The Man who Started the Berlin Airlift
At roughly 5 pm on 24 June 1948, the day the Russians started the blockade of the Western Sectors of Berlin, a reporter asked the American Military Governor in Germany General Lucius D. Clay whether the city could be supplied entirely from the air. Clay gave a clear an decisive answer; he said: "Absolutely not." Yet on the next day he instituted the airlift. His change of heart can be traced back to one man, a forgotten hero if there ever was one: Air Commodore Reginald Waite. Waite's contribution to the Berlin Airlift was decisive. Prior to his intervention, the Allies were divided over whether to withdraw their garrisons from Berlin or try to fight their way down the autobahn. Waite's calculations showing that an airlift could sufficiently replenish Berlin's stockpiles of necessary goods to buy the Allies time to negotiate were decisive in creating consensus for the launch of an airlif -- yet there are history books about the Berlin Blockade that ...