In presenting the subject of the historical background of the construction of the Berlin Wall, it is necessary to know how the GDR officially called the border construction. It was colossal structure that divided East Berlin from West Berlin during the Cold War period. It is time unveal what the GDR officially called the Berlin Wall and some facts concerning its construction and further functioning.

Building of the Border Structure

The GDR called this border structure the “Antifaschistischer Schutzwall,” or the “Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart.” This name implies that wall was erected to shield East Germany from fascism influences and to stop west from spreading capitalist structures into East Germany.

The construction of the Berlin Wall started on 13th August 1961 and unlike the wall this barrier comprised of cement walls and barbed wire, fences, watchtowers, and NO MAN’S LANE. The wall really severed families and friends, and even cities in Berlin for nearly three decades of time.

Reason and Background of the Proclamation

The so-called GDR proclaimed that East Berliner built the wall to shield its citizens from imperialism and the danger of fascism. East Germany needed to portray the wall as an instrument that would protect the socialist state from spies from the West and counter revolutionaries.

However, the main reason why the Berlin Wall was built was to stop hordes of East Germans from fleeing from East Berlin and East Germany. In the early sixties, thousands of east Germans were crossing the border into West in a bid to escape poor living standards, and lack of freedom, or job oppurtunities. This kind of brain drain had a great impact to the social and economical point of view in GDR.

The arrests of attempt to flee by people and the construction of the Berlin Wall acting as a barrier only increased the number of people coming into the GDR. No-go-area between the inner and outer walls which contained trip-wire, floodlights, patrol dogs ensured that any escape attempts where highly costly and most successful one being fatal.

This biography systematically presents an overview of both the personal biography and the biographical context of life and challenges in divided Berlin.

The Berlin Wall highlighted the difference between the two parts of the city. On one side of the sector – West Berlin – citizens twenty-four hours to indulge in everything that a prosperous and liberated society can offer, on the other side of the Wall – East Berlin – people had to face economic problems, political oppression, and limited rights.

Husbands and wives, siblings, grandparents, and children could not easily go back and forth across the wall and visit each other. This division brought a lot of suffering and kept many East Berliners confronted with the fact of a divided Germany.

Having experimented with a poverty perception of the socialist state, the GDR over time sought to improve the living standards of east Berlin and therefore try to paint a positive perception of life under communism. However, such endeavours were not really effective enough in reducing the desire of many East Germans to run to the freedom as well as opportunities in the western part of Germany.

The Fall of the Berlin Wall

The symbol that was most effective throughout the Cold War was definitely the Berlin Wall. But the wall came down on November 9, 1989, due to months of campaigns without violence along with the political transformation in East Germany.

The breakdown of the represents one of the major milestones in the historical process. It signified the collapse of the Cold War and final the unification of Germany and Germany this year (1990).

In Conclusion

For the German Democratic Republic GDR the wall was officially called the “Antifaschistischer Schutzwall” or the “Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart.” However, Berlin Wall was much more than the borderline . It was an embodiment of the split between two ways of thoughts and a badge of the inhabitants of East Germany’s suffering.

New dawn of optimism and union began to dawn on the people of Germany with the demolition of the Berlin Wall. Today part of the wall still stands and acts as a symbol of what people of Germany have gone through in the past.