The blockade imposed by the Soviet Union around the Western sectors of Berlin from 24 June 1948 to 12 May 1949 forces the Western Allies to organise an airlift along air corridors specifically allocated to aircraft supplying the cut-off city.

Diagram of the Berlin Airlift showing the flight paths and altitudes of Allied aircraft.

The blockade imposed by the Soviet Union around the western sectors of Berlin from 24 June 1948 to 12 May 1949 forced the Western Allies to establish an airlift along air corridors specifically allocated to aircraft supplying the cut-off city. In July 1948, the cartoonist of the German daily newspaper Frankfurter Rundschau points out the implications of the airlift, whose initial objective is to supply Berlin while, above all, symbolically protecting Europe against the Soviet threat.

In July 1948, as the Soviet authorities impose the Berlin Blockade, British cartoonist Ernest Howard Shepard takes an ironic look at the vain attempts by Moscow to put an end to the airlift organised by the Western Allies in order to bring supplies to West Berlin.

On 4 August 1948, Lieutenant-General Hugh Gray Martin, military correspondent of the British daily newspaper The Daily Telegraph, gives a personal account of the various stages in the organisation and the workings of the airlift to the western zones of Berlin.

On 15 September 1948, commenting on the airlift organised by the Western Allies to bring supplies to West Berlin, British cartoonist Leslie Gilbert Illingworth takes an ironic look at the new mission of the British pilots of the Royal Air Force, heroes of the Battle of Britain, who, three years after the end of the Second World War, have to fly to Berlin to transport food.

On 25 September 1948, as the airlift enters its 100th day, the German daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung considers the numerous difficulties involved in providing financial aid to the Western sectors of the City of Berlin, which have been cut off by the blockade imposed by Soviet forces since 24 June 1948.

On 27 September 1948, British cartoonist Leslie Gilbert Illingworth emphasises the effectiveness of the airlift bringing supplies to the Western sectors of Berlin, temporarily isolated by the blockade imposed by the Soviet forces on 24 June 1948. From bottom to top: Joseph Stalin, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union; Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet Foreign Minister; and Andrey Vyshinsky, Permanent Representative of the Soviet Union on the United Nations Security Council, who are vainly trying to stop the intermittent flow of aircraft bringing supplies to West Berlin.

On 1 November 1948, Otto Grotewohl, Chairman of the Unified Socialist Party (SED), makes a speech in which he condemns the airlift organised by the Western powers and portrays the Soviet Union's blockade of Berlin as a Western invention.

In February 1949, the Western allies proudly display the millionth tonne of supplies to arrive in the Western sectors of Berlin, currently cut off by the blockade imposed by the Soviet forces on 24 June 1948.

In 1949, the cartoonist, Mirko Szewczuk, illustrates how Lucius D. Clay, US General and organiser of the airlift, circumvents the Soviet blockade of West Berlin.

Between 24 June 1948 and 12 May 1949, more than 270 000 flights are required to deliver supplies to the Western sectors in Berlin which the Soviet authorities have decided to blockade following a currency reform initiated by the USA, the United Kingdom and France.

Dans ses Mémoires, l'ancien président américain Harry S.Truman se souvient des conséquences du blocus soviétique des secteurs occidentaux de Berlin en juin 1948 et décrit le pont aérien mis en place par les Alliés occidentaux pour ravitailler Berlin-Ouest.