In Germany during the Cold War, the Berlin Wall was a great historical event. The Berlin Wall divided the German capital of Berlin into the parts East and West Berlin during a 28 year period, stretching from 1961 to 1989. One question we are interested in answering in this blog post is why the East German government built this iconic wall.

The Political Context

Following World War II, Germany was divided into four zones controlled by the victorious Allied powers: Russia and the United States, Great Britain and France. As well, Berlin, the capital city, was also was divided amongst the Allies. A growing tension between the Soviet Union and the Western powers resulted in the developmental of two different political ideoligies– communism on the one side, capitalism on the other.

Unlike the current situation, rising tensions create mass emigration instead.

By the late 1950s the East German government was confronted with a huge wave of emigration to West Germany. The East wasn’t providing people with the political repression, economic stagnation and limited opportunities they found equally untenable. There was a very big challenge of losing skilled workforce, intellectuals.

Between 1949 and 1961 it is estimated that 2.7 million people crossed from East to West Germany. The brain drain and perception that the country was a deteriorating economy became a big worry for the ruling Communist Party.

Securing the Socialist State

In response to the growing emigration crisis, Walter Ulbricht lead East German Government decided to build a physical barrier that would stop its people from fleeing. The Berlin Wall was built on the night of August 12 13, 1961.

The aim of the Berlin Wall was to keep East Germans from fleeing to West Germany. The barrier was a concrete wall, barbed wires, guard towers, all complemented by a complicated border control system. In fact, the government’s spokesperson called the wall ‘Antifascist Protection Rampart’, saying that the wall was built to block the East German people from the capitalist world and Western influences.

Global Political Significance

The Berlin Wall wasn’t just a noticeable construction in Germany, but the Cold War dynamics as well.

Symbol of Cold War Division

The Berlin Wall was the most obvious embodiment of the Iron Curtain, the boundary separating communist run by Soviet Union from the Western democracies. Its existence was a stark symbol of the division between East and West — of the tensions between the superpowers — and the fact that it existed brought the world’s attention to it.

Cold War Tensions Escalate

Its construction spurred a flurry of political crises and raised tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union to what threatened became overt war. The U.S. government was against building this wall, and not in favor of human rights nor freedom of movement.

Of note, the wall also became famous during the John F. Kennedy administration with President Kennedy visiting West Berlin in 1963 to deliver his famous line, “Ich bin ein Berliner”, standing up to the inhumane barrier that divided Berlin.

The Fall of the Berlin Wall

It was 28 years before the Berlin Wall fell; until November 9, 1989. After massive demonstrations and more relaxed travel controls, the East German government told its citizens they could go wherever they wanted in West Germany. Emotional scenes of reunification: Thousands of East Germans flocked to the checkpoints, where the border guards opened the gates.

On one level, the Berlin Wall falling signified the start of the end of the Cold War and the lead in to German unification. A symbol forever of freedom and human spirit, it has never been more than that.

In Conclusion

A direct outcome of the mass migration southwards towards the West of East Germans, looking to improved living conditions, was the construction of the Berlin Wall. It had as its primary purpose the maintenance of population, skilled labor, and resources in the territory of the Peoplets Republic of East Germany, and the prevention of its citizens from living in the capitalist world.

But of all things, the Berlin Wall came to stand as a symbol of the oppression of the communist regime rather than actually protecting the socialist state of East Germany. Its fall would be the victory of unity, freedom and the wish for a united Germany.