Three years after the end of World War II, the American occupation of Germany was failing. The Germans were becoming less – not more – attracted to democracy. Communism was on the march, overthrowing one government after another. Faith in America was at a low ebb. Then, on June 24, 1948, intent on furthering its domination of Europe, the Soviet Union cut off all land and sea access to West Berlin, prepared to starve one of the largest cities in the world into submission unless the Americans abandoned it. Soviet forces hugely outnumbered the Allies’. The choices before the western allies were seemingly to abandon the city to the Russians, allow the Berliners to starve, or start World War III. Most of America’s top officials considered the situation hopeless. But not all of them. Harry Truman, an accidental president, derided by his own party; Lucius Clay, a frustrated general, denied a combat command and relegated to the home front during the war; Bill Tunner, a logistics expert downsized to a desk job in a corner of the Pentagon; James Forrestal, a Secretary of Defense beginning to mentally unravel; Hal Halvorsen, a lovesick pilot who had served far from the conflict, flying transport missions in the backwaters of a global war – together these unlikely men improvised and stumbled their way into a uniquely American combination of military and moral force unprecedented in its time. In the course of a single year, these men undertook the most successful humanitarian action of all time, won the hearts of America’s defeated enemies, inspired people around the world to believe in America’s fundamental goodness, avoided World War III, and won the greatest battle of the Cold War without firing a shot. THE CANDY BOMBERS is their story. Army Air Corps 1st Lt. Gail Halvorsen, a C-47 pilot stationed in Germany in support of the Berlin Airlift, handed two sticks of gum to local children peering through a fence near a local airport. That small gesture at Berlins Tempelhof Airport led to Operation Little Vittles, a humanitarian mission that continued for 15 months Here he is a 91-year old Gail Halvorsen with Tom Brokaw and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir commemorating the operation. The greatest joy is not in the receiving but in the giving, just as the proof is not in the pudding but in the eating of it. :) Click below for a taste of American Christmas pudding past...
Posted on: Sun, 26 Oct 2014 07:51:40 +0000
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