Daring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of The Berlin Airlift-June 1948-May 1949

by Richard Reeves

In the early hours of June 26, 1948, phones began ringing across America, waking up the airmen of World War II—pilots, navigators, and mechanics—who were finally beginning normal lives with new houses, new jobs, new wives, and new babies. Some were given just forty-eight hours to report to local military bases. The president, Harry S. Truman, was recalling them to active duty to try to save the desperate people of the western sectors of Berlin, the enemy capital many of them had bombed to rubble only three years before. Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin had ordered a blockade of the city, isolating the people of West Berlin, using hundreds of thousands of Red Army soldiers to close off all land and water access to the city. He was gambling that he could drive out the small detachments of American, British, and French occupation troops, because their only option was to stay and watch Berliners starve—or retaliate by starting World War III. The situation was impossible, Truman was told by his national security advisers, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff. His "We stay in Berlin. Period." That was when the phones started ringing and local police began banging on doors to deliver telegrams to the vets. Drawing on service records and hundreds of interviews in the United States, Germany, and Great Britain, Reeves tells the stories of these civilian airmen, the successors to Stephen Ambrose’s "Citizen Soldiers," ordinary Americans again called to extraordinary tasks. They did the impossible, living in barns and muddy tents, flying over Soviet-occupied territory day and night, trying to stay awake, making it up as they went along and ignoring Russian fighters and occasional anti-aircraft fire trying to drive them to hostile ground. The Berlin Airlift changed the world. It ended when Stalin backed down and lifted the blockade, but only after the bravery and sense of duty of those young heroes had bought the Allies enough time to create a new West Germany and sign the mutual defense agreement that created NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. And then they went home again. Some of them forgot where they had parked their cars after they got the call.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Aviation, Military Fiction, Military History, Politics, War

316 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Richard Furman Reeves was an American writer, syndicated columnist, and lecturer at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a pilot, I am in awe of what these Berlin Airlifters did--5 Stars Daring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of the Berlin Airlift, June 1948-May 1949 is an excellent account of the Berlin Airlift. The author covers the major events, the key players at the political and military leadership levels, as well as the aircrew, mechanics and the people of Berlin. The blockade by the Soviets started in Jun ‘48 and officially ended in May ’49, although the RAF and USAF kept the airlift going until Sep ’49 to build up reserves in Berlin in case the Soviets tried to restart the blockade. Some interesting aspects:

-Credit is given to RAF Air Commodore Waite as the first to recommend and show an airlift could work
-The airlift was a huge learning ground that benefits anyone who flies into or out of a busy airport today
-The Allies showed strength and the result was a free West Germany, rather than a Soviet occupied reunited Germany
-The airlift showed the power of global airlift capabilities
-The Allies imposed a counter-blockade on East Berlin/East Germany/USSR which was highly dependent on finished materials and goods from West Berlin. This counter-blockade was very successful.

Three years prior, the participants were trying to kill each other. Now, the victors were trying to save the defeated:

Within twenty-four hours of arrival, Thompson was piloting ten tons of coal toward Berlin. He knew the landscape below from twenty-one bombing missions over Germany in the 3-175 of the Eighth Air Force. More than 40 percent of his group’s 450 crew members had been shot down or just crashed. Below him now were the people who beat to death his buddy, Lieutenant Don Dennis, the man in the bunk next to him in 1945, who had parachuted onto farmland from his burning B-l7 one spring day. What happened next was not unusual: civilians on the ground, local farmers, enraged by incessant Allied bombing, killed Dennis with pitchforks and clubs, and probably set dogs on him as well. “And now I’m bringing them food,” Thompson thought. “What a world.”

The British flew 5,919 flights, carrying 29,053 tons--an amazing contribution, considering that the people of Great Britain, their capital and country smashed, too, were living under postwar rationing that provided them with little more food than the Berliners were receiving. And, for the first time since the end of the war, the British instituted bread rationing-after grain ships from the United States and Canada were diverted from English ports to Germany. British airmen, who could often get back home if they had a couple of days off, would stop by American messes to get milk to bring to their children.

The joys of joint operations and a little humor:

The Americans chafed under strict British rules-and they hated the overcooked food and bare housing arrangements of their Atlantic cousins. For their part, the British were astounded by the informality of the Americans. The latest indignity was the way American pilots kidded around on the radio. Lieutenant Leonard Sweet, the man who found French wine under his seat, was listening in when a ground controller at Tempelhof told a pilot he was a minute ahead of schedule and to make a 360-degree turn before landing. “A three-sixty will take me two minutes,” the pilot said. There was a slight pause and the controller answered: “OK, do a one-eighty and back in.”

Then there was an American pilot, ready for takeoff, who used a heavy Brooklyn accent to tell a British ground controller: “Just give me the woid and I’ll make like a boid.”

The British had their moments, though. Master Pilot Walter Dougan, called “Dickie,” was leading a block of Dakotas from Gatow west, carrying passengers, one of whom was under medical supervision and listed on the manifest as an “imbecile.” As the planes approached the British base at Lubeck, a medical officer radioed from the ground, “KN566, what is the name of your imbecile.” Before Dougan could answer, a pilot flying behind KN566 answered: “Master Pilot Dougan.”

The aircrews in the Berlin Airlift had to live under terrible flying conditions. Maintenance was delayed beyond reason sometimes. Plus the aircrew usually pressed on with the mission despite airplane and weather conditions.

William Martin, who used a spotlight held to the cockpit windshield to melt some of the ice blinding him, said, “A general principle evolved. As long as you had one instrument that indicated something about what you needed to know, go ahead and take the plane, and if we ever get any parts for this we’ll fix it.” Lieutenant George H. Nelson, signing in the Fassberg logbook after a coal flight, read the entry above his: “No 4 (right outboard) engine fire warning light burns in flight. Corrected-bulb removed.”

Prayer was practically on the preflight checklist of airlift pilots. The RAF equivalent of the cartoonist Jake Schuffert was a York pilot, Flight Lieutenant “Frosty” Winterbottom, who did his work on the walls of Malcolm Clubs, the British officers’ canteens. One of his cartoons showed his plane headed for Gatow. The caption was: “Hello, York 274. Understand you are lost in the clouds on three engines, icing up, hydraulics jammed and short of fuel. Visibility here is 800 yards. Cloud base, 200 feet. Repeat after me: ‘Our Father which art in heaven…’

The French did not have much to do despite being one of the four powers in Berlin. As anyone in the military knows, French politicians may be at odds with the other Allied politicians but the militaries usually get along pretty well. In Berlin, the Soviets were in charge of Radio Berlin, which had tall radio towers just off the end of the Tegel airfield runways which was in the French sector. The Soviets would not let the French move the towers out of the flight path. The French took action after several months of asking politely:

Herman did not know it, but French soldiers had surrounded the airport and nearby streets and were turning away both vehicle and pedestrian traffic. Then they cut the telephone lines to the Radio Berlin station and “detained” Soviet and German employees, including several Red Army soldiers. The French put them under guard in two buses that leisurely toured the city for a couple of hours and then dropped them off in East Berlin. The twenty American officers assigned to the new field had been called to a small reception organized by the French commandant in Berlin, General Jean Ganeval-in fact, they were locked in, too. At 10:45, they were shaken by the same explosion that moved Herman’s plane. They rushed to the windows and saw the twin radio towers near the end of the runway crumpling to the ground in a huge dark cloud of smoke. The French had blown up the broadcast towers of Berliner Rundfunk, Soviet-controlled Radio Berlin. Thirty French engineers had enclosed the tower legs in bags of plastique explosive, which had been flown into Tegel the day before by an American, Lieutenant Harold Hendler.

“You will have no more trouble with the towers,” said Ganeval, raising a glass of champagne to his American guests.

Captain Herman and his crew climbed back into their plane and flew out over the smoking wreckage. Within three hours, an outraged response arrived in the person of the city’s Soviet commandant, Marshal Alexander Kotikov. "How could you do that?” was the French version of Kotikov’s opening line.

Ganeval’s answer, so they said, was: “Tre simple. Avec le dynamite!”

[Allison · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting read of an often forgotten time. This book had some strong points and some weaknesses. It did good job of explaining the politics of the airlift and surrounding events from both sides. In that way it showed that the airlift could really be considered the opening salvo of the Cold War. It's weakness seemed to be in the way it was organized. The chapters were chronological, but still seemed all over the place, and some times repetitive. This may have partly been due to the nature of the airlift though. That said, it was a very quick and compelling read though it seemed to drag in parts. That's to be expected I guess in a long book on a complicated issue that nonetheless spanned only 11 months, roughly a quarter of the time frame of the World War that came just before, and yet the feats of daring described were just as big if not more amazing then some things in the war. Over all a compelling read.

[carl theaker · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s said “Logistics wins wars.” When the Soviet Union cut off all land access to Berlin in 1948, hoping to send the Western powers packing as they could not hope to feed and provide heating by air supply to 2 million Berliners, they picked a logistics battle with the two biggest and most experienced logistical powers in the world, the USA and Great Britain.

Not that the Western powers were in any way prepared for the event, both the USA and Great Britain had disarmed after the war, sending most everyone home, and those that were in Europe, were the new draftees, who were itching to get home. Author Reeves sets a fast pace in ‘Daring Young Men’ that kept me eagerly reading, wondering what was going to happen next ?

There is a great mix of personal stories with the high level history of the opening of the Cold War and the required insight of logistics, that is, the tonnage and the timing of cargo planes coming into the frozen airfields of West Berlin. Stories like how the ‘Candy Bomber’ got started show just what mankind is about all the while the potential of WW3 looming in the background.

This is not an in depth analysis of the history, that is, don’t worry about charts and graphs of how much flour you can fit in a C-47.

A couple of asides: I did wonder why there was no comparison of Berlin being cutoff ‘peacefully’ in 1948 w/the great encirclement battles of the Eastern front. It seem like the Soviets were just continuing their methods into the Cold War.

Also, General Patton died in a car accident in 1946, can you imagine if the Soviets had pulled this with him around? He’d have run an armored division from West Germany to Berlin before President Truman had a chance to open his mail.

[Barry Medlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating account of an amazing feat!! Interesting details and behind-the-scene accounts of the daily lives and experiences of people who were there! Great writing!

[Derk · Rating 2 out of 5]

I usually don't read non-fiction for relaxing at night, but this book was available and I thought the topic would be interesting. However, I found the treatment rather superficial and the book much too long. It was mostly a bunch of repetitive one or two paragraph vignettes that made their point after the first few. There was almost noting on the national politics or decision makers of the principal countries. In fairness to the author, the book was focused on the "Daring Young Men," but it actually told very little about them as people. I finished the book, but did not enjoy it. I think it would have been interesting boiled down to, say, 40 pages rather than its 300.

[Stefanie Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Post- World War II, Germany was divided between the Allied powers. Berlin was inside the area that was controlled by the Soviet Union, and there were concerns that Berlin would be absorbed and turned communist. Britain and the United States were especially concerned about this happening in the aftermath of World War II. Soviet forces implemented a blockade on rail, water, and road access to the other Allied powers, who then responded by airlifting supplies into Berlin. This whole situation really furthered the division between Eastern and Western Europe, and was one of the major kicking off points for the Cold War and Red Scare that was to come.

This book contained interviews and service records from the people who were involved in the Berlin Airlift, which I found very interesting and extremely valuable. One of the things I love the most about being a nonfiction reader and a historian is the use of personal accounts and historical documents. This book was exceptionally done, the research was on point, the storytelling was informative and educational. I really enjoyed this book, even though it was in the World War II section of my bookstore and it should have been shelved elsewhere. I have another book by this author that is on my reading list for the 2023 Reading Challenge this year, and I am very excited to get to it after reading this one.

[Nathan Ells · Rating 3 out of 5]

Daring Young Men is a detailed description of the incredible Berlin Airlift, a logistical masterclass of a joint operation, headed by the US, that supplied the Soviet-blockaded western sector of the occupied German capital. While there are plenty of interesting tid bits and unique storylines, I found Reeves gets terribly bogged down in numbers, dates, and names; these are the kind of historical narratives that I find give the history genre its dusty, boring stereotype. That being said, Reeves does well to sprinkle in bits of intruige and highlights some important players at each level of involvement from those in command to the daring pilots flying the missions themselves. I found it very interesting that many credit the intense, flurried nature of the missions with a massive leap in aircraft control, planning, and maintenance programs which may very well have factored in the emergence and growth of the commercial airline sector post-war.

[Al Berry · Rating 4 out of 5]

The last plane delivering supplies in the Berlin airlift was painted with Psalm 21:11 ‘Though they plan evil against you, though they devise mischief, they will not succeed’

This is the story of the heroic airlift to feed West Berlin while the communists tried to starve them into submission, a mighty tale well told, at one point there were planes laden with supplies landing in Berlin every minute, some of the technical achievements are remarkable.

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25/5. The Berlin Airlift is a wildly overlooked act of Anglo-American postwar heroism, and it deserved a great chronicler. I’m not sure if that was the case here — it was very much a “tell, don’t show” sort of narrative, with stilted political “intrigue” and somewhat strange and disjointed use of primary sources. Despite the lack of narrative flow, it’s still an interesting story of how brave aviators and their support team kept an entire city from starving.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating story of the Berlin Airlift and the sacrifices made to feed and fuel West Berlin during the tense standoff of the early Cold War.
Reeves combines interesting statistics and personal stories to blend an engaging read/listen.

[Grant · Rating 5 out of 5]

As the title implies, this history of the Airlift focuses on the pilots, crews, and ground staffs that made the Airlift possible, with enough political and economic context to keep the story together. Reeves excels with the information drawn from veteran interviews.

[Nolan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of us come through the school system with at least a vague understanding of what the Berlin Airlift was and why it existed. Sadly for most of us, it's not something most history teachers spend a lot of time on. There are some resoundingly good reasons you should read this, and merely filling holes left by the educational system isn't even the first reason.

There are so many highly readable gripping stories here about American heroism and German courage that these accounts will stay with you for years. Soviet leaders assumed they could block the flow of food and other necessities to the people of the western sectors of Berlin. Such a blockade, the Soviets reasoned, would force the Americans, Brits, and French out of the country, leaving Berlin undivided and entirely in Soviet hands. But the Soviets, Americans, British, and French had agreed to flight paths that were reminiscent of an arrowhead between the eastern and western sections of the city. The Communists were sure starvation would ultimately turn the German heart to communism, and while the Pentagon reportedly thought otherwise, President Truman determined that the U.S. would not leave Berlin, nor would America allow Berliners to starve.

For 11 months between 1947 and 1948, American flyers, using broken planes in bad need of maintenance in many cases, flew millions of pounds of food and industrial material to starving freezing Berliners.

You'll read here about how forgiving and trusting American military personnel were when it came time to hire German mechanics to repair planes. The French avoided hiring them; the Brits hired them, but watched over them constantly, fearing sabotage. The Americans hired them, recognizing that they had tremendous talent and skill as mechanics, and after converting a part names in manuals from English to German, the Americans stepped back and let their new hires get on with the job of fixing planes. Americans exhibited a lot of forgiveness and trust, and German workers were more than eager to live up to the expectations of their new employers.

You'll read here about the not-yet-married Mormon guy who became known as the "candy bomber" for his efforts to parachute American candy to hungry German children.

The airlift was far from a perfect venture. It was supposed to take only two weeks; it became a far more involved experience. The flight path was dangerous, and there's some speculation about whether Truman had sent some bombers capable of carrying atomic weapons in the event that the Soviets harassed U.S. pilots to a tipping point. Young men who had just regrouped and begun to get on with their lives after a war were suddenly pressed back into service, this time in the name of easing suffering. More than one pilot who contributed information to this book expressed the sheer wonder that months earlier, he had been bombing along many of the routes he was now using to deliver food and manufacturing materials.

Of course, there are sections here on the inevitable black market and how it worked, and there are sad accounts indeed of teenage German girls eager to engage in sex with American flyers for as little as a candy bar, a circumstance which numerous flyers put to their recreational advantage. But there are love stories told here, too. You'll read about young couples who pledged themselves to one another and remained faithful to those pledges even though those marriages couldn't happen until 1950, nearly a year after the airlift ended.

The author's writing style is excellent, and you won't find a section of the book that you'll want to skip.

[Bridget · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was the perfect book to read to learn more about the Berlin Airlift. What an amazing story. I really appreciated getting to read about something really wonderful the US did for a people who were very recently their mortal enemy.

See also the podcast on this page.

My favorite passage:

[A woman living in West Berlin during the airlift wrote, after the besieged citizens voted down the Soviet political party:]: "An admirable result considering that this decision most likely will have to be paid for with an intensification of the blockade, a winter without coal, nights without light and a permanent diet of dehydrated potatoes, dehydrated vegetables and canned meat. We feel as if we had wings. We feel it's great to be a Berliner. It is wonderful to live in a city that prefers death to slavery, that has decided to suffer more deprivations rather than dictatorship."

And an interesting one:

"The Army and Air Force are pre-cooking meals for Berlin housewives to save coal in Berlin. There is coal enough for heating one room for two hours a day and about 20 minutes of that is 'cooking time' with heat sufficient to boil fluids. Beans, for instance, are pre-cooked for two hours by mess personnel, dehydrated and shipped in bags to families. With but a nominal amount of fuel expended the housewife can heat the food for eating. This is the general procedure for many other foods."

[J.C. · Rating 1 out of 5]

The problems with this book are that it has no narrative flow. There is no historical set up. There is no sense of place. The author seems to assume that you are smart enough to know the history of post war Europe (Germany in particular) and that is presumption that kills the book from the beginning. There is too much reliance on newspaper articles and diary excerpts to convey the necessary information. People come and go and come back again. There are too many people in this story and everyone of them is important. There is no "main character" to focus on or to have the narrative flow around. Also there are seriously random pieces of information scattered throughout the book in the weirdest places, as if the author had no place else to put these tidbits of (mostly useless) information so he tacked them on where ever he could find room.

[Nicole Marble · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Berlin Airlift was in 1948, '49, and was the first open move in the Cold War. President Harry Truman said, 'We stay in Berlin' as the Soviets cut access to West Berlin which was isolated in East Germany after WWII. So, this book tells the somewhat forgotten story of the heroic pilots who flew in food and medicine and fuel to West Berlin and kept a city from starving.
The story is fascinating and the characters heroic, but the writing needs editing. (And in this audio book, the reader was mediocre.)

[Tony Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, especially if you enjoy history. The Berlin Airlift was America at its best, and was also the stepping stone for the creation of a true post-war ally with Germany. The author presents the story as well as Stephen Ambrose ("Citizen Soldiers") could have done. Every high school or college student should read this account of unselfish heroism by our men in uniform, and of the gratitude shown by the people of Berlin.

[Charlie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is what I call a good book to read, especially if you know just a little about the Berlin airlift that took place June 1948-May 1949. There are many facts - interviews and stories that are interesting.

This book does get bogged down at times and a bit difficult to follow at times - the only reason for my rating of a 3. Outside of that it's a good book on the Berlin airlift.

[Jerry Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Berlin Airlift was, for me, as I imagine it is for many, a historical event that I had heard about, but which I knew relatively little. This book acknowledges this situation and recognizes that many people have no idea when it took place (the 60s being a common guess apparently) or the background to it. It is perhaps the first serious skirmish of the Cold War and it deserves more widespread recognition, understanding and admiration than I think it receives. I say this from a personal point of view, since my own knowledge of this year long airlift was only sketchy at best.

This is an interesting book that serves to fill in those gaps, telling the story of the airman who were just beginning to settle back into civilian life after WW2, only to be summoned as reservists to carry out the difficult and obviously dangerous task of supplying besieged West Berlin which was blockaded by the Soviets. The immediate post-war period is, indeed, a fascinating one. How quickly the allies who defeated the Third Reich became Cold War enemies is well documented and this was perhaps the first serious dispute on the ground, and one that had serious concerns being expressed that it could lead to another shooting war on the continent of Europe, so soon after the defeat of Nazi Germany.

There is also the strange change of role for many of those flying the air route into Berlin, landing on short runways in old and deteriorating planes, carrying often dangerous cargos. Many of them were experienced bomber crews who had been bombing this same population just a few years before. The change around from enemy to friend, and the fact that there was widespread goodwill towards the Berliners in their hour of need is truly remarkable. I doubt that would be the same in today's world to be honest.

This book effectively tells the story in a chronological fashion, dwelling on the individual stories of the airman as much as the geopolitical climate of the time. It is sobering to think of the danger that was faced in a situation where the planes had to run the gauntlet of flying along a corridor bordered by Soviet airspace, into small airports nestled among buildings, only to turn around and fly out less than half an hour later and do it all again. There are points touched on here that speak to the development of aviation itself, as this was one of the first times modern ATC methods were developed and used to keep planes separated and moving as fast as possible.

I am glad I read it and this is a marvelous example of how countries can work together to solve a common problem for the good of humanity. I wish we saw more of this in this increasingly divided world. As ever, when I read history, I wonder what would happen in a similar situation today. I fear that the US and the UK would simply leave West Berlin to fend for itself or worse, let Russia take it and turn it into East Germany. Many in the GOP today would probably applaud them for doing so. That is a depressing thought, but we should remember the honor and heroism of those who both made the airlift happen, and those who flew it.

The book is a very worthwhile read but due to the nature of the airlift itself, it dwells significantly on the figures - tons flown in, number of flights etc. which is hard to get one's head around sometimes. I don't really know how this can be avoided and it is to RR's credit that he uses the human stories of dropped candy and the interaction between Berliners and the airman to make it a more human story. We need to understand how these amazing events in history shape who we are today - at least for those of us who even bother to read and learn about them

[Kristi Thielen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspirational story about a time when Americans did just the right thing at just the right time. Reeves tells the amazing story with style and charm, focusing on the people who made it happen.

Germany was divided into four zones (American, British, French and Soviet) after the end of WW2, and Berlin was, as well – but Berlin sat in the Soviet zone. In the spring of 1948, the Soviets established a blockage of all air, road and rail traffic into Berlin from the West. The Soviet goal was to prevent the Western powers from maintaining any control over their sector of Berlin. And if starving and freezing the West Berliners aided their cause, so be it.

America, Britain, and France were having none of that.

An airlift was created to fly food, fuel, medical supplies and more necessities into blockaded Berlin. Pilots and mechanics were recruited from the ranks of the military and from the ranks of those who had returned to civilian life. Despite often horrible weather, a system of landing planes, one every few minutes, round the clock, was perfected. The airlift went on, against all odds, for just over a year. When the Soviets relented (in their way) and the airlift was ended, 2,325,809 tons of material had been flown into Berlin on 277,569 flights.

Americans led the effort because it was the nation least impacted by the horrors of WW2. The British supplied what they could, but their economy was in shambles and many Brits were still stung by the German bombing of England. The French were the least involved in the airlift, both because of their lack of planes and the resentment felt by people who had been occupied by the Germans.

The West Berliners themselves, grateful for the aid and unwilling to knuckle under to the Soviets, provided help; in the early days when landing strips needed to be built, German women in high heels (probably the only shoes they owned) trundled wheelbarrows to help remove rubble so concrete could be laid down. German men provided mechanical and on-the ground assistance.

American pilots marveled at the turn of events in their lives: those who had flown missions to bomb Berlin during the war, were now flying missions to deliver things like baby formula.

Thirty-nine Brits and thirty-two Americans were killed in crashes during the airlift, as well as nine German airlift employees. No one regretted their efforts. Everyone was proud. We should be, too.

[Scottnshana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently read a good article in "Foreign Policy" about the ways in which the U.S. is disrupting our relationships with our best allies, and I immediately thought of this great episode in Twentieth Century history. The United States, which recently had been putting ordnance daily on German cities and factories, had decided to uphold its responsibilities to the people it had liberated from Nazism in 1945. Airframes that had recently dropped American and British paratroopers into France were tasked from around the world to bring humanitarian aid to Berlin in defiance of a new brand of totalitarian threat. Reeves has done the research and the interviews in this book and it shows. The details are interesting and documented here: the damage coal dust does to the insides of airplanes, the French garrison commander blowing up two radio towers blocking the approach to Tegel Airfield, the complex personalities of Generals Tunner and Clay, for instance. He also goes into the delicate political situation on the ground in Berlin and the daily hazards--i.e., awful weather, harassing Soviet fighter planes, exhausted flight crews--that made the Airlift such an amazing battle between democracy and tyranny. I have read several accounts of this campaign--Tunner's biography, "The Candy Bombers", and others--and I have met these heroes at a recent Berlin Airlift Veterans Association event. I'll always be enthused about hearing great accounts of this era, because it was a moment in American history when we stepped up and unselfishly led a coalition to uphold the values espoused in not only the Constitution, but the Gospel, and it was a tangible, measurable demonstration of the values espoused in our foreign policy. I think bringing all this up today is totally appropriate, because culture is the stories we tell our kids about ourselves, and this narrative is both inspirational and true.

[Ryan Moses · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Many Brave Hearts
Daring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of the Berlin Airlift, June 1948-May 1949 is a nonfiction book by Richard Reeves. The book covers the many events and people that led to the overall success of the berlin airlift. The book proceeds to go into extreme detail about everything that went into making the airlift a success as well as the failures along the way. The topic is well developed but I often found it to drag along due to its large explanation of all the parts it covers. However, the amount of knowledge about the events that happened at the berlin airlift is outstanding. The facts provided can often be found in the quotes from people involved and newspapers the author found at the time of the berlin airlift.
Daring Young Men Feels like a book you would find in the school library under the textbook section. While packing a lot of information, the jumps in topics within the book and lack of real voice make the book fell stern and academic.”As a consequence they now want to seriously endeavor to recruit engineers from the western zones”(Richard Reeves 79).
While I do enjoy the book, especially the topic, I can’t say I liked the way it was written. It is not very engaging and it was hard for me to stay with the text and the things being said. If I had a favorite part it would have to be any newspapers the Russians put out while they were trying to gain control over Berlin. If I could change something I would change the way the information was presented to the reader. I would definitely recommend this book to a student even though it is not very intriguing.

[Joe Keefhaver · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent history of the Berlin Airlift of 1948-49, when the western allies supplied western Berlin with food, coal and other necessities completely by air during a Soviet ground blockade. I was aware of this chapter in history, but didn't know all the details. In particular, I didn't realize the risks involved in the airlift, the number of lives lost and the very real possibility a war with Russia could have erupted. Only a few short years ago, they had been fighting each other. Yet now, the Americans were enlisting German aircraft mechanics to service U.S. military planes and German civilians to unload their cargoes. Most Germans seem to have responded positively to this new alliance, although a few remained die-hard Nazis. It was interesting to learn more about this period, when East Germany and West Germany were not yet established and the Cold War between the West and the Soviet Union was just beginning.

[Piker7977 · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Berlin Airlift is a topic that deserves more attention than it gets in larger histories of the cold war. Richard Reeves did a fine job of recapturing the ingenuity, bravery, and significance of the American and British response to Stalin's blockade of western Berlin. The airlift is one of the moments that spotlights what is good about the United States and her allies. Not only did the operation save the city, it also revolutionized aviation and cemented a commitment to western Europe.

Reeves does a balancing act between a straight history and Greatest Generation worship that was popular in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Sometimes it pendulums back and back between the two perspectives a little too hard, but overall its a good book of a great moment in history.

[Jordan Brehove · Rating 2 out of 5]

Great topic and worth learning about but the author badly needed an editor to pull this together. It fails to spend time on setup or global context of strategic decision making and has endless disjointed anecdotes. The story of the airlift is a great one and I’m disappointed that this was the best book I have found on the subject. If you read it, read some other synopses first as this book is a struggle and that might make it more digestible.

Also, I listened to this on audiobook and it was one of the worst readers I have heard. The tone was hard to hear and the accents were off and even tougher to hear.

[Michael Perkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

America at It's Best

As a former Army guy I have to tell you that my respect for the Air Force went up exponentially after reading this book. It really helped me understand what the Air Force does, what it's mission is, and what it means for our defense. The book also made me a little sad because I look at what we once were as a country and what we are now and I see a vast chasm. Unfortunately we are shadow of our former selves, and we seem to be meandering around without a cause or Reason except crass materialism. It was delightful.

[Darla Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve read a few books about the Berlin Airlift and learned a lot from this book. There were more personal information about the Germans in West and East Germany. I learned more about the Black Market than I ever have and more about the planes. This book is quite detailed and to be honest I skipped some of the political details…I knew where things were headed. Interested in this time period, the Berlin Airlift, the politics, and the real people who were there? This is an excellent choice.

[Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

a good read. Reeves has interviewed many of the people involved in this great feat. I enjoyed much of the stories of things that happened in this Operation. I wondered if my dads pilot in WWII was called into the service for this, too bad I never asked him. Good statistics, great research some photos, they could have better.

[Janet · Rating 3 out of 5]

The subject matter is fascinating and relatively New to me. The author's attention to detail is exceptional. Unfortunately, it's this detail that made the book drag for me. It is probably perfect for those keenly interested in WWII and/or aviation history.

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another view of the Greatest Generation. Men and women who went back into service to deliver aid to the country we just defeated. Some gave their lives in this often overlooked effort. Another one that should be required reading in our schools.

[Josef Komensky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book about Berlin airlift. When I was reading it it felt like reading new series of Band of brothers ater the war. I read itself very easy, and I am glad to have another two books in my stash about the same subject.