasses the many surveys and monographs on
the subject that have been published over the past sixty years. It is
a comprehensive study, and Harrington's is a nuanced approach on more
than one level." -- Lawrence S. Kaplan, author of NATO 1948: the
Birth of the Transatlantic Alliance" --
Daniel F. Harrington is deputy command historian at United States
Strategic Command. He lives in Bellevue, Nebraska.
