Files On-line
Military Planning for Berlin Emergency (1961-1968)
Preface by SHAPE Historian - NATO Archivist Note
- List of Acronyms and Key Actors
- Archival Description (PDF/126Kb)
Administrative history/Scope and content:
Following the Soviet note of 27 November 1958 which challenged the status quo established by the Potsdam Agreement, the Three Western Powers decided on 4th April 1959 to set up a Planning Group, named Live Oak, to prepare plans on land and in the air which would guarantee West Berlin’s access and would help assess Soviet’s intentions.
On 2nd April 1959 and 21st September 1960 respectively , the French and UK Representatives to the North Atlantic Council presented the Three Powers’ view on the measures to be taken in case of a crisis and on the need for coordination between NATO and Live Oak.
The crisis of 13 August 1961 and the erection of the Berlin wall, resulted in an acceleration of NATO’s plans for Berlin Emergency and the adoption of temporary measures to strengthen the Alliance’s military machinery.
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Arrangement note:
The 6 volumes in this sub-series are not organic. They have been assembled by the International Staff Registry from files created by the Economic and Finance Division and the Defence Planning Policy Division.
The documents classified Cosmic Top Secret were originally filed separately before being integrated in the files.
The files have been divided into sections in order to follow the evolution of the events.
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Conditions of Access and Use:
The documents in this series have been declassified and approved for public disclosure under the NATO Public Disclosure Programme.
The documents have been made available for research purposes only and any non-research use of them requires the written permission of NATO.