Refrigeration plants, mills, whole factories, generator equipment, lathes and precision tools were dismantled and loaded in rail cars for shipment to the Soviet Union.
Inhabitants of the defeated capital, dazed, were just beginning to attempt to provide themselves with the bare necessities of life. Dully they sought food, items of clothing, anything to put them back in the battle for human survival. It was in this simmering cauldron of a city -- a setting as historic as the great sacks of Rome -- that the Berlin Brigade was born. The Berlin Command had a modest enough beginning on the first day of July, Colonel Frank Howley led a contingent of military government personnel into the city.
The Russians, who up to then had full control of the city, had not allowed the Americans to scout their sector before entering. As a result, hundreds of officers and men had to find places to stay in the ruins. Many wound up sleeping in tents in the Grunewald. Parks, the first American Commandant, together with elements of the 2d Armored Division had moved in to occupy the American Sector in the southwest areas of the city.
Ceremonies in several parts of the U. Sector marked the takeover. General Omar Bradley flew into Berlin especially to represent the United States on this historic occasion. In fact, U. Finally, most of the Russians moved out, but not without considerable "urging". Eisenhower, had flown to Berlin for the initial conferences with the Russians.
Paralleling these developments, the French were given a sector of the city -- the boroughs of Reinickendorf and Wedding, which had been carved out of the six districts designated to become the British Sector. This modified the wartime agreements on the occupation of Berlin and resulted in the present division of the city.
Before the war, Greater Berlin had been divided into twenty administrative districts. The Soviet Sector East Berlin was composed of eight eastern districts; the French Sector of two northwestern districts; the British Sector, of four center-western districts; and the U. Sector, of six southwestern districts. The occupation structure was complex. A permanent security force for the American Sector, the future Berlin Brigade, was not formed until The troops of the 2d Armored Division remained in the city until relieved on 9 August by the 82d Airborne Division.
From the outset, it was difficult to separate the missions of the security force and the military government team in the American Sector. Berlin Brigade was charged with the monumental task of restoring a semblance of order to the American Sector.
However, Berlin was also the site of the military government headquarters. There was no central government for conquered Germany. The four military governors, acting by unanimous decision in the Allied Control Council, exercised supreme governing authority in the four Zones of Occupation.
Symbolically, the Council established itself in the mammoth building in Berlin's Schoeneberg district which had housed Imperial and Nazi Germany's supreme court.
The object was to fulfill the terms of the Potsdam Agreement to provide one central, military government for all four Zones of Occupation. The Council was unable to realize that objective. Communist obstructionism was obvious from the beginning.
By the fall of Secretary of State James F. Byrnes publicly declared: "The Allied Control Council is neither governing Germany nor allowing Germany to govern itself. But minor irritants were evident even then. Practically every effort of the Allied Kommandatura to restore order and a semblance of normalcy to Berlin was to some extent thwarted by the Soviets and their German sympathizers.
The fact that the Red Army had taken Berlin and had been its sole occupiers for two months before the Western Allies moved into their Sectors gave the Russians an advantage that they were not slow to exploit. Since only persons who could prove that they had not been Nazis were eligible for government posts under the occupation, the Soviets were able to fill key posts in all four Sectors with pro-Soviet functionaries.
In addition, the Soviets took advantage of the initial era of good feeling to influence the organization of the Allied Kommandatura. As a result it was easy for them to block real four-power government for the whole city, since they had insisted that all decisions of the Kommandatura must be unanimous. A Soviet veto was enough to disrupt or block constructive action.
The Kommandatura itself, the sole legal authority in Berlin, had to transact business in four languages -- English, French, Russian and, of course, German. The end of the War in the Pacific added to the problems of American participation in the four-power occupation. Redeployment and demobilization of U. Some military units in Berlin reportedly experienced a personnel turnover of as much as percent in a single month.
To cope with the problem of maintaining order it was necessary to re-train battle-hardened soldiers in the techniques of civil police duties. Early in they were assigned to a mobile organization, a provisional constabulary squadron. This lightly armed unit patrolled the city in cavalry scout cars. One of its principal duties was to curb the black market gangs and the smugglers who trafficked in all types of contraband.
Such gangs were, in part, responsible for further inflating the ruined Germany currency and the spreading economic chaos. The first permanent units of the Brigade, the 16th Constabulary Squadron and the th Military Police Battalion were formed and had taken over these missions by 1 May New operational techniques had to be devised for using soldiers to control a civilian population governed jointly by four different countries.
Differences in language magnified differences in temperament, legal philosophy and national outlook. Cooperation with Berlin's rehabilitated civil police, controlled by a Moscow-trained police president, was difficult. In many instances, problems were generated by a combination of honest misunderstanding and Soviet opposition. Eventually, however, procedures were developed to facilitate routine operations among the four occupation powers and the Berlin police. The occupation was not a complete failure.
The breakdown of the four-power occupation machinery was gradual. When it finally occurred, in , it was, like most milestones in Berlin's post-war history, the result of a calculated Soviet policy offensive.
In this complex and sensitive situation, the Army stood ready to guarantee United States rights under international agreements. It contributed significantly to the success of State Department programs to provide the basic human necessities for the German people and to restore economic order. During it became increasingly clear that the Soviet Union's one-sided interpretation of the Potsdam Agreement violated the spirit of the agreement, as well as the United States' concept of fundamental human rights.
With the Soviets demanding reparations in excess of what Germany could produce and blocking efforts in the Control Council to implement economic reforms, the Western Allies found themselves, reluctantly at first, taking the first steps on the road to reconciliation and alliance with their former enemy. Under the U. Military Government, the Brigade went to work. Results were quickly apparent. Restoration of basic services was the first requirement and the re-lighting of only 1, gas-fueled street lamps throughout Berlin, on 2 March , was an event of sufficient importance to convince untold numbers of the city's inhabitants that perhaps there was some light for the future, too.
The spirit of the Berlin Brigade was perhaps lighted by that first, symbolic step back on the road to self-sufficiency and self-esteem for the Berliners. However small, it offered hope for a new beginning. The problems of rotation and demobilization plagued the Brigade during Rotation without replacement had so decimated the 78th Infantry Division that by November it was reorganized and designated the 3d Battalion of the 16th Infantry and became part of the garrison.
The composition of the Berlin security force proved adequate to the tasks it was called upon to perform during The concept of the force and its missions changed during , however, when the level of international tensions was first characterized as a "cold war.
Attempts to establish democratic institutions and a degree of self-government were also impeded by the Soviet-controlled Socialist Unity Party or SED, which later became the ruling Communist party in East Germany. This shattered the remnant of four-power government for all Germany. The Soviet presence in the Berlin Kommandatura continued until 18 June when it ended with a Soviet "withdrawal. By that time the Soviet Blockade of Berlin and the Allied airlift to counter it were already in progress.
During the month period from July through March Soviet representatives had persistently blocked Allied efforts to introduce economic reforms. At the Potsdam Conference the Western Allies had not agreed to the indefinite occupation of Germany, nor to its permanent division. By they were finally committed to supporting German economic recovery. The Soviets had blocked the first and most important step, the reform of the German monetary system.
By the Allies had decided to implement the needed reforms in the Western Zones of Occupation. The decision to introduce the new "West Marks" into Berlin triggered the Soviet blockade.
Before the blockade, Berlin was supplied largely by rail from the Western Zones. On 21 June the Soviets used the excuse of "technical difficulties" to cut rail communications. In the days that followed other forms of surface access were also blocked. The Soviet Government apparently believed that it could starve the Berliners into submission and force the Western Allies to withdraw from Berlin.
The Allies, led by the United States, responded with an unprecendented use of air power. When the first supply planes landed in Berlin on 26 June , no one knew how long it would last or if it would work. But the Soviets were clearly violating international agreements. General Clay told President Truman that the Berliners would prefer unknown hardships to Communist rule and that they had the will to stick it out.
The Berlin Airlift was on. The Allies, the Berliners, the Air Force and the Army all share in the credit for the success of the airlift. To supply a city of over two million people with the planes available required a miracle of organization on the ground. Berlin Brigade personnel devised off-loading systems, worked as guards and checkers and supervised a German workforce of thousands.
Army engineers constructed a new runway at Tempelhof in 49 days. On the site of a former German training area, they constructed a new airfield -- Tegel. Three months after construction started, airlift planes were landing at Tegel.
During this "cold war" battle for Berlin field training and many other normal garrison activities were curtailed. Tactical and service units, the available manpower of the Allied garrisons in Berlin was wholly committed to the support of the vital lifeline, the Airlift.
The Blockade lasted for some days. By agreement between the Ambassadors of the four powers in the United Nations -- the so-called Jessup-Malik agreement -- the Blockade was formally ended on 12 May Operation VITTLES, as the airlift came to be called, continued for another two months while the surface transportation system was restored and stocks in the city brought up to normal levels. The world breathed a sigh of relief when the Blockade was ended peacefully.
Berlin had weathered its first major post-war crisis. Out of those eleven months of tension and exertion in a common cause, the foundation of a new bond of sympathy and mutual respect between the German and American people was laid. It was the beginning of a new era. The end of the Blockade was followed by a period of reorganization. The military government in West Germany ended and in its place the Allied High Commission, eventually located with the new Federal German Government in Bonn, was established to supervise West Germany's transition to full sovereignty.
In Berlin the remaining military government functions were combined with those of the U. Commandant in a new post, that of the U. Army, Berlin. In Berlin Brigade began to acquire some of its now familiar characteristics. Most notable was the beginning of the long association between the Brigade and the 6th Infantry. As a result of widespread riots in the city, occasioned by a Communist-sponsored "All German Youth Rally," the 6th Infantry was activated and assigned to Berlin.
Throughout all ensuing organizational changes, the 6th Infantry has formed the core of Berlin Brigade's combat strength. The last of these changes occurred in September Since that time the Brigade's three infantry battalions have all borne the flag of the 6th Infantry. Then as now the daily activities of the Berlin Brigade were closely linked to larger policy issues.
From the beginning the United States took the position that the right to be in Berlin -- under wartime and post-war agreements which the Soviet Union had not successfully repudiated -- was inseparable from the right to get to Berlin, the right of access.
This became especially important on the autobahn, where, unlike the rail lines and the air corridors, no formal post-war agreements with the Soviets confirmed access rights. On the autobahn the men of the Berlin Brigade, in single vehicles and convoys, were frequently subjected to Soviet and East German harassment.
The object was to force upon the Allies new and ever more complex restrictions on the exercise of their access rights. The only way to maintain Allied rights and to assure that the Soviets did not erode them was to use them steadily and oppose all efforts by the Soviets to introduce changes to which the Allies had not agreed.
Exercising Allied rights on the surface access routes became one of the Brigade's most important missions. As a result, Brigade soldiers were often the first to bear the brunt of new Soviet tactics and policies. In what was known as the "Krushchev Ultimatum," the Soviet Union posed a serious threat to the future status of the city.
The United States rejected the ultimatum and its six-month deadline passed without incident. A conference of Western and Soviet foreign ministers, which convened the following summer June in Geneva, failed to reconcile the longstanding differences.
The Allies demanded free, U. At this meeting of the four foreign ministers, the first since the Berlin Conferences of , the Soviets made what they knew to be unacceptable demands.
In effect they said that, in the foreseeable future, there was no possibility of agreement to reunify Germany on terms acceptable to the United States and the Western Alliance.
With hopes of reunification wining and international tensions over Berlin running high, East Berliners and East Germans began, as the West Berliners put it, "voting with their feet. In July as many as 3, escaped in a single day. The daily average for July and early August was about 1, per day.
In terms of manpower, East Germany was bleeding to death. The Communist leadership solved the problem with brutal simplicity. Twenty-eight miles of barbed-wire and barriers went up across the city and construction of the Berlin Wall began. At the time the combat-arms units of Berlin Brigade consisted of two pentomic battle groups 1, officers and men each -- the 2d and 3d Battle Groups of the 6th Infantry -- and Company F, 40th Armor.
Three days after the sealing of the sector-sector boundaries, President John F. Kennedy ordered the reinforcement of the Brigade. He ordered that the reinforcement be accomplished in a way that would convince the Soviet Union that the United States had no intention of backing down from its commitment to free Berlin.
Johnson and General Lucius D. Clay the former Military Governor and, among Berliners, probably the most revered living American flew into Berlin. The next day the 1st Battle Group, 18th Infantry reinforced , some 1, officers and men, moved over the autobahn from Helmstedt to Berlin.
In full battle gear, they paraded through the center of the city and were reviewed by the Vice President and General Clay. During the three and one-half years that followed, a different infantry battle group after September , they were infantry battalions organized as at present was rotated into Berlin at day intervals. In keeping with the political and psychological purpose of demonstrating American intentions, they exercised Allied access rights by moving in over the autobahn.
They cannot be changed by force or the threat of force, but only by negotiation. American history had shown that the American people wanted to live in a law-abiding world, which would be possible only if all countries lived up to their international commitments. The principle was simple. Those agreements apply not just to West Berlin, but to Greater Berlin as defined by law, all of it. As a result, throughout the Berlin Wall crisis, the United States refused to compromise on agreed rights deriving from the four-power status of the city.
Men of the Berlin Brigade went on patrols along the Wall and to East Berlin because free circulation to all parts of the city was the right of the United States under international law.
Rather than sacrifice even the tiny exclave village of Steinstuecken, General Clay flew into it by helicopter in September Thereafter, until October when the problem was solved by agreement , a three-man detachment of Military Police from the Brigade's th MP Company was stationed there and rotated by helicopter. Their presence was not just symbolic; it was necessary since the East Germans harassed the residents crossing the access roadway through East German territory, frequently refused ambulances and fire trucks and prevented West Berlin police from entering the village by road.
Confrontations with the Russians at the autobahn and rail checkpoints and in East Berlin during the years between and were frequent; detentions were sometimes prolonged. Whether it was Soviet APC's trying to enter West Berlin, or Soviet jet fighters constantly buzzing the city, intentionally creating sonic booms, the Berlin Brigade showed the flag, reassuring the people of West Berlin that they would not be forced to live under East German rule.
What that meant in human terms was illustrated by an incident which occurred at the height of the Wall Crisis. An American reporter asked a calm Berliner if he wasn't worried that the Allies might be forced out of the city. By that time, crisis was almost "normal" for Berlin. The Berliner shrugged. Yes, he was worried.
The Berlin Wall Crisis didn't exactly end, it wound down. By the end of the crisis as such had eased, but East-West tensions remained high.
Soviet harassment on the access routes, severe during the period , also eased gradually. By the spring of the severe harassments of Allied military traffic had virtually ended. For the most part the access procedures now observed had been firmly established. In September of that year the four powers signed the first Berlin agreement since June The Quadripartite Agreement of 3 September came into force on 3 June It confirmed long-disputed Allied access rights, greatly improved the conditions of civil access, and compared with the timeframe, resulted in a significant reduction of East-West tensions over Berlin.
By setting the seal of international agreement on the Berlin situation as it had evolved since , the Quadripartite Agreement marked the end of an era. The gradual easing of the situation in Berlin after was paralleled by the buildup of U.
By the Army's requirements for highly skilled and trained personnel in southeast Asia led to shorter tours in Berlin. During the period the Brigade drew on the experience of its combat veterans to provide a specialized type of training to orient men slated for reassignment to Vietnam. Eventually the requirements of the war necessitated the first serious curtailments in the Brigade's field-training program since the Blockade era.
Hard on the heels of the end of ground-combat in Vietnam, the onset of the energy crisis Nov 73 posed further long-term problems. By the end of the Brigade's authorized strength had been fully restored. With tensions in the Divided City at the lowest level in two decades, attention focused on training. In many ways marked a turning point in the history of the Brigade. In the absence of crisis, many of the Brigade's traditional missions were less demanding.
The resulting opportunity for new initiatives paralleled developments in the Army as a whole. Seen in historical perspective Berlin Brigade, no less than the Army as a whole, responded to the challenges of creating the Army of the seventies. The problems confronting the Army in the seventies were America's problems; the nation was entering a new era of social consciousness. Among other new goals were efforts to contain drug and alcohol abuse and to achieve a new understanding for the problems of minority groups and women.
The Brigade achieved considerable success in countering the debilitating effects of drug and alcohol abuse. Comparative statistics suggested that Berlin was not confronted with a major problem in this area. Preventive medicine through counseling centers and reeducation of the entire community coupled with a meaningful and challenging training program offered the best prospect for longterm success. Most important in the areas of awakening social consciousness was a new sensitivity to the problems of racial and ethnic minorities.
Though the Brigade was not free of racial incidents, it recorded some distinguished successes. Race relations personnel of the Brigade were selected to attend the first course at the Defense Race Relations Institute. There followed during a graduated series of race relations seminars for military personnel of all ranks and the command's career civil servants.
A milestone in the Brigade's program came in November when a three-day exposition, Ethnic Expo 73, enabled the entire community to see and experience the cultural heritage of America's minority groups.
Efforts to enhance racial understanding also included seminars given in the Brigade's School of Standards for newly assigned personnel.
Overall, the specialists working in the equal opportunity program agreed that Berlin Brigade had achieved a considerable degree of racial harmony. Most significant and far-reaching of the events shaping the Army of the seventies was the decision to create an all-volunteer Army. Historically related to that decision were new training concepts which, taken collectively, constituted the broadest, most imaginative and ambitious program in the Army's year history.
In , the Army announced the concept of "decentralized" training, which fixed the initiative for planning and executing unit training at the company level. To provide additional variety and scope for initiative the idea of "adventure training" came into play the same year.
Adventure training was not a substitute for standard training requirements. Berlin Brigade units continued to train in company class rooms and areas, sports facilities and in the wooded areas of the city. They also participated in Allied field training with the British and the French. Adventure training, however, was an opportunity that rewarded leadership initiatives, fostering esprit, the "All the Way" spirit. In this area, the "firsts" of the Berlin Brigade showed the Army in Europe what could be accomplished.
During Berlin Brigade achievements in adventure training included mountain training in Italy, France and Scotland; skiing in southern Germany; crossing the English Channel in kyacks; and scaling the heights behind the Normandy beaches, reenacting the World War II landing on the coast of France 6 Jun Brigade units also scored firsts in combining normal training activities with normal mission activities.
Showing the flag, of course, remained a vital part of the mission. Rarely has it been shown more dramatically than in January when the 4th Battalion, 6th Infantry, accompanied by the USCOB, the Brigade Commander and members of the General Staff, conducted the first marathon Wall run" along the entire mile circumference of West Berlin. Berlin's urban environment is such that, in mission training, high priority is given to combat in cities.
To facilitate this type of training, a new combat in cities range, with concrete structures closely simulating actual conditions was completed in the spring of In addition, several times each year units of the Brigade use the West German Army's training village at Hammelburg near Schweinfurt. Finally, since the Brigade Staff has periodically reviewed both training experience and recent historical models as potentially significant for Army-wide, combat in cities doctrine.
Now as in the past t is an exciting time and a rewarding experience to serve with the Berlin Brigade. He was killed while observing front line operations in France in July For many years McNair-Barracks has been home to the combat battalions of the Berlin-Brigade, the 5th and 6th Battalions of the nd Infantry, the 6th Battalion of the 40th Armor and others.
The th and th share the. They both arrived to the city in a vehicle convoy on July 3, The commanders of both units were old high school classmates. Parades on 4. Ring The most parades took place on the wide street between McNair Narracks and the german After the reunification of Germany on 3 October , the presence of U.
Since then, USAB housing areas, schools, and the Army Hospital have reverted to civilian use, some for German citizens, and others being taken over by the U. Truman Plaza was razed in anticipation of new housing for employees of the German federal government relocating from the former capital Bonn, as yet unbuilt.
Across the street from Truman Plaza was the Berlin Brigade headquarters, part of which serves as an annex of the Embassy of the United States in Berlin. Footnote: 1 Have distinction of being the longest continuously assigned units in Berlin. Both units arrived to Berlin in a 37 vehicle convoy on 2 JUL The commanders of both units were high school buddies.
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