Importance Of The Berlin Wall

The Berlin Wall was built in 1961 during the Cold War between Soviet Russia and the United States. The wall was built to separate Soviet controlled East Berlin from US controlled West Berlin. It soon became a physical barrier that symbolized the differing political and social ideologies of the two superpowers. The Berlin wall stood for 28 years separating a city into two very different sections with differing governments, economies and social organization. The importance of Berlin in International politics stemmed from Germany’s role in World War II. After WWII ended, Berlin was divided between the victors, France, England, the US and the USSR. The area surrounding Berlin was under Soviet control making West Berlin a strange island of democracy,

Even after the Soviets created the blockade to Berlin, the US defiantly held onto West Berlin and responded with the Berlin airlift. Before the wall, people in either section of Berlin could freely travel back and forth but these freedoms began to diminish as the Soviets got more uneasy with the large flow of East Berliners that were emigrating out. The Soviets saw West Germany as America’s attempt to undermine Soviet control in the area. West Berlin was a bleeding wound for the USSR because it allowed Germans from all across the communist controlled area, not only just in eastern Berlin, to escape the East and emigrate west. The border between East and West Germany was closed, but people fleeing communist rule could simply enter West Berlin and then fly out of the city freely to other areas of Europe or to Western Germany. In many ways Berlin really had no huge value for the west. It was a landlocked city, deep in communist territory that was expensive to support but yet America held onto it. Like a Medieval Castle holding onto it was deemed important because of what it symbolized for the West. It was a game of ego on both sides by the Soviets and the Americans, both superpowers defiantly faced down each other there with a series of political moves and bluffs, all in an effort to outdo the