Backstory to the Berlin Airlift: Prosperity vs Unity
No sooner had the Western Allies solved the most pressing economic problem (currency reform) than they collided with the political consequences of their actions. Introducing a sound currency meant the establishment of a German central bank independent of political interference and operating on the basis of sound monetary and financial policy -- something totally incompatible with the Soviet Union's vision for Germany. The Western currency was instantly banned in the Soviet Zone and Sector. Increasingly, Germans in the West were being faced with a choice between Economic Prosperity and Political Unity.
From the day the “D” Mark was introduced into the Western Zones in 1948, the economies on opposite sides of the Zonal border started to diverge at an increasing rate. Within just months of the Currency Reform an English airman reported:
As seen from the air, West of the East Zone border, life appeared normally civilized, re-building was taking place, there was motor traffic on the roads, and the countryside was alive. After crossing the border to the Russian Zone, the roads were empty except for the occasional horse and cart and it was apparent that none of the war damage had been repaired and reparations were being carried out by the Russians, removing as much as they could carry back to their own country. In the Russian occupied zone large buildings were decorated with pictures of “Stalin” but there were little other signs of life.[i]
By 1989 the contrast between economic abundance in the West and economic bankruptcy in the East induced the population to revolt against their incompetent leadership. The SED was toppled in record time and without bloodshed. Seldom has there been a “revolution” that was so obviously economically motivated.
But the economic miracle initially passed Berlin by. This was because there was no good way to introduce currency reform in just part of a city. Trying to find a satisfactory solution was like trying to “square the circle.” One of Berlin’s city councilmen anticipated the difficulties in January 1948 predicting: “If you do nothing, there will be complete chaos. Berlin will become an even greater smuggling hub than it is already. But if Berlin becomes part of the Soviet currency area, then it will inevitably be absorbed both economically and politically into the Soviet Zone. If the Western Sectors use western money and the Eastern Sector uses eastern money, than the city will be torn in two – which is not sustainable in the long run.”[ii]
This observer proved prescient, but in the event, the chaos was even greater than anticipated. The Western Allies opted for the introduction of a Berlin Mark – separate from the Deutsche Mark in that it was marked with a large “B” for Berlin and was only valid in Berlin – in theory in all of Berlin, both East and West Berlin. The Soviets, getting wind at the last minute of the impending introduction of the “B” Mark, worked fast and furiously to introduce a Berlin Mark of their own.
As usual, the Soviet effort was marked by the dilettantism that characterised their monetary policy throughout their history. Rather than printing new notes, the Soviets took the worthless occupation marks which circulated in completely uncontrolled numbers. Then they glued by hand with poor glue a little sticker on the old notes to make them “new” notes. Not only did the stickers come off easily – even without evil intent - but the stickers had no serial numbers, water marks nor other security features. Hence they were easy to forge and could be printed up by the millions to ensure that the new currency was just as worthless as the old. It is hardly any wonder that the Berliners in 1948 – no less than Germans in the DDR in 1989 – wanted the “D” (or even the “B”) Mark more than any other thing the West had to offer.
Having created the currency catastrophe by printing the occupation mark without accountability or control, and aggravated the situation by now creating a currency only good for wall-papering (the Berliners referred to it as “wall-paper mark” (Tapetenmark)), the Soviet “solution” was to simply forbid the use of the hard “B” mark throughout Berlin. The Western Commandants were quick to point out that the SMAD had no authority to forbid anything whatsoever in the Western Sectors. So the Berliners had two currencies and this led to a number of absurd situations. For example, one had to use east marks to purchase stamps at post offices in the East and “B” marks to purchase – the identical stamps – in the Western Sectors. People using the same public transport system were paying in different currencies, and workers who worked in the East but lived in the West had no money to pay for their rent, while workers who worked in the West but lived in the East were not allowed to pay their rent in the currency of their wages.
Meanwhile, the Soviets provided a vivid display of their concept of “fairness” by making the rates of conversion from the old “occupation” to the new east mark dependent upon loyalty to the Soviet regime. Soviet controlled enterprises and SED-organisations could convert their occupation marks to new east marks at a rate of one-to-one, but the general public got a less favourable rate and “profiteers,” “capitalists,” and “fascists” (as defined by the SMAD/SED without trial or recourse) simply were not allowed to convert money at all; their liquid assets were wiped out from one day to the next. The signal was not lost on anyone.
In consequence, despite the most diligent efforts of the SED and SMAD to portray the “B” mark as the instrument of evil which was dividing Germany in two and enslaving her people to “Western Capitalism”, the Western currency remained the currency of preference to everyone in both East and West – so much so that the SMAD and SED were forced to pay at least those workers who had legitimate reasons for travel to the West (i.e. they lived or worked there, or worked on the public transport system that crossed the Sector borders) partially in west marks.
SED/SMAD efforts to incite opposition to the Marshall Plan were equally futile. Efforts to convince the labour unions to condemn Marshall Aid failed miserably. Responding like the creatures of Adam Smith rather than Karl Marx, Germans steadfastly refused to be convinced that offers of financial and material aid were evil – particularly when the voice maligning the aid was responsible for robbing them of what few resources they had left.
The one issue that seemed to have sufficient emotional appeal for the SED to exploit was “Unity.” Opinion poles indicated that the Germans had a strong national identity and were opposed to the fragmentation of Germany into arbitrary Zones of Occupation as had happened at the end of the war. The Germans did not view the partition of Germany as “natural,” “legitimate,” or “fair.” The SED therefore launched a propaganda campaign which portrayed every aspect of the Western economic recovery program as a “subversive” campaign to tear Germany in two and so prevent it from ever again becoming a proud and sovereign country.
The Western response was to slow down and not talk about plans for a sovereign German state in their Zones. They feared there would be a backlash against such plans and the SED would gain ground. Western caution, in turn, fuelled SED confidence. Believing they were on the right track, they increased the pressure. The SED proposed a “plebiscite” on “Unity.” The German people were to be asked if they wanted “division” – which they clearly did not – without being asked if they preferred the alternative: economic stagnation.
The SED started circulating petitions demanding such a plebiscite. Quite aside from the issue of whether the plebiscite would have had any value in the form planned, there was good reason to fear that the mere exercise of collecting signatures would be exploited by the SED to identify their “friends” and “enemies.” A district leader of the SED openly announced at a mass rally that “the time will come when the card you receive for signing must be shown in order to prove that you really stand on the side of the People.”[iii] By prohibiting the plebiscite, however, the West played into the hands of the SED by appearing to fear a vote in favour of Unity, i.e. to genuinely favour Partition.
Despite being on the right side of an important and emotional issue, the SED failed to turn the indisputable pubic desire for national unity to their own advantage. They found that no amount of hysteria could mobilize people outside of their own political cadre to protest western economic actions. It proved completely impossible to organise a general strike or even the kind of mass – albeit minority -- protests that had brought down the government in Prague in February 1948. The SED was undoubtedly “the Unity Party” and the Germans undoubtedly preferred Unity to Partition – but not at the price of being kept in economic destitution and excluded from the “milk and honey” now flowing from the U.S. in the form of Marshall aid. It was rather like choosing between half of a wonderful, thick, juicy rump steak or the left-over bones of a whole but scrawny chicken. The way to a man’s vote is often through his stomach.
[i] Squadron Leader Eric Robinson, letter to the author Sept. 2005.
[ii] Gerhard Keiderling, Rosinenbomber über Berlin, Dietz, Berlin, 1998, p. 46.
[iii] Haydock, City Under Siege, Brassy's, London, 1999, p. 129.
NOTE: The content of this blog post is based on Helena P. Schrader. The Blockade Breakers. Pen & Sword, 2008
The Berlin Airlift is also the subject of Bridge to Tomorrow, a trilogy of novels starting with Cold Peace.
Berlin 1948.
In the ruins of Hitler’s capital, former RAF officers, a woman pilot, and the victim of Russian brutality form an air ambulance company. But the West is on a collision course with Stalin’s aggression and Berlin is about to become a flashpoint. World War Three is only a misstep away.
View a video teaser at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTuE7m5InZM&t=5s
My novels about the RAF in WWII are intended as tributes to the men in the air and on the ground that made a victory against fascism in Europe possible.
they took the war to Hitler.
Their chances of survival were less than fifty percent.
Their average age was 21.
This is the story of just one bomber pilot, his crew and the woman he loved.
It is intended as a tribute to them all.
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MORAL FIBRE is the WINNER OF A HEMINGWAY AWARD 2022 and was a FINALIST for the BOOK EXCELLENCE AWARD IN HISTORICAL FICTION.
"Where Eagles Never Flew" was the the winner of a Hemingway Award for 20th Century Wartime Fiction and a Maincrest Media Award for Military Fiction. Find out more at: https://crossseaspress.com/where-eagles-never-flew
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