June 2023 marks the 75th anniversary of the Berlin Airlift. The blockade imposed on West Berlin by the Soviet Union is often viewed as one of the opening ‘shots’ of the Cold War, a point in history when it became clear that the uneasy alliance between the former wartime allies of the East and West was over.

However, many other incidents prior to the blockade indicated that the hard-won victory in May 1945 would not bring lasting peace to Europe. On March 5, 1946, Winston Churchill warned of an ‘iron curtain’ descending across the continent; the current generation of Russian historians view his speech, given in Fulton, Missouri, as the starting date of the Cold War.

Issue 67 in the Aviation Archive series, NATO Fighters of the Cold War, details the fighter jets and fighter bombers flown by the air forces of NATO that fulfilled this mission during the Cold War: “If you want peace, prepare for war.”