The berlin wall

germany was divided after the cold war

By 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union had begun to
emerge as ideologically opposed 'superpowers', each wanting to
exert their influence in the post-war world. Germany became a focus
of Cold War politics and as divisions between East and West became
more pronounced, so too did the division of Germany. In 1949,
Germany formally split into two independent nations: the Federal
Republic of Germany (FDR or West Germany), allied to the Western
democracies, and the German Democratic Republic (GDR or East
Germany), allied to the Soviet Union.
• In 1952, the East German government closed the border
with West Germany, but the border between East and
West Berlin remained open. East Germans could still
escape through the city to the less oppressive and more
affluent West.
berlin wall

• Barrier that surrounded West Berlin

and prevented access to it from East
Berlin and adjacent areas of East
Germany during the period from 1961
to 1989.
• In the years between 1949 and 1961,
about 2.5 million East Germans had
fled from East to West Germany,
including steadily rising numbers of
skilled workers, professionals, and
intellectuals.
why the berin wall was built

On August 13, 1961, the Communist government of the

German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany)
began to build a barbed wire and concrete “Antifascistischer
Schutzwall,” or “antifascist bulwark,” between East and
West Berlin. The official purpose of this Berlin Wall was to
keep so-called Western “fascists” from entering East
Germany and undermining the socialist state, but it primarily
served the objective of stemming mass defections from
East to West.
The Berlin Wall stood until November 9, 1989, when the
head of the East German Communist Party announced that
citizens of the GDR could cross the border whenever they
pleased. That night, ecstatic crowds swarmed the wall.
Some crossed freely into West Berlin, while others brought
hammers and picks and began to chip away at the wall
itself. To this day, the Berlin Wall remains one of the most
powerful and enduring symbols of the Cold War.
Why was the berlin wall torn down
• As the years went by, the
East German government
fortified the wall, making it
very difficult for East Berliners
to escape. Even if people
went near the wall, guards
were ordered to shoot them
on sight. Regardless, around
5,000 people successfully
escaped and around 100 lost
their lives attempting to.
• In the 1980s, the Soviet Union was undergoing several
huge problems. The economy was stagnant in the Soviet
Union and those countries it occupied. Moreover, the
hierarchical government structure and the problems were
too local to make any positive changes. Mikhail
Gorbachev tried to save the Soviet Union by instituting
reforms. By then, communism and the hold the Soviet
Union had over Eastern Europe was getting weaker.
• Poland secured free elections and then the Baltic states
sought independence from Soviet rule. The communist
government of East Berlin made an announcement that
they would grant free passage from East Berlin to the
West at midnight of November 9, 1989. There were
impromptu celebrations and a city-wide party began as
the wall, which was a symbolic manifestation of an Iron
Curtain, came down.
when did the berlin wall fall

The border between East and West Germany was opened

on November 9, 1989, following anti-government protests in
East Germany and the democratization of other eastern and
central European states. Sections of the Berlin Wall were
subsequently torn down by East German border guard
crews and residents of a reunified Berlin.
how tall was the berlin wall
The Berlin Wall was actually a
system of barriers that
included two walls. In the
system’s final form, the outer
wall, called the
Vorderlandmauer, was 11.5–
13 feet (3.5–4 metres) tall,
and the inner wall, the
Hinterlandmauer, was 6.5–10
feet (2–3 metres) tall.
how it was built

That night, Premier Khrushchev gave the East German

government permission to stop the flow of emigrants by
closing its border for good. In just two weeks, the East
German army, police force and volunteer construction
workers had completed a makeshift barbed wire and
concrete block wall–the Berlin Wall–that divided one side of
the city from the other
• Before the wall was built, Berliners on both sides of the
city could move around fairly freely: They crossed the
East-West border to work, to shop, to go to the theater
and the movies. Trains and subway lines carried
passengers back and forth. After the wall was built, it
became impossible to get from East to West Berlin except
through one of three checkpoints: at Helmstedt
(“Checkpoint Alpha” in American military parlance), at
Dreilinden (“Checkpoint Bravo”) and in the center of Berlin
at Friedrichstrasse (“Checkpoint Charlie”).
• (Eventually, the GDR built 12 checkpoints along the wall.)
At each of the checkpoints, East German soldiers
screened diplomats and other officials before they were
allowed to enter or leave. Except under special
circumstances, travelers from East and West Berlin were
rarely allowed across the border.
facts
1. The fall of the Berlin Wall happened by mistake.
At a press conference on the evening of November 9, 1989, East German politburo
member Günter Schabowski prematurely announced that restrictions on travel visas
would be lifted. When asked when the new policy would begin, he said, “Immediately,
without delay.” In actuality, the policy was to be announced the following day and would
still have required East Germans to go through a lengthy visa application process.
Schabowski’s confused answers and erroneous media reports that border crossings
had opened spurred thousands of East Berliners to the Berlin Wall.

At the Bornholmer Street checkpoint, Harald Jäger, the chief officer on duty, faced a
mob growing in size and frustration. Receiving insults, rather than instructions, from his
superiors and nervously expecting results of his cancer diagnostic tests the next day,
the overwhelmed Jäger opened the border crossing on his own, and the other gates
soon followed.
2.The Berlin Wall was actually two walls.
The 27-mile portion of the barrier separating Berlin into east
and west consisted of two concrete walls between which
was a “death strip” up to 160 yards wide that contained
hundreds of watchtowers, miles of anti-vehicle trenches,
guard dog runs, floodlights and trip-wire machine guns.
3. More than 100 people died trying to cross the Berlin Wall.
The Centre for Research on Contemporary History Potsdam and
the Berlin Wall Memorial Site and Documentation Center report that
at least 138 people were shot dead, suffered fatal accidents or
committed suicide after failed escape attempts across the Berlin
Wall. Other researchers place the death toll even higher. The first
victim was Ida Siekmann, who died on August 22, 1961, after
attempting to leap to a West Berlin street below her fourth-floor East
Berlin apartment window. The last fatality occurred in March 1989
when a young East German attempting to fly over the wall in a hot
air balloon crashed into power lines.
4. More than 5,000 escaped by going over and under the Berlin Wall.
The first defector to escape across the Berlin Wall was 19-year-old East
German border guard Corporal Conrad Schumann, who was immortalized on
film as he leapt over a 3-foot-high roll of barbed wire just two days after East
Germany sealed the border. As the Berlin Wall grew more elaborate, so did
escape plans. Fugitives hid in secret compartments of cars driven by visiting
West Berliners, dug secret tunnels and crawled through sewers. The three
Bethke brothers pulled off the most spectacular escapes. Eldest brother Ingo
escaped by floating on an inflatable mattress across the Elbe River in 1975,
and eight years later brother Holger soared over the wall on a steel cable he
fired with a bow and arrow to a rooftop in West Berlin. In 1989 the pair flew an
ultra-light plane over the wall and back to pick up youngest brother Egbert.
conclusion

The Berlin Wall remained in place until November 9, 1989,

when the border between East and West Berlin was
reopened and the wall itself was finally dismantled.
Thank you !