Berlin at the end of world war II
Fall of Germany
After the fall of the Nazi party in Germany, World War II had come to an end. After the war, the allied powers had 2 conferences to discuss the faith of Germany's territories.In the end,the US,Great Britain,France would receive the western territories of Germany while the USSR would receive the eastern territories. With the fall of one superpower brought the rise of 2 more, the US and the USSR. Both sides had wanted to spread their ideals into Europe.With the superpowers becoming increasingly suspicious towards one another, the world had feared for the worst and the Cold War had begun.
The Cold War
At the start of the Cold War,the USSR had began expanding and forcefully converting it's neighboring countries to communism.Communist ideals had spread all the from Russia to Germany and according to Soviet Leader Nikita Khrushchev had said that Western Berlin "stuck like a bone in the Soviet throat"
The Berlin Wall |
In 1948, in an attempt to spread communism to Western Berlin, the USSR had placed a military blockade on the border into West Berlin in hopes the allies would be forced out of the city do to starvation.However this plan failed as the allies responded by airlifting supplies into West Berlin.By 1949 the Soviet blockade was dismantled.In 1961,the USSR had begun building a wall that blocked West Berlin from the east in order to prevent the spread of democracy and capitalism and to prevent the rapid emigration of citizens that were fleeing to the west.Over the time the wall had stood,there were about 5000 successful escape attempts by different ways such as digging underground tunnels,going through the sewers,even going on a hot air balloon.Finally in 1989 when relations between the west and east had begun to improve did the east german government open all checkpoints to the west and when the Cold War had truly ended.
Death in the sand
Before the fall of the Berlin Wall,many people feared and refused any plan of escape that involved climbing over the wall and running for the other side.Over the wall was a strip of sand between the wall and the outer fence that was covered with barb wire fences,watchtowers,guard dogs,and patrols by guards and vehicles had made crossing the over the wall nearly impossible.The estimated deaths do too escape attempts were between 130-200 by the death strip.
Sources
http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/berlin-wall
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2009/11/why_berlin_mattered.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fd4wVLMd5pA
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2009/11/why_berlin_mattered.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fd4wVLMd5pA