American Views Abroad

 
There was a ninety minute documentary on the Berlin Air Lift of 1948/49 on German public TV, ZDF, yesterday. Three points stood out when viewed from today's perspective. First was the relationship between the American pilots and the German citizens of Berlin. Both viewed each other as former enemies. One US pilot spoke about how, at first, he didn't think he could like the Germans after all that had happened during WW II. A German woman who was a child during the operation declared how merely hearing planes flying over Berlin brought up dreaded memories of the bombings during the war. The last thing the civilians wanted back then was to be reminded of that. However, the logistics of the operation forced both sides to work with each other. Everything, but everything, had to be flown in since the Soviets blocked all transport into the city. Not only food, basically in powered form, but particularly coal for heating had to arrive by air. This was accomplished by a finely tuned operation with planes landing every three minutes and where Germans from all walks of life found work by immediately unloading them. Added to that was the fact that the civilians could have gone into East Berlin to cash in their ration cards for food. However, only 5% chose to do this. The mayor of Berlin, Ernst Reuter of the SPD, told the US military governor that he should take care of the airlift and he, the mayor, would get the support of the people of Berlin for it. Thus, through bonds forged by working together, former enemies began, grudgingly, to take another look at each other. This is so important to remember in light of what neo-cons were proclaiming before the start of the present war in Iraq--- US troops would be greeted with flowers and how they used Germany as an example.

The second point was the life of the civilians during that blockade. They had just begun to return to a sort of normalcy among the ruins when suddenly they were confronted with the possibility of being cut off from food, electricity, and heating. The role of the media (as we put it today) did its part in leaving impressions of that time. The newsreels from the eastern part of the city showed a dark, gloomy West Berlin where factories had to close down. RIAS -- Radio In the American Sector -- used a megaphone on a truck to keep the people informed of the news or public speeches. The pilots' stories of their lives in the US stood in stark contrast to what people of Berlin were going through.

Last, but not least, was the enormous precision that went into the military planning. You couldn't help but be impressed with how they managed to accomplish an almost impossible feat. Why then is the present situation for the civilians in Iraq so appalling in light of all this?

Summaries and videos of this documentary can be viewed in German at
www.zdf.de/ZDFde/inhalt/0/0,1872,1020192,00.html
- posted by Gloria @ 4:02 PM