The Berlin Wall 1970 to 1980

In his book, The Berlin Wall, Peter Galante described Sunday, August 13, 1961 in a uniquely personal way:

It was like splitting Manhattan down the middle of Fifth Avenue from the Battery to the Bronx; like splitting London with a zigzag line from Barnet to Croydon. . . . If you lived on one side and your office was on the other, you couldn't go to work. . . . If your mother lived on one side and you lived on the other, you couldn't go visit her. . . . The aim was simple and brutal: to shut a people in and annex to Communist East Germany what she had not been given by agreement, East Berlin. Its effect was cruel and horrible. At seven in the morning on the first day, a man went to see his child. Barbed wire, concrete blocks and armed police stood between them. For the people, it produced misery. From the people, it produced fortitude and heroism (Galante, 1965, ch. 1).

However, to analyze the dynamic aspects of the German culture and the unique subculture created by the Berlin Wall, a brief historical perspective will be helpful. Berlin is the historic capital and largest city in Germany. Located in the northeastern

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s always to act for them (MacCloskey, 1967, p. 7). Brandt became chancellor in 1969. Brandt's chief innovation was his change in policy toward West Germany's eastern neighbors. This was called Ostpolitik. Kissinger detested Ostpolitik. He believed it implied a long-term division of central Europe by the Berlin Wall and ultimate recognition of East Germany as a legitimate state. Those were the realities, however. Kissinger considered it a miracle that it worked (Wyden, 1986, p. 353). Through a series of treaties, including one which amounted to a reciprocal recognition of the two German states, Brandt was able to promote a relaxation of tension in Central Europe. The "Quadripartite Agreement" was signed on September 3, 1971. By December 1971, an agreement on the Western transit traffic along designated major East German highways had been signed. By June 1972, telephone dial service between East and West Berlin had been put in place. By October, travel by West Berliners to East Berlin was regularized. On December 21, 1972, the two Germanys signed an agreement placing their basic relations on a formal and equal footing. No further international crises occurred in Berlin through the 1970s, but the impact of the Be
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Approximate Word count = 1993
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)