The Candy Bombers
The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour
2 of 3 copies available
The Candy Bombers is a remarkable story with profound implications for our own time. Cherny tells the tale of the ill-assorted group of castoffs and second-stringers who not only saved millions of desperate people from a dire threat, but also 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.
With newly unclassified documents, unpublished letters and diaries, and fresh primary interviews, The Candy Bombers takes readers along as American pilots, with only a few small rickety planes, manage to feed and supply West Berlin completely by air for nearly a year; as Harry Truman exploits the very real threat of war to win an upset reelection campaign; as America's first secretary of defense descends into madness in the midst of a dangerous military crisis; and as a lovesick American pilot shows that acts of basic human kindness can send powerful ripples through the course of history.
"What an exciting, inspiring, and wonderfully-written book this is. ... Each page has lessons for today, and it is also a thrilling narrative to read."—Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Steve Jobs
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
August 14, 2008 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9781456106461
- File size: 701264 KB
- Duration: 24:20:57
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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The Americans, French, British, and Soviets shared joint stewardship of post-WWII Germany, but Stalin wanted all of Europe to himself. The Cold War had started by late 1945, and the Russian blockade of West Berlin in 1948 found a world unprepared to retaliate. As with many military histories, the author didn't write this to be entertaining, and narrator Jonathan Davis can do little to make it so. Placing unnaturally long pauses after every period gives the impression of disinterest or fatigue on his part, and the annoying silences prevent him from establishing a smooth listening experience. The audiobook's strength comes from the abundant details about Germany's reconstruction, including the Berlin Airlift, which secretly dropped candy on German kids' heads on approaches to landings. J.A.H. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine -
February 18, 2008
In 1948, West Berliners were suffering and hungry, existing on food rations transported by trucks, trains and barges primarily by the occupying American forces. The Russians, trying to control the divided city, blockaded the transports on June 24, 1948, and American and British pilots risked their lives to airlift in 4.6 billion pounds of food and supplies until the blockade was lifted in May 1949. Pilot Hal Halvorsen won Berliners' hearts by secretly dropping his and his buddies' candy rations by parachute into the waiting hands of the city's children. In the process, says Cherny (The Next Deal
), Berliners became devoted to democracy, and Washington foreign policy and military brass learned that the Cold War needed to be won not primarily with bullets but by appealing to hearts and minds. This book could have been cut by a third for better effect; Cherny's prose and his references to 9/11 are manipulative, and his subject, particularly the nuts and bolts of the airlift, will appeal primarily to WWII buffs, who should still find much to savor in this exhaustive, often absorbing and lucid account of America's successful standoff against the Soviets. 16 pages of b&w photos.
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