1. Warm up: Write a caption for the below picture
Warm up: Write a caption for the below picture. Give at least one sentence to justify why you’ve written this caption.

2. Yalta Conference
Division of Germany

3. Developments Since Yalta
1948: US, Great Britain & France agree to combine their zones into 1 (West Germany & West Berlin)
Creation of Deutschmark (new currency; aimed at fighting inflation)

4. Stalin’s Concerns & Reaction
Reaction = Blockade
Not consulted about new currency in West Germany/Berlin
Deutschmark is a “capitalist plot” to help Germany become powerful and able to be reunified at capitalist state.
Is this an attempt at reunification of Germany?
6/28/48 Stalin orders all railroads, canals, roads connecting West Germany to West Berlin closed.

5. Allied Reaction
Is this Stalin’s 1st step in a planned take-over of Western Europe?
US does not want to use force and risk war
Began airlift of supplies (blockade lasts 11 months)…275,000 flights
B-29 bombers stationed in Great Britain (can carry nuclear bomb)

6. Effects of the Blockade
USSR US
Stalin cannot shoot planes down…act of war
Stalin/USSR embarrassed
Stalin realizes USSR’s need for atomic bomb and amps up development
Formation of NATO in 1949 (Warsaw Pact formed in response in 1955)
Refuses to “appease” a dictator
Truman Doctrine in action
US = heroic