THE FALL OF THE BERLIN WALL

By Debbie Bulloch



Today, November 9, marks the 20th anniversary of the tearing of the Berlin Wall. Television images of jubilant men and women bringing down the Wall and walking across the barrier that had formerly separated a nation’s people are still fresh in the minds of most people. Like images of brave students defying Chinese Army tanks at Tian'anmen Square, the images of the Wall’s fall will live forever as a tribute to man’s indomitable desire for freedom.

Following the end of World War II, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin built up a belt of Soviet controlled nations on Russia’s Western border. The so-called Eastern bloc included Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia plus a weakened, Russian-controlled East Germany.

As part of the Soviet plan to keep control over the German people, Russian dictator Nikita Khrushchev ordered the puppet government of East Germany to build a wall in the city of Berlin. The wall would separate Russian-controlled East Berlin from free West Berlin.

On June 15, 1961, two months before the construction of the Berlin Wall started, the chair of the East German government, Walter Ulbricht, stated in an international press conference, "Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!" (No one has the intention of erecting a wall!). It was the first time the colloquial term Mauer (wall) had been used in this context.

The record of an August 1961 telephone call between Nikita Khrushchev and Ulbricht, however, clearly indicates that Khrushchev ordered Ulbricht to build the Berlin Wall. On Saturday, August 12, 1961, East Germany government officials attended a garden party at a government guesthouse in Döllnsee, a wooded area to the north of East Berlin. It was at this party, that Ulbricht signed the order to close the border and erect a wall that for nearly three decades tore thousands of German families apart and helped enslave an entire nation.

At midnight, the police and units of the East German army began to close the border and by Sunday morning, August 13, 1961, the border with West Berlin was closed. East German troops and workers had begun to tear up streets running alongside the border to make them impassable to most vehicles; they also installed barbed wire entanglements and fences along the 97 miles (156 kilometers) around the three western sectors and the 27 miles (43 kilometers) which actually divided West and East Berlin.



The wall was built slightly inside East Berlin, on East German territory. During the construction of the wall, East German troops stood in front of the wall, with orders to shoot anyone who attempted to defect. Additionally, chain fences, walls, minefields, and other obstacles were installed along the length of the inner-German border between East and West Germany.

What followed after the erection of the Berlin Wall is one of the greatest crimes ever committed by an occupying army – a steel and cement testimony to the moral fallacy, emotional bankruptcy and political failure of Communism.

The human spirit’s desire for freedom, however, is far stronger than any man-made wall. During the Wall's existence, there were approximately 5,000 successful escapes to West Berlin.

Early successful escapes involved people jumping the initial barbed wire or leaping out of apartment windows along the line but these ended as the wall was fortified. To solve these simple escape attempts, East German authorities no longer permitted occupancy of apartments near the wall; any building near the wall had its windows boarded and later bricked up.


On August 15, 1961, Conrad Schumann was the first East German border guard to escape by jumping the barbed wire to West Berlin.

To keep its own people from escaping to freedom, the East German government issued “kill orders” for anyone attempting to escape. The East German government repeatedly denied issuing such orders. In October 1973, researchers working after the re-unification of Germany, found evidence that East German soldiers had been in fact issued “kill orders” by their government. In the order, the government told East German soldiers that people attempting to cross the wall were criminals and needed to be shot: "Do not hesitate to use your firearm, not even when the border is breached in the company of women and children, which is a tactic the traitors have often used".

If an escapee was wounded in a crossing attempt and lay on the death strip, no matter how close they were to the Western wall, they could not be rescued for fear of triggering engaging fire from the 'Grepos', the East Berlin border guards. The East German guards often let wounded escapees bleed to death in the middle of this ground. The most notorious failed escape attempt was that of Peter Fechter, an eighteen-year-old East German. On August 17, 1962, Peter was shot and bled to death in full view of the Western media.

The exact number of people who died trying to cross the Wall has been disputed. Alexandra Hildebrandt, Director of the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, estimates the death toll to be well above 200. An ongoing historic research group at the Center for Contemporary Historical Research (ZZF) in Potsdam has confirmed 136 deaths. Prior official figures listed 98 as having being killed.



On June 12, 1987, in a speech at the Brandenburg Gate commemorating the 750th anniversary of Berlin U.S. President Ronald challenged Gorbachev, then the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, to tear the Berlin Wall down.

In that fateful summer afternoon, President Reagan spoke these 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!



President Reagan then added the following words:

As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner, 'This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality.' Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.



With these words, President Reagan ignited a worldwide fire that eventually led to the tearing of the Wall, the end of Soviet oppression of countless millions of Eastern Europeans and the ushering of a new era of freedom.



The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library is located in Simi Valley, California, within short driving distance of my home. I have visited the Reagan Library on many occasions. I was even there when the President’s body was carried to his final resting place. As a person whose family suffered under the yoke of Communist oppression, I am personally grateful to the man whose brave words were responsible for the demise of Soviet oppression.

There is a section of the Wall on permanent display at the Reagan Library. On my first visit to the Library, I headed straight for the garden area where that piece of the Wall stood in muted testimony to the suffering of the millions of victims of Soviet oppression.



After a minute in front of the Wall, I began to cry. Standing so close to a piece of the Wall that had helped to separate and enslave my own people I could feel the pain of all the other families that had been separated and enslaved by the wall – not just in Germany but everywhere else in the world where the Soviet boot tried to crush man’s aspiration for freedom.

It was the same sensation I experienced when I stood in front of the Holocaust exhibits at the Los Angeles Museum of Tolerance and the interment exhibits at the Los Angeles Japanese American Museum. These were the voices of men, women and children crying out for the freedom to which all of us humans are entitled to as our birthright.





On the 20th anniversary of this important moment in history, we should pause and reflect on the importance of the freedoms that we enjoy. More importantly, we should pledge to never rest until freedom rings on every corner of the world.




Editor's Note: The photographs shown here were taken from various archival, historical resources. The photographs are subject to U.S. and international copyright laws. The copyright owners fully reserve all rights to their work. The photographs are used here for educational and illustrative purposes only. No comercial use is intended or implied by their use here.

Editor's Note (Part Two): The comment by "anonymous" reminded me of this 1960s song by group The Rascals:

THE RASCALS - People Got To Be Free