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Wednesday, July 30, 2008

THE CANDY BOMBER STILL LIVES…...AND FLIES!

In 1948, Josef Stalin cut off the roads and rails connecting West Berlin with West Germany, hoping to take the entire city into the communist fold. 

Harry Truman decided that the United States would stand by the free people of Berlin, and began the “Berlin Airlift”, supplying an entire city with flour, sugar, meat, even coal, through the bitter winter of 1948-49, until Stalin admitted defeat and opened the roads.

But, it wasn’t ALL about staples.  One young pilot began to drop little handkerchief parachutes with candy packages attached, to children who had never tasted chocolate, and soon many of his fellows started doing the same. 

Children went home and told their parents about what the American pilots were doing, and relations between the people of Germany and the U.S. changed as a result of what HAL HALVORSEN, THE CANDY BOMBER began.

There’s a NEW BOOK out about the Berlin Airlift and Hal Halvorsen’s part in it, and you can watch the AUTHOR SPEAK AND ANSWER QUESTIONS on C-Span. 

Finally, Ruth Marcus points out an important LESSON FOR IRAQ in the story of the Berlin Airlift and the Candy Bombers, and MICHAEL BARONE follows up with a similar suggestion.

Posted by Earl on 07/30 at 10:02 AM
Miscellany • HEROES • (0) Comments •
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