Annemarie Reffert went straight down to the Marienborn checkpoint after watching live coverage of the SED press conference. She and her daughter arrived in the West at around 9.15pm. She said she had just wanted to see if the border was open.
Duration : 0:3:5
The Road To The Wall / Berlin Wall Documentary Film Video. Public domain video.
Directorate of Armed Forces Information and Education. The Road to the Wall. 1962. The Road to the Wall is a 1962 short documentary film produced by Robert Saudek. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. This program has been declared obsolete for use within the sponsoring agency, but may have content value for educational use. Producer: Department of Defense. Creative Commons license: Public Domain.
The Berlin Wall (German: Berliner Mauer) was a physical barrier completely encircling West Berlin, separating it from the German Democratic Republic (GDR) (East Germany), including East Berlin. The longer inner German border demarcated the border between East and West Germany. Both borders came to symbolize the Iron Curtain between Western Europe and the Eastern Bloc.
The wall separated East Germany from West Germany for more than a quarter of a century, from the day construction began on 13 August 1961 until the Wall was brought down on 9 November 1989. During this period, at least 98 people were confirmed killed trying to cross the Wall into West Berlin, according to official figures. However, a prominent victims’ group claims that more than 200 people were killed trying to flee from East to West Berlin.[2] The East German government issued shooting orders to border guards dealing with defectors, though such orders are not the same as shoot to kill orders which GDR officials denied ever issuing.
When the East German government announced on 9 November 1989, after several weeks of civil unrest, that all GDR citizens could visit West Germany and West Berlin, crowds of East Germans climbed onto and crossed the wall, joined by West Germans on the other side in a celebratory atmosphere. Over the next few weeks, parts of the wall were chipped away by a euphoric public and by souvenir hunters; industrial equipment was later used to remove almost all of the rest of it.
The fall of the Berlin Wall paved the way for German reunification, which was formally concluded on 3 October 1990.
By the early 1950s, the Soviet approach to controlling national movement, restricting emigration, was emulated by most of the rest of the Eastern Bloc, including East Germany. The restrictions presented a quandary for some Eastern Bloc states that had been more economically advanced and open than the Soviet Union, such that crossing borders seemed more natural—especially between where no prior border existed between East and West Germany.
Up until 1952, the lines between East Germany and the western occupied zones could be easily crossed in most places. On April 1, 1952, East German leaders met the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in Moscow; during the discussions Stalin’s foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov proposed that the East Germans should “introduce a system of passes for visits of West Berlin residents to the territory of East Berlin [so as to stop] free movement of Western agents” in the GDR. Stalin agreed, calling the situation “intolerable”. He advised the East Germans to build up their border defenses, telling them that “The demarcation line between East and West Germany should be considered a border and not just any border, but a dangerous one … The Germans will guard the line of defense with their lives.”
Consequently, the Inner German border between the two German states was closed, and a barbed-wire fence erected. The border between the Western and Eastern sectors of Berlin, however, remained open, although traffic between the Soviet and the Western sectors was somewhat restricted. This resulted in Berlin becoming a magnet for East Germans desperate to escape life in the GDR, and also a flashpoint for tension between the superpowers–the United States and the Soviet Union.
In 1955, the Soviets passed a law transferring control over civilian access in Berlin to East Germany, which officially abdicated them for direct responsibility of matters therein, while passing control to a regime not recognized in the west. When large numbers of East Germans then defected under the guise of “visits”, the new East German state essentially eliminated all travel to the west in 1956. Soviet East German ambassador Mikhail Pervukhin observed that “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.
Duration : 0:33:11
Former East Germany officer Klaus-Peter Renneberg defended the border for almost a decade. He speaks to Telegraph TV in Berlin about those that got across and the careless joke that cost him his commission.
Duration : 0:2:44
The Wall (1962) / Berlin Wall Documentary Film Video. Creative Commons license: Public Domain. Government film about the erection of the Berlin Wall. From the holdings of the National Archives.Sponsor: United States Information Agency. The Berlin Wall (German: Berliner Mauer) was a physical barrier separating West Berlin from the German Democratic Republic (GDR) (East Germany), including East Berlin. The longer inner German border demarcated the border between East and West Germany. Both borders came to symbolize the Iron Curtain between Western and Eastern Europe and, ultimately, between USA and the Soviet Union. The wall separated East Germany from West Germany for more than a quarter-century, from the day construction began on August 13, 1961 until the Wall was opened on November 9, 1989. During this period, at least 136 people were confirmed killed trying to cross the Wall into West Berlin, according to official figures. However, a prominent victims’ group claims that more than 200 people were killed trying to flee from East to West Berlin. The East German government issued shooting orders to border guards dealing with defectors; such orders are not the same as shoot to kill orders which GDR officials denied ever issuing. When the East German government announced on November 9, 1989, after several weeks of civil unrest, that all GDR citizens could visit West Germany and West Berlin, crowds of East Germans climbed onto and crossed the wall, joined by West Germans on the other side in a celebratory atmosphere. Over the next few weeks, parts of the wall were chipped away by a euphoric public and by souvenir hunters; industrial equipment was later used to remove almost all of the rest of it. The fall of the Berlin Wall paved the way for German reunification, which was formally concluded on October 3, 1990. On Saturday, 12 August 1961, the leaders of the GDR attended a garden party at a government guesthouse in Döllnsee, in a wooded area to the north of East Berlin, at which time Ulbricht signed the order to close the border and erect a wall. At midnight, the police and units of the East German army began to close the border and by Sunday morning, 13 August 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, and to install barbed wire entanglements and fences along the 156 km (97 miles) around the three western sectors and the 43 km (27 miles) which actually divided West and East Berlin. The Soviets were not directly involved. The barrier was built slightly inside East Berlin or East German territory to ensure that it did not encroach on West Berlin at any point, and was later built up into the Wall proper, the first concrete elements and large blocks being put in place on August 15. 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, chain fences, walls, minefields, and other obstacles were installed along the length of the inner-German border between East and West Germany. Due to the closure of the East-West sector boundary in Berlin, the vast majority of East Germans could no longer travel or emigrate to West Germany. Many families were split, while East Berliners employed in the West were cut off from their jobs; West Berlin became an isolated enclave in a hostile land. West Berliners demonstrated against the wall, led by their Chancellor Willy Brandt, who strongly criticized the United States for failing to respond. Allied intelligence agencies had hypothesized about a wall to stop the flood of refugees, but the main candidate for its location was around the perimeter of the city.
Duration : 0:9:20
The former border crossing of “Bornholmer Strasse” was the first point of the “DDR” that opened it’s gates to the West on 9th of november 1989. Shortly after the news the first “Trabi” rolled into the west.
Duration : 0:9:23
more: http://www.dw-world.de/english
For 28 years, a nearly insurmountable barrier kept people from fleeing East Germany. But then, the dramatic night of November 9, 1989, saw the fall of the Wall that divided Germany. Today, it is difficult to imagine what was bitter reality just a few decades ago.
For the first time, a realistic computer animation reveals the vast security system of Germany’s inner border and the Berlin Wall, both of which were recreated virtually in the greatest detail.
The animation is part of the DVD “Walled in! What the Cold War frontier in divided Germany was really like” which can be purchased at DW’s online store http://store.dw-world.de.
Duration : 0:10:40