The Wall: The Rise And Fall Of The Berlin Wall

"Good fences make good neighbors." Some people may think that they should have fences to keep other people/things out, but I think that people should be able to communicate and work together. Three reasons why I believe that the Berlin Wall is unfortunate is because it blocks freedom, separates families, and it causes problems between neighbors.

On August 15, 1961 the Berlin Wall was built. I was only ten years old at the time. I was separated from my family, so all I had was my life long friend, Leo. I've always wished the wall to be destroyed, so I could see my family again, but my wish has never came true.

In 1989, one event occupied the spotlight around the world. The Berlin Wall, which for twenty-eight years had separated families and friends came down as thousands of people began crossing Bornholmer Bridge in northern Berlin. NBC’s Tom Brokaw could be seen on television throughout the United States saying, “A historic moment tonight. The Berlin Wall can no longer contain the East German people. Thousands pouring across at the Bronholmer bridge” (Dodds, 2014). This single event changed many things in Europe and around the world. The fall of the Berlin Wall that night, which was the ultimate symbol of the Cold War, was a major turning point in the collapse of communism leading to the unification of East and West Germany and was influenced by political leaders from both the Soviet Union and the United States. The fall of the wall affected the Communist world and eventually led to the collapse of the Soviet Union allowing countries under their control to become independent and free.

Berlin Wall, known as the Iron Curtain, divided and separated the entire Europe in two. Berlin Wall was meant to stop people from escaping to the West. Many people didn’t have a chance to react before the wall was set up. No one was allowed to cross to the other side without permission. Tens of thousands of people were separated in just one night. On both sides, separated brothers, sisters,

The ending of World War II was the start of the building of the Berlin Wall. The United States and Great Britain helped provided West Berlin with food and supplies to help them survive. This was extremely hard because the Soviets decided to build a wall between East and West Germany to keep the people separate. The Soviets decided to do this because the future of Germany and Berlin was a major point in the postwar treaty talks, and tensions grew when the United States, Britain, and France moved in 1948 to join their occupation zones into the Federal Republic of Germany. In response, the USSR launched a land of blockade to West Berlin in an effort to force the West to abandon the city. However, a massive airlift by Britain and the United States kept West Berlin supplied with food and fuel. In May 1949 the Soviets ended the defeated blockade.

After 28 long years of separation, the border between East Germany and West Germany finally opened on November 9, as an announcement was made by the spokesman for East Berlin’s Communist Party which permitted citizens to cross between the two countries. Over 2 million East Berliners participated in the destruction of the Berlin Wall, as a celebration of the end of the long-lasting division (Berlin Wall).

The first source which will use to support the thesis will be Serge Schmemann’s book When The Wall Came Down: The Berlin Wall and the Fall of the Soviet Communism, written in 2006 and published by Kingfisher. Schmemann received the Pulitzer Prize for his work over the reunification of Germany, he is also a graduate of Harvard College and holds an M.A. from Columbia University, as well as an honorary doctorate from Middlebury College. In 1989, the year of the Berlin Wall coming down, Schmemann was chief New York Times correspondent in Germany.It is understood that the book was created sometime after the Cold War topic, but Serge Schmemann was a first-person witness to the event of the Berlin Wall opening. Schmemann traveled through Eastern Europe as one Communist government after another toppled under the will of the Eastern Germany people.Giving not only his perspective but others as well of their

Germany has 16 states and three of them are called City-States. Their country capital is Berlin, Germany. Berlin was divided into four zones, America, British, Soviet, and French. The British and American Zones were combined in 1946 when it was first established, calling it the Bizone. In 1948, the French joined the Bizone causing it to be called the Trizone. In 1961, the Soviet’s built a wall all the way around West Germany to keep them from going to the land controlled by the USSR. The Berlin wall was demolished in 1989, and you can still see where the wall stood.

After the Berlin Wall went up people started to fight for the ability to cross the Berlin Wall. Many people died trying

The Berlin wall is a very significant point within history. It began quickly after World War II; Berlin was separated and conquered into four different zones. Each part was owned by Great Britian, France, the United States, or the Soviet Union. Eventually three of these zones (owned by the United States, Great Britain, and France) combined to become West Germany. The Soviet Union hastily followed after these three zones but instead became East Germany.

the demise of communism has continued since the nineteenth century The same could be said of the concept of the failure of Communism, in terms of dictatorship, perfection, dissent, the turn to capitalism and betrayal or ‘Fall’ narratives. But when pressed, a critic will fall back on the simple point that communism in many places came to an end. The toppling of the Berlin Wall is the symbol and the rolling back of communism in Eastern Europe and even in parts of Asia (such as Mongolia) is the reality – or so it is argued. The reply is equally simple: let us leave aside the continuing socialist countries in Asia, let alone the South American versions of socialism, and ask: why is longevity, or indeed eternity, a criterion for success? The fact

Through the course of our lives we only have a finite amount of time to live and experience the world around us. Between the summer of my junior and senior year I was privileged with the opportunity to go on a week and half long tour of Europe. To see and experience the culture and enrichment that Europe provides to a foreigner, a novice is breathtaking. Along with other students and a few chaperones we first landed in Berlin, Germany, in short to me the city was the culmination of German culture that was beautiful in every sense of the world. Visiting the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag and what was left of the Berlin Wall put into perspective a history that really I never experienced and yet still plays a pivotal role in the workings and

Before the Berlin Wall’s construction the citizens of Berlin were allowed to go back and forth from east to west. They had trains and subways for transportation so that they could go shopping for food, go to work, or watch a movie. The Soviet Union had decided to build a wall in order to stop the East Berliners from leaving and migrating into the west part, the whole purpose was to divide them even more, as well as stopping the east side’s population from decreasing (Staff, History.com). On August 12, 1961 the wall had started being built, to block all possible passageways between the divided city (Staff, History.com). Policemen along with volunteer construction workers built and finished it in 2

As a consequence of Germany losing World War II, the countries victorious of the war divided Germany into four sectors. Those victorious countries, which were: France, United States, Britain, and Russia also divided the capital of Germany Berlin. The war left poor relations between allies and soviets, two political ideals were created, two currencies, and at the end, it left two Germany’s totally contrasting one another. By the year 1949, the Western sector was renamed the Federal Republic of Germany and its Eastern counterpart was named the German Democratic Republic. The night of August 12, 1961, soldiers from the East were ordered to build a wall and take immediate action and close all entry points between the East and the West. One of the

The Cold War by nature divided Europe in two camps – capitalist West, and communist East. This slowed down the political, economic and social integration drastically. As Winston Churchill put it, an “iron Curtain had descended” across Europe. Consequently, Europe was more divided than any other time in history. Germany was divided into east and west. Berlin itself was also divided into similar territories which caused a huge economic, political and social strain on its people. The construction of the Berlin wall was one of the pivotal moments of the Cold War as it served as a physical illustration of the “iron Curtain”. Today however, Germany has become the economic hotspot of the EU so evidently the Cold War only hindered/delayed the inevitable