Berlin Wall

Background

After the end of World War II the victors: the United States, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union divided Germany into four occupation zones, each one controlled by one of the four countries. Berlin also divided into four zones, the same way the rest of Germany did. At first, Berlin's citizens could move freely between the zones to work or visit family and friends. The U.S., British and French zones became capitalist and democratic, which formed into the Federal Republic of Germany (and West Berlin) in 1949. The Soviet zone became a communist dictatorship, which in turn formed the German Democratic Republic (including East Berlin) the same year.

Divergence of German states

From 1948 onwards, West Germany developed into a western capitalist country with a social market economy and a democratic Allies while the communist Soviet Union argued over how to govern Berlin. Berlin was in the Soviet part of Germany, an island surrounded by capitalism. Western nations assumed they would have free access to the city. But on April 1, 1948 the Soviet Union blockaded routes in and out of East Germany, trapping 2 million West Berliners with little food or fuel. The Allies countered with the Berlin Airlift, flying planes with food and supplies into West Berlin for 462 straight days. The Soviets lifted the blockade in across the inner-German border; East Germany established an authoritarian government with a Soviet-style command economy. While East Germany became one of the richest, most advanced countries in the Eastern bloc, many of its citizens still looked to the West for political freedoms and economic prosperity. The flight of growing numbers of East Germans to non-communist countries via West Berlin led to Germany erecting the GDR border system (of which the Berlin Wall was a part) in 1961 to prevent any further exodus.

Massive migration

From 1949 through to 1961, huge numbers of professionals and skilled workers migrated daily from East to West Berlin frequently because of lucrative opportunities connected with rebuilding Western Europe funded by the Marshall Plan Furthermore, many West Berliners traveled into East Berlin to do their shopping at state-subsidized stores, where prices were much lower than in West Berlin. This drain of labor and economic output threatened East Germany with economic collapse. This had ramifications for the whole Communist bloc and particularly the Soviet Union, because East Germany's economy was being subsidized by the Soviet government, and simultaneously, the now-threatened East German production was responsible for all war reparations to Poland and the Soviet Union. More than 3 million people left East Germany for a better life in the West. By 1961, the communist government knew it had to stop the exodus.

Proposed barrier

The impetus for the creation of the Berlin Wall came from East German leader Walter Ulbricht, approved by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, but with conditions imposed. Ulbricht's proposal for a second air blockade was refused and the construction of a barrier was permitted provided that it was composed at first of barbed wire. If the Allies challenged the barrier, the East Germans were to fall back and were not to fire first under any circumstances.

Construction begins, 1961

Construction of 45 km (28 miles) around the three western sectors began early on Sunday 13 August 1961 in East Berlin. That morning the zonal boundary had been sealed by East German troops. The barrier was built by East German troops and workers, not directly involving the Soviets. It was built slightly inside East German territory to ensure that it did not encroach on West Berlin at any point; if one stood next to the West Berlin side of the barrier (and later the Wall), one was actually standing on East Berlin soil. Some streets running alongside the barrier were torn up to make them impassable to most vehicles, and a barbed-wire fence was erected, which was later built up into the full-scale Wall. It physically divided the city and completely surrounded West Berlin. During the construction of the Wall, NVA and KdA soldiers stood in front of it with orders to shoot anyone who attempted to defect. Additionally, the whole length of the border between East and West Germany was closed with chain-fences, walls, minefields, and other installations.

Immediate effects

Many families were split. Many East Berliners were cut off from their jobs and from chances for financial improvement; West Berlin became an isolated enclave in a hostile land. West Berliners demonstrated against the wall, led by their mayor Willy Brandt, who strongly criticized the United States for failing to respond. Allied intelligence agencies had assumed about a wall to stop the flood of escapes but the main candidate for its location was around the boundary of the city.

President John F. Kennedy while visiting the Berlin Wall on June 26, 1963

John F. Kennedy had aware in a speech on 25 July 1961, that the United States could hope to defend only West Berliners and West Germans; to attempt to stand up for East Germans would result only in an embarrassing withdrawal. Accordingly, the administration made polite protests at length via the usual channels, but without fervors, even though it was a violation of the postwar Four Powers Agreements, which gave the United Kingdom, France and the United States to say over the administration of the whole of Berlin. Indeed, a few months after the barbed wire went up, the U.S. government informed the Soviet government that it accepted the Wall as "a fact of international life" and would not challenge it by force.

The East German government claimed that the Wall was an "anti-fascist protection barrier" ("antifaschistischer Schutzwall") intended to dissuade aggression from the West, inspire of the fact that the entire wall's defenses pointed to East German territory.

Thus, this position was viewed with a doubt even in East Germany; its construction had caused considerable hardship to families divided by the Wall and the Western view that the Wall was a means of preventing the citizens of East Germany from entering West Berlin was widely seen as being the truth.

Secondary Response

It was clear both that West German morale needed more and that there was a serious potential threat to the viability of West Berlin. If West Berlin fell after all the efforts of the Berlin Airlift, how could any of America's