Berlin Wall Essay, Research Paper

The Berlin Wall

For twenty-eight years, the Berlin Wall separated friends, families, and a nation.

After the second World War in 1945, the victorious Allies, the US, Britain, France,

Russia divided Germany into four sectors, each under the control of an ally. The US,

British, and French Sectors combined to form a democratic state, The Federal Republic of

Germany, or West Germany. The Soviet sector became a communist state, The German

Democratic Republic, or East Germany, on October 7, 1949.

A barrier now separated east and West. Winston Churchill named this barrier the

Iron Curtain. Even though Berlin lay deep within the Soviet sector, the Allies thought it

best to divide this metropolis. Therefore Berlin was also divided into four sectors. Again

the US, British, and French Sectors combined to form West Berlin. The Soviet sector

became the East German capital, East Berlin.The governments of these two new countries

were set up by the occupying forces, not the populous. Most of the residents of East

Berlin and East Germany did not like the communist regime. In fact, most people were

not communists.

The Berlin Wall, though not part of the iron curtain, was a reminder of it. The

wall was made of steel, cement, and barbed wire fences with traps and explosives. There

were guard towers with machine guns and other weapons. It was almost impossible to

cross this barrier without the communist government’s permission.

Conrad Shuman was a nineteen year old border guard when he witnessed families

tearfully separated. He realized he was not protecting his country, but imprisoning its

people. Three Days after the border was closed, he leapt to freedom.

The people of East Germany became dissatisfied with the economic and political

conditions of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Private trade was outlawed, as

was the ownership of private land. People were forced to work on collective state owned

farms. There were food and supply shortages. Onehundred-sixty thousand refugees

crossed the border from East Berlin to West Berlin between January and the beginning of

August of 1961 in search of a better life. This upset the East German government and the

Soviet countries. (East Germany was a Soviet satellite, but was of special interest to

Moscow).

Nikita Kruschev, the Soviet premier of that time ordered the Berlin wall built to

stop the flow of refugees. The GDR began building what they called “the anti-fascist

protection wall” on August 13, 1961, using barbed wire and anti-tank obsticales.

However the East German citizens were still escaping. The GDR added tanks at

important streets some supplied by the red army. They tore up the streets to use the

paving stones to build barricades.

There were many escape tunnels dug under the wall. The tunnel system was an

extraordinary resistance movement dug by hundreds of East Berlin students with

thousands more willing to help. The first successful tunnel was in an East Berlin

Graveyard. Mourners brought flowers to a grave and then dropped out of sight. A woman

with a baby accidentally found the tunnel and escaped leaving the baby carriage. The

police found the carriage and closed the tunnel. The largest tunnel was in the basement of

a house at number sixty Wernerstrasse, twenty-nine people were freed from this location.

On August 23, 1961, the GDR stopped the subways, the railroads, and the

telephone lines going to West Berlin. The people of East Berlin were no longer allowed

to enter West Berlin, including the sixty-thousand workers who worked in West Berlin.

However East Berliners still managed to get out. Some of them bribed their way out with

cigarettes and money. After some people managed to scale the wall, there was a ban on

the sale of rope and twine.

On September 20, 1961, the GDR began to demolish all of the houses near the

wall. They began construction of a more permanent concrete wall. When completed the

wall was onehundred-sixtysix kilometers long, and an average of four meters high,

topped with concrete tubing and barbed wire. Behind the wall was a trench to stop

vehicles. After that was a patrol track with a corridor for watch dogs, watch towers, and

bunkers. Behind that was a second wall. This area of no man’s land cut off

onehundre-ninetytwo streets.

Checkpoint Charley was the main crossing point for the American sector of West

Berlin. It was sixhundre-eighty feet west of the Brandenberg Gate. On October 27, 1961,

the Unites States sent tanks, jeeps and soldiers to Checkpoint Charley go guarantee US

officials access to West Berlin.

During the twenty eight years the wall was standing, over five thousand people

tried to escape. Over one-hundred died in the attempt. most were shot by the GDR border

guards.

On August 17, 1962 near Checkpoint Charley, Peter Fechter, age eight-teen, was

shot down and left to bleed to death by the border patrol as he tried to climb over the

wall. After Peter’s tragic death, riots broke out in West Berlin, and the West Berliners

began to resent the Americans for failing to help the bleeding youth. This prompted US

President John F. Kennedy to visit Berlin to ask East Germany and the USSR to tear

down the wall.

The Wetzels and the Strelzycks secretly purchased many small amounts of nylon

cloth. They made a hot air balloon large enough to lift four adults and four children.

Close to midnight on September 15, 1979 they drove to a deserted field and took off.

Twenty three minutes after liftoff the gas burner died ant the balloon fell. Soon they

realized that they had triumphantly landed on West German soil. After their escape,

purchases of lightweight fabrics were limited in East Germany.

The beginning of the end of the German Democratic Republic and the Berlin Wall

was when Hungary (another communist state) opened its doors to the west. Migration

between Communist states was unrestricted, therefore, East Germans would go from East

Germany to Hungary and from there to West germany, or any other Western European

state.

There were large demonstrations in Leipzig on Mondays. East Germany began to

reform. On November 9, 1989 at about 7:00 PM, the leader of the East Berlin communist

party, Gunter Schabowski, announced that the boarder with West Berlin would be opened

for “private trips abroad”. Wall “woodpeckers” started to use hammers and chisels to

knock out pieces of the wall. Shortly thereafter, a massive emigration of East berliners to

West Berlin began.

There were mass celebrations at the important places in both cities, including the

Brandenberg Gate and Kurfstendam in West Berlin. On November 10, 1989 and later on

December 22, 1989 checkpoints were opened for pedestrians at Potsdamer Platz and the

Brandenberg Gate. Finally on July 1, 1990 East and Wast Germany were united. They

assumed West Gernamy’s old name, The Federal Republic of Germany. All restrictions,

travel and otherwise between East Germany and West Germany were dropped. The entire

wall was taken down except for the areas of historical importance such as the section in

front of the parliament of Berlin and the places with graffiti artwork.

The reunification of Germany was a great victory for the German people and the

nations of the west.but the Berlin Wall has left economic and emotional scars that can

only be healed by the hard work and understanding of generations to come.

Finally, my research found many residents of the GDR who welcomed the

Communist Government both during the time the wall was up and to a greater extent

immediately after reunification when unemployment and inflation in East Germany

soared, it remains our conclusion that most East Germans did not like the communist

regime. In support of this position is the fact that while thousands of people tried to cross

the wall from East Germany to West Germany and over one hundred people died in the

attempt, there does not appear to be a single case of anyone climbing the wall in the other

direction. Overall the arrising and destruction of The Berlin Wall proved to seperate two

nations, but overtime brought those nations from being allies to comrads.