As a countermove, Soviet authorities conferred extensive powers on a German Economic Commission in the Soviet zone. Subsequently the British, French, and Americans agreed to proceed with plans to draft a separate constitution to revive German political authority in the West.
The Soviet delegates walked out of the Allied Control Council, after charging the Western powers with undermining the quadripartite administration of Germany.
Alarmed by the degree to which the city was becoming a capitalist outpost within eastern Germany, the Soviets began interfering with traffic going between Berlin and western Germany.
The Western powers announced the introduction of currency reform in western Germany, establishing the stable deutsche mark, and initiating a process of rapid economic recovery.
Disagreement between the Soviet Union and the West over the latter's program of economic and currency reforms brought complete Soviet stoppage of rail and road traffic between Berlin and the West. To circumvent this blockade, the Western powers began a large-scale airlift of vital supplies (BERLIN AIRLIFT).
After ousting the democratic majority in the Berlin municipal assembly, the Communists set up a new administration, claiming authority over the whole of Berlin.
In response to the Communists, elections in the western sectors of Berlin gave the Socialists 64.6 percent of the vote, and Socialist Ernst Reuter became lord mayor.
The United States, Great Britain, France, and the Benelux countries constituted themselves (and eventually Germany) as an International Ruhr authority with far-reaching powers of control.
