Walls (Part 3)

…(continued from previous post)…

The Berlin Wall went through several transformations. The most well-known version, and the one shown in most of the surviving photographs, are the twelve-foot high reinforced concrete wall sections, along with a “Death Strip” of gravel leading up to the wall from the East German side - to make it easy for border guards to shoot any defectors trying to cross to the West. While the Wall was up, there were as many as 5,000 successful escapes made to the West. In the first three days of the order to divide the city, a famous photo was taken of Conrad Schumann (an East German border soldier), which showed him leaping the barbed wire to safety. In a famous, non-successful attempt, an eighteen-year-old East German bricklayer named Peter Fechter tried to leap the six-foot wall, but was shot by East German guards. He fell back to the East German side. Both sides were afraid to help him, for fear of being shot as well, and Fechter bled to death over the course of an hour – in full view of cameras and passers-by.

The Wall was built on order of the Soviet government, with the purpose of preventing people from escaping or being able to compare socialism and democracy. But it became a symbol of oppression, despised by all those who treasure freedom. When the Wall was up, the side facing democracy was painted and made colorful by graffiti. The side facing Communism was gray and untouched - guarded by soldiers with orders to shoot anyone who approached it.

In June of 1987, to commemorate Berlin’s 750th anniversary, Ronald Reagan visited Berlin’s Brandenburg gate and uttered these now-famous words:

“We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization, come here to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”

Two years later, the Berlin Wall came down, but not before a strange sequence of events occurred. Eastern-bloc Hungary decided to open its border to Western-minded Austria. Thousands of East Germans fled there. Other East Germans already in Hungary crowded the West German embassy and announced that they would not return to their country. This triggered protests in East Germany against their own government. A revolution was well underway.

Under pressure, the East German government issued an edict allowing refugees and private travelers to exit the East for the West. Television stations and announcers, confused by the text, announced that East Germany was opening its borders to everyone (which was not really the intent). On November 9, 1989, people began gathering at the wall and demanding the guards to let them through. The guards, also confused, called their superiors but found that no one on the other end of the phone was willing to direct them to use force to preserve the borders. The guards simply opened the gates and let people pass freely. People began to systematically chip at the concrete wall. Small tools turned into sledgehammers over the next few days, and the Wall began to come away in large pieces. By mid 1990, the German military began tearing down large sections of the wall. Germany was formally reunified on October 3, 1990.

Unlike the French Maginot Line, which was designed to keep people out, the Berlin Wall was primarily erected to keep people in. But is one purpose more noble than the other? Keep reading the series…

Walls (Part 2)

On this twentieth anniversary of the opening of East Germany's borders to the West, it seems appropriate to continue this series in discussion about the Berlin Wall...

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After World War II, Germany was divided into zones, each of which were controlled by one of four war “winners” – The United States, Britain, France, and the Soviet Union. The goal of the first three was to return Germany to economic and government independence. But it was immediately clear that the Soviet Union had no intent to honor this part of the agreement, as they began to make plans and take action as if to make Germany their own. Within a few years, the US, Britain and France combined their three zones into one and funneled funds toward German reconstruction. The Soviets did not participate.

Curiously, the city of Berlin itself lay deep within the Soviet zone. As part of the original agreement, the city itself was divided into four occupation zones – one for each of the aforementioned nations. It is important to understand that Berlin became divided into two cultures and two governments – with all of this taking place within the Soviet occupation zone. As the city of Berlin evolved into East and West, it should be noted that West Berlin was an island of democracy, surrounded entirely by a Communist-controlled nation.

In 1948, over a reconstruction disagreement, East Germany blockaded the import of food and supplies to West Berlin. Because West Berlin was geographically surrounded by East Germany, an airlift of goods was put into place by various western nations (including the United States).

A great experiment was now put in place – one which could not have been designed or implemented more thoroughly in a laboratory environment. East Berlin operated under a restrictive Communist regime (and struggled), while West Germany implemented a western capitalist-style economy (which thrived and grew). It is no surprise that people in East Germany found themselves wanting to emigrate to the more prosperous West Germany.

Until 1952, people were allowed to pass freely between East and West Germany. As the two political experiments began to grow apart from each other, the Soviets began to restrict movement across the border. Stalin directed that the border between the two be closed, and barbed wire was erected between the two nations. The borders between East and West Berlin remained open up to this point, though. People wishing to immigrate (illegally) from East to West simply went to East Berlin, rode the subway or walked into West Berlin, and then took a flight out of Berlin to the western half of Germany. Thus, they escaped through the “island” of democracy which was surrounded on all sides by Communism.

By 1956, the Soviet leaders back in Moscow had seen enough. The Soviet East German ambassador Mikhail Pervuhkin said, "the presence in Berlin of an open and essentially uncontrolled border between the socialist and capitalist worlds unwittingly prompts the population to make a comparison between both parts of the city, which unfortunately, does not always turn out in favor of the Democratic [East] Berlin." Additionally, Germany began to see a “siphoning off” of their most educated and talented workforce, with millions of engineers, doctors, teachers and lawyers leaving for the West.

On August 1, 1961, Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union, suggested the placement of a wall between East and West Berlin. On August 13, at midnight, streets began to be torn up along the dividing line, barbed wire was set in place, and soldiers were placed with orders to shoot any defectors. Shortly thereafter, construction of the Berlin Wall began. The U.S. administration of John F. Kennedy put up a weak protest and eventually informed the Soviets that the States considered the Wall “a fact of international life” and did not challenge it (even though many families had been split up, with little recourse, by the sudden border placement). Curiously, the border was only closed in one direction. Anyone wishing to travel from West to East was allowed to pass.

…(to be continued)…