ipl-logo

The Berlin Wall: The Cold War

1230 Words5 Pages

The Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall was a symbol of the Cold War and a picture of the separation of ideas and government from east and west. The Wall was put up to keep the East Germans from leaving the Soviet half of Berlin and West Germans from bringing their democratic ideas into East Berlin. Although the Soviets built the Wall during the Cold War in an attempt to defend their nation from western ideas invading Eastern Europe, it proved to be the downfall of the Soviet Union and socialism.
The Cold War was a competition between the United States and the Soviet Union that started after World War II. This war is called the Cold War because neither sides fired any weapons. There was a lot of tension between them because these were two of the world …show more content…

Besides the five thousand East Germans that managed to cross the Berlin Wall, another five thousand were captured. Nearly two hundred West Germans were killed while attempting to cross the Wall. On October 25, 1961, United States’ and Soviet’s military tanks faced off at Checkpoint Charlie. Checkpoint Charlie was the most well-known place to cross over the barrier. At the checkpoint, E. Allan Lightner Jr., the senior United States diplomat in West Berlin, was stopped on his way to the opera house by East German guards and they demanded to see his passport. The United States claimed to have the right to move freely to the Soviet sector. General Clay ordered the next diplomat to enter East Berlin to have an escort of armed US army military police.
Clay then ordered M48 tanks to Checkpoint Charlie. Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet leader, sent T55 tanks to the checkpoint. For sixteen hours, they challenged each other. Eventually they came to an agreement. The Soviets removed their tanks and the United States reopened the Kremlin in Moscow, which was a fortified base in the middle of Moscow and is now the House of the president of Russia. The United States also removed their tanks from the Wall (“Berlin Crisis: the Standoff at Checkpoint Charlie,” Colitt). If either side would have fired their tanks, a war would have broken out across the world. World …show more content…

Their oil prices dropped to low levels. The division between the upper class and the lower class began to widen and the younger generation of the Soviet Union did not want to embrace the socialist way of life (“Soviet Union”).
The Cold War was coming to an end and the Soviets were being overwhelmed by western democracy. The Soviet government tried to fix their issues, but eventually, they had to give up socialism and conform to the west. The Soviet leader announced that the citizens of Berlin were now free to cross over the Wall. On November 9, 1989 the East German government opened the barriers (“Berlin Wall,” Encyclopedia Britannica). East and West Germany were officially united in 1990 ("Berlin Wall Built").
“The Berlin Wall came to symbolize the Cold War’s division of East from West Germany and of East from West Europe.” The West saw the Wall as a clear image of socialist oppression. There are still a few socialist countries today, but it is not as popular as it was before the Berlin Wall. When it was taken down, socialism fell with

Show More
Related

  • Ronald Reagan Tear Down That Wall Rhetorical Devices

    729 Words  | 3 Pages

    On June 12, 1987, President Ronald Reagan arrived in West Berlin to speak to the people of West Germany at the Brandenburg Gate, with the intent of gathering support for democracy and to oppose the Berlin Wall along with the Soviet Government behind it. Reagan used several rhetorical strategies such as; rationality, using examples, imagery, and compare and contrast, to win the support of all who listened, including the Soviet leaders whom Reagan was hoping to persuade. Berlin was an incredible humanitarian and diplomatic crisis across the world because, the Eastern side of Berlin was impoverished, famined, and the people who lived there had to face cruel leadership and heinous punishment for the littles things, because they were under Soviet rule. This is why President Reagan travelled to Berlin, because he wanted to persuade the people of Berlin to resist the Soviet’s cruelty and to persuade the Soviets to “Tear down that wall!”. Reagan first uses rationality to

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis Of Reagan's Speech

    1091 Words  | 5 Pages

    On June 12, 1987, President Reagan stood in front of the Brandenburg Gate ,a background most dreary visible behind him, to give a speech to not just the people of Berlin, but also to the people of the world. Through his speech, Reagan sought to undermine the Soviet Union by raising support against it from the people of Berlin, a people who would have felt the effects of the Soviet Union very much. Their city was divided by a wall which separated not just East from West, but family from family, friend from friend, and freedom from oppression. And he not only attacked the Soviet Union, but also communism as a whole and any totalitarian state. And he ultimately sought to bring about the end of the Berlin Wall, which would have unified Berlin and

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis Of Ronald Reagan's Remarks At The Brandenburg Gate

    479 Words  | 2 Pages

    In his Remarks at the Brandenburg Gate speech in June of 1987, former President Ronald Reagan addresses the issue of the separation between European nations due to conflicting ideals of governments. This issue is most prevalently seen in in the city of Berlin, Germany, where the speech is addressed. This is due to a huge wall that runs directly through the city which divides the Communist East and Democratic West Berlin, more famously known as the Berlin wall. Nearing the end of the Cold War, President Reagan made a bold statement that was a catalyst for the end of the war, and a beginning to nuclear disarmament. This risky statement, which called out Mr. Mikhail Gorbachev, was a cry for peace; not just for the people of Berlin, but for the world.

    Read More

  • Rise Of Tension Dbq

    916 Words  | 4 Pages

    Why Can’t We Be Friends?: The Rise of Tension between the US and USSR post-WWII Dating back to at least the start of communism, the world saw the gradual rise of the Cold War between the United States of America (USA) and the United Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR). Although the Cold War was may have been inevitable because of these countries differing visions of economic policy, governmental systems, and the postwar world in general, it was during the years 1941-1949 when it became imminent. In this time, suspicion and tension between the Superpowers increased due to the battle between communism and capitalism, as well as their different governmental systems.

    Read More

  • Outline On Ronald Reagan And The Berlin Wall

    562 Words  | 3 Pages

    RONALD REAGAN AND THE BERLIN WALL THESIS STATEMENT Ronald Reagan’s speech at the Berlin wall challenged Gorbachev to tear down the wall because communism supported by Soviet Union divided the Germans and caused the Berlin wall. Berlin wall The Berlin Wall, one of the key symbols of the Cold War conflict, was constructed by the Soviet-influenced East German state in August 1961 to stop East Berlin residents from fleeing west. For nearly three decades it reminded the world of the division between East and West, between the Communist and the western countries.

    Read More

  • Ronald Reagan And Robert Frost's Mending Wall

    78 Words  | 1 Pages

    Walls are like grand barriers that withhold its interior inhabitants from leaving them, whether or not they wish too. The wall that bisected the German city of Berlin since 1949 held back the extreme animosity kept within the German people , and the emotional wall built in Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall” prevented a man from connecting with those he does not know. Both President Ronald Reagan and Robert Frost emphasized the appalling effects on civilizations that walls have.

    Read More

  • Ronald Reagan's Role In Public Administration

    784 Words  | 4 Pages

    Over two years after Reagan’s famous statement to tear down the Berlin Wall, Gorbachev permitted the people of Berlin to break down the wall. The fall of the Berlin Wall signaled the end of the Soviet Union’s control of East Germany and the end of the Cold War (Biography.com Editors,

    Read More

  • Ronald Reagan Tear Down The Berlin Wall Analysis

    694 Words  | 3 Pages

    Breaking Boundaries The Berlin Wall was built to separate the Communist east from the Democratic west. This ominous divider was was twelve feet of concrete that stretched for one hundred miles around West Berlin. The infamous symbol of the Cold War was guarded by electric fences and guard posts stationed along it.

    Read More

  • Argumentative Essay On The Berlin Wall

    1268 Words  | 6 Pages

    Berlin was known as the centerpiece of the Cold War. Being the capital city of Germany, the desire to have power over it was extremely high. Germany was split into two, the East, taken over by the Soviet Union, and the West, taken over by the United States, Britain, and France. Tensions rose between each country on who would be able to have power over Berlin. Since the city was on the east side and up to 100 miles inside Soviet-controlled East Germany, the Soviets had power; However, the West would not allow them to take over the capital city so easily.

    Read More

  • Was The Cold War Inevitable Essay

    969 Words  | 4 Pages

    This became one of the first of many international crisis of the Cold War, in which America responded well, not destroying the blockade or attacking the Soviets, but by delivering supplies through an alternate route until the USSR had no choice but to acknowledge their actions were futile and remove the blockade. Just before the Berlin Blockade and right before Harry Truman became president he said, “I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisted subjugation by armed or outside pressures.” (A) This concept surely followed him into the incident involving West Berlin and he stayed true to his ideas in helping the citizens living there obtain resources, despite the Soviets

    Read More

  • Jfk Museum Research Paper

    700 Words  | 3 Pages

    With East Berlin losing its professional class to West Berlin, the Kremlin decided to make sure that no one could get out. The large numbers of Red Army soldiers around construction sites lead many to fear that an invasion was nearing. In response, Kennedy put troops on the other side of the wall, both countries insisted on never backing down. That was, until an agreement had been made, and another world war

    Read More

  • Berlin Wall Dbq

    445 Words  | 2 Pages

    During the beginning of the “Cold War”, Berlin was an area where Europeans were able to relocate to without having to cross the international borders of Europe. In response to this east Germany, authorities thought it would be best to build a “wall” that surrounded West Berlin. After the East German government had given permission to stop the immigrants from moving into Germany the premier decided that he wanted to close its border forever. The Wall was completed within a night and day and was built with barbed wire and concrete block, it divided Berlin from one side to the other. For years after West Berlin became the hot end of the “cold” war as nuclear weapons faced off across the wall.

    Read More

  • Berlin Barbed Wall

    563 Words  | 3 Pages

    After the World War II, the defeated Germany were divided into 4 allied occupation zones which are American, Soviet Union, French and British. Also, the capital of Germany Berlin were divided into 2 occupation zones, Western and Eastern and Soviet Union took the Eastern part of Berlin. Many residents of Berlin found out on first morning that they are suddenly get cut off from their friends and some of them were cut off from their family member, because some of them were other side Berlin. Suddenly on 13 August 1961, East German soldiers started building the bricks as a barrier, and barbed wire as control point between the East and West Berlin, and the soldiers laid more than 100 miles of barbed wire slightly inside the East Berlin border.

    Read More

  • Berlin Wall Research Paper

    1957 Words  | 8 Pages

    Both presidents were in office while the Berlin Wall was up, so they were able to discuss it to the public. Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy were two American presidents who publicly stated their opinion on the Berlin Wall, Kennedy saying “I am a Berliner” and Ronald Reagan declaring, “Tear down this wall!” (Brown). Furthermore, when a president speaks publicly about a very important issue, peoples opinions on it can be persuaded and changed. Also, Ronald Reagan gave his speech in front of the wall, which adds an even bigger impact on the opinion of it.

    Read More

  • The Berlin Wall: The Most Important Event In History

    134 Words  | 1 Pages

    The Berlin Wall was built by the Soviet Union in order to stop people from East Berlin entering West Berlin. On November 9th, East Germans were able to travel to West Berlin freely and destruction of the Berlin Wall started. The Berlin Wall symbolized the coming collapse of the Soviet Union and it was seen when the Berlin Wall fell. The fall of the Berlin Wall ended the Cold War that lasted about forty-five years between the United States and the Soviet Union. In conclusion, the fall of the Berlin Wall is the most important event in history because it reunited East Berlin and West Berlin, it foretold the coming collapse of the Soviet Union, and it has come to represent the end of the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union.

    Read More

More about The Berlin Wall: The Cold War

Open Document