Off-duty American airmen of the 19th Troop Carrier Squadron in Hawaii are ordered to report to their squadron in July 1948. What is briefed as a temporary "training assignment" in the United States becomes a flight halfway around the world to Germany for the C-54 Skymasters of the 19th, where the Soviets have blockaded Berlin in an attempt to force out the Allies by starving the city. Tech Sgt. Danny MacCullough (Montgomery Clift), flight engineer of a C-54 nicknamed "The White Hibiscus", is immediately ordered to fly with his crew from Frankfurt into Tempelhof Airport to deliver a load of coal. His friend Master Sgt. Hank Kowalski (Paul Douglas), a ground-controlled approach (GCA) operator, hitches a ride with them to his new station. Hank, a POW during World War II, resents the German people and goes out of his way to be rude and overbearing to them. Danny on the other hand is frustrated at being restricted to the airport because of the necessity of quickly offloading and returning to Frankfurt.