Berlin Airlift: first skirmish of the Cold War

Sixty years ago today, 32 planes took off for Berlin with a cargo of milk, flour and medicine. The Berlin airlift, one of the first big battles of will at the start of the Cold War, had begun.

In 1948, when Stalin's Soviet Union blockaded Berlin, they cut the city off from the parts of Germany controlled by the Americans, British and French. The purpose of this siege was to wrest control of the entire city. West Berlin was left with little more than one month's supply of food and fuel. General Lucius Clay, military governor of US-controlled Germany, warned: "People are going to be cold and people are going to be hungry."

With all land routes blocked off, warming and feeding the two million Berliners became a gargantuan task that could only be accomplished by flying cargo into Tempelhof and Gatow airports. Every day, British and American planes needed to provide 1,534 tons of food and 3,475 tons of coal and gasoline. In winter even more was needed. Military commanders had initially planned for a three-week mission, but they would ultimately need 278,228 flights over more than a year. At one stage, planes were taking off every three minutes, all day long.

Air controllers had to position planes 500ft away from each other in a crowded sky. Pilots had no time to spare between landing and take off; a crew of 12 set a record when they unloaded ten tons of coal in under six minutes. The prettiest girls in Berlin were sent to boost pilots' morale and hand them drinks through their cockpit windows. Soon after their countries had been at war with each other, French engineers and local German women worked together to construct a new airport on the shores of Lake Tegel in less than three months.

Adding to the hazards of the operation, fog and rain made for treacherous landing conditions. On July 30 1948, 'Black Friday', one plane crashed, another burst its tyres trying to avoid it, and a third span onto the auxiliary runway. The incident caused pandemonium for those in the air above. The Soviets, initially scornful of the Allied effort, were determined to ensure its failure. They launched balloons into the flight paths, set up a radio signal at the same frequency as Tempelhof and ordered their pilots to fly intimidatingly close to the cargo planes, firing into the air around them. Once, a Soviet fighter collided with a British plane, killing 35. In total, there were 101 fatalities over the course of the Berlin airlift, including 39 Britons.

Despite the setbacks, enough supplies got through, and resilient West Berliners were convinced they were better off without Soviet rule. American pilots dropped chewing gum, chocolate and candy from planes christened 'raisin bombers' by grateful German children. An illustrated propaganda poster from the time shows a fleet of planes dropping glasses of milk into the hands of a cute pigtailed girl. Its slogan: 'milk... new weapon of Democracy!'

By May 12 1949, the Soviets had realised the futility of their efforts and gave up on the blockade, though air cargo deliveries continued until late September to create a stockpile for any future emergency. The airlift ranks as one of the great logistical achievements alongside the evacuation of Dunkirk and the D-Day invasion. ·