Like so much of the Cold War, the Berlin Wall was eventually torn down in 1989. Built in 1961, it was symbolically the most iconic thing about the Cold War. This conference was constructed directly out of these tensions and conflicts between the United States and the Soviet Union during that postwar period. In this blog post we tell you why the Berlin Wall was build and why it was so historically important!

The Division of Germany

After World War II, Germany was divided into four occupied zones: French, British and American, as well as Soviet. As with Berlin, the city itself (over there) was divided into four sectors. Here the Western Allies hoped to establish the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) in 1949 and the Soviets created the less Western German Democratic Republic (East Germany) in tandem.

In succeeding years many East Germans fled to West Germany for political repression, personal freedom, hope for economic prospects. By 1961 more than 2.7 million East Germans had fled, and the drain was simply too great for the East German economy and intellectual resources to bear.

The Escalation of Tensions

That’s why the mass exodus left East Germany in states of internal instability and economic problems. In response, the East German government, with Soviet backing, closed this emigration. An essential part of West Germany was to get a physical barrier erected so East Germans could not cross over into West Berlin.

Then on August 13, 1961 the wall was created with a simple barbed wire fence, however this was fleshed out quickly with armed guards leading to a highly fortified wall. Ultimately, it stretched out over 100 miles, a concrete wall with guard towers, anti vehicle ditches and more.

As to why it was built.

There were several key reasons behind the construction of the Berlin Wall:

1. Ideological Differences:

The Cold War was mostly a battle between the capitalist West and the communist East. This ideological divide also manifested itself physically between the free world and the controlled world and manifested it in a Berlin Wall.

2. Economic Struggles:

For the economy, East German faced a problem since a lot of the skilled laborers and intellectuals were emigrating in mass. The East German government was attempting to keep its workforce and escape from economic decline by building the wall.

3. Political Stabilization:

The constant emigration made the East German government afraid of political instability. This closing of the border allowed the controlling of their population, and preventing an uprising.

The Impact of the Berlin Wall

The Berlin Wall had a profound impact on both the people of Germany and the global political landscape:

1. Human Tragedy:

The act was that wall that tore families and friends apart from social connections and that did blades of emotional pain to the hearts of thousands and put heave burdens on the souls of all mankind. The number of people dead on the wall from those attempts of escape left some dead from the attempts of escape by the guards and some dead out of the escapes.

2. Heightened Cold War Tensions:

Topping this off were the building of the wall. Since growing militarily arrogance and political talk, this was taken not only as a direct threat for the freedom of the Western world, but also as an attempt to humiliate and undermine it.

3. Symbol of the Cold War:

In all of this it was also a symbol of the split between the communist and it’s sense of unwanted division with capitalism. It was a physical divide of the East and the West, a meeting to the rest of the world that this was a split on ideology between the two superpowers.

4. Fall of the Wall:

Most people think of the word and only one event comes to mind: the actual demolition of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989. The reunification of Germany, delivering renewed hope and unity to the world.

Conclusion

Inconsolidable was the Berlin Wall, constructed to politically consolidate during the cold war and as a barrier to East German mass emigration. Very quickly it became a symbol of the ideological and the physical separation between East and West. It would fall eventually, and it did, but that was a triumph of freedom and unity and the human spirit.