Abstract
This paper describes and analyzes the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall, the Cold War and Berlin as a divided city between Eastern and Western ideology. It also discusses associated events and includes an annotated bibliography.

From the Paper
"Berlin has been characterized as the flash-point of the entire Cold War which lasted from ... to ... and during which a divided Germany and a divided Berlin with its two halves separated by the infamous Berlin Wall symbolized the bipolar world. In January ... two of the four zones of Berlin, those of the British and the Americans, were united leaving the Soviet and French zones in an autonomous position. The American plans for a self-governing and financially self-supporting West Germany..."

Tags:Berlin Wall, Soviet Union, Cold War, United States, West Germany, East Germany, checkpoints

Abstract
This paper provides an overview of the historical and political events and decisions that led up to the building of the Berlin Wall. The writer describes how the wall was developed and how its presence influenced the residents of Berlin, the relations between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, and the international community. The paper concludes that while the Berlin Wall certainly represented the failure of Soviet-style Communism and the deprivation of human rights, it may well have served an important function in decreasing the likelihood of all-out war between East and West during its existence.

Outline:
Background and History - Postwar Geopolitical Conflict in Europe
The Evolution of The Berlin Wall
Erection of the Berlin Wall
Resolution of Issues
Retrospective Analysis and Conclusion

From the Paper
"Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the wall was systematically improved, evolving from what started out as a few strands of barbed wire into a fortified, state-of-the-art nearly completely impervious barrier that eventually incorporated 12-foot-high high, 4-foot-wide cement walls, sophisticated electronic controls, flood lights, minefields, guard dogs, listening devices intended to detect digging, and automatically triggered machine guns. As the wall grew, escape attempts became more and more sophisticated, ranging from jumping from windows of buildings on the Eastern side, tunneling underneath, and even the video-taped flight of East German citizens by light aircraft."

Tags:Truman NATO, Marshall Plan, nuclear weapon, Stalin Roosevelt aggression geopolitics Kennedy

Abstract
This paper focuses on the Berlin Wall crisis. The paper explains that this event has been considered to be one of the most extensive feuds between two political factions in modern European history, spanning from the years 1961 to 1989. The paper continues on to assert that events during the twenty-eight years that the wall existed have forever changed the course of history and will remain in both history books and the memory of the people who experienced them. The paper concludes that the establishment of the Berlin Wall significantly impacted the people of Germany several ways including: psychologically, symbolically, and economically.

From the Paper
"Unlike most great walls in history of the world, the Berlin Wall was designed to keep its citizens in, not keep the enemies out. The USSR knew that in order for communism to work it would need full participation even from talented people; however, East Berliners desired to live in the west where the capitalistic form of government was treating its people well. For any East Berliner willing to climb the fence laid the "death strip", a small slice of land between the borders in which the communist guards would shoot on site any escapees. The entrapped living conditions suffered by East Berlin took a heavy psychological toll on its citizens. "

Tags:USSR, Soviet, armed, feud, political

Abstract
The paper attempts to show how for forty years, the Berlin Wall would represent the physical tensions and ideological distinctions between Soviet and Western ideologies. The paper looks back at the Potsdam Conference and how this resulted in Western occupiers creating West Germany and the Soviets establishing a Kremlin-sponsored state government in East Germany. The paper describes how East Germany became a puppet to the U.S.S.R.'s communist government and was harmed economically and diplomatically in its relations with the rest of the world. The paper discusses how West Germany, unlike East Germany, would accept responsibility for the atrocities committed by the Nazis before and during World War II. The paper clearly demonstrates how the erection of the Berlin Wall and East Germany would become noted symbols of Soviet repression and iron curtain imperialism.

From the Paper
"To the point, the end of World War II would be a pivotal time for the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union. Former partners in the defeat of Germany, they would now begin a struggle at defining the future of the Germany, Europe and, indeed, the world. However, these two world powers would have distinctly different views on how to do this, resulting in the division of Germany into East and West, as well as the alignment of the global community on either side of a long Cold War. Thus, in the period which would follow the second World War, East Germany and West Germany would be among the most significant national births to occur in a time global power re-distribution and the complex demarcation of international boundaries. Thus, these would be significant fronts in the Cold War that would shape the fate of the globe for nearly the remainder of the 20th century."

Tags:Potsdam, Conference, Soviet, Union, Communism, East, West, Germany

Abstract
This paper focuses on the events that led up to the building of the Berlin Wall - what countries were involved and what allowed for the complete bisecting of an already unstable nation. The paper also discusses how the wall came to collapse and who fulfilled their responsibility to make this happen.

From the Paper
"The Berlin Wall blockaded citizens of Soviet-controlled East Germany for thirty-eight years, from August 1961 to November 1989, isolating an unlucky third of Germany from the comparative free western state and resulting in numerous deaths as East German citizens attempted to scale the barbwire and cement and were killed. How did this wall come to be erected in Berlin, who contributed to the circumstances that led to the event, and who took responsibility and helped to tear it down? This paper focuses on the events that led up to the building of the Berlin Wall - what countries were involved, what allowed for the complete bisecting of an already unstable nation - and also discusses how the wall came to collapse and who fulfilled their responsibility to make this happen. Sources of research include an article focusing on the United States' involvement and also a website devoted to Berlin's history. A cursory study of these events clearly shows that the United States held a large part of the responsibility and did nothing to make things right."

Tags:communism, democracy, cold, war

Abstract
This paper presents the history of the Berlin Wall that indicates that the United States was equally responsible for it as the Soviet Union because, unlike other major Cold War events like the Vietnam War and the Cuban missile crisis, the U.S. neglected to get involved. Next, the author underscores that the East German citizens freed themselves with no help from the United States or opposition from the collapsed Soviet Union. The paper concludes that the United States or any other country cannot take the final credit for the end of the Cold War but rather it can only be attributed to its victims finally upraising.

From the Paper
"President John F. Kennedy had previously called for a build-up of U.S. military in preparation for conflict between West Germany and the Warsaw Pact; yet he offered little response to the building of the wall: "Washington made it clear that only if the Soviets and their East German proteges tried to blockade or invade West Berlin would war become a possibility." Though the United States had worked with the Soviets post-war to divide Germany, had abandoned the weakened country to be picked apart by the Soviet Union and Poland, and had sat on the sidelines while the Soviets overran East Germany with the communist experiment, still we did nothing but shake an ambivalent fist.
"Life for East Germans was terrible. They became a pinched limb of the larger state, cut off from resources and infrastructure, losing citizens to flight and death, and "things only continued to get worse throughout the 70s and 80s as Communism and the USSR began to collapse" (Berlin). The United States played a major role in the stirring and in the ending of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union while the bastard child of the Communist-capitalist conflict, for which the United States was also responsible, wavered and whimpered unnoticed as its economy collapsed."

Tags:sectors, escape hatch, kennedy hungary reuniting

Abstract
This paper looks at the Monika Maron stories "The Promise" and "Silent Close No.6". In the two stories, the author tells us that The Berlin Wall comes to represent much more than concrete blocks built together. Throughout both pieces, the Wall represents the struggles each character goes through with their fathers and their battles or embraces of Communist ideals.

From the Paper
"Throughout The Promise and Silent Close No.6, there are references made to the Berlin Wall. Though the same physical object looms over the characters in each piece, the wall comes to represent two entirely different things within the context of each work. Within The Promise, the wall separates two lovers, Sophie and Conrad. However it is much more than a barrier, the Wall represents the teachings of Conrad's father, the loyalty to his country, and the importance he shows for his family. The only way Conrad can live out his love story with Sophie is to escape the shackles that keep him tied to the East side of the Wall. These restraints come off only after the Wall has fallen, but by that time it is too late to rekindle the romance he shared with Sophie. In Silent Close No.6, the wall is used as a tool of unification rather than separation. Beerenbaum perceived it as a tool in unifying and solidifying the socialist nation. The wall was representative of the pinnacle of the East German socialist regime, a legacy for Beerenbaum to leave behind. Rosa, on the other hand, views the wall as a physically looming presence upon which she projects her resentment and bitterness onto her father and communism. For all these character the Wall becomes much more than concrete and watchtowers. It divides them all further than spatial limitations allow, creating a mental wall that prevents all Germans from coexisting."

Tags:compare, contrast, german, germany, literature, berlin

Abstract
Although the Berlin Wall was erected by the East German government in order to stop the mass exodus of refugees from East to West Germany, it acquired in the course of its twenty-eight-year life span symbolic meanings which transcended the pragmatic political intention behind its building. As a demarcation line between East and West, the Wall played a significant symbolic role in the "imaginative geography" of the Cold War, detente, and finally the collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe which brought to an end the dominance of a bipolar world system. This paper examines the significance of the Berlin wall from the eyes of author Roger Darton and his book, "Berlin Journal".

Abstract
This paper deals with the redevelopment in Central Berlin after the fall of the Berlin Wall through the lens of architecture. The writer stresses that redevelopment projects like the one in Berlin should strive to reflect an accurate national past; they should be constructed with architecture that is composed of balanced narratives. At the same time, the projects afford Germany the ability to move forward through fashioning Berlin as the economic and cultural capital of Europe. The paper concludes with suggestions for redevelopment processes.

From the Paper
"While the capital's move back to Berlin was contentious, it was representative of a prevailing desire in German society to reassert the German nation as a world power. The architecture of the Spreebogen claimed to recall Germany's Golden Age in the late 19th and early 20th century and to eschew National Socialist designs. Germany saw itself as a victim as well as a perpetrator. It had suffered under the reign of the Soviet Union since the 1940s and could finally again assert its national legitimacy. It desired a capital district that would recall historic successes under leaders like Otto von Bismarck. Nonetheless, it has proved nearly impossible to ignore the National Socialist history in the capital district."

Tags:urban, history, environment, conciliatory, memorialization, meta-narrative, monumental

Abstract
This paper explores the attitude of France to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany.