BERLIN WALL: When soldiers have to place a wall around their city in the middle of the night to keep citizens IN, it pictures a colossal failure in leadership. It is one thing to protect citizens from outside attack, but when residents have been leaving at up to 1,000 per day, including professionals and skilled laborers, it is not a nice place to live! This day in 1961, the Berlin Wall construction was begun, with soldiers laying barbed wire and bricks along the entire political divide between East Berlin (controlled by the Communists), and West Berlin, which was democratic. Even as the wall was erected overnight, telephone wires between the 2 sides of the city were cut. The wall eventually reached over 100 miles long and ultimately from 6 feet to 12 feet high, patrolled by armed guards. There was a dangerous 300-foot-wide “no-man’s-land” strip between the wall and a smaller wall, all in an attempt to keep citizens from fleeing. Still there were folks willing to take the risk to escape to freedom, including a girl who attended high school with me, who escaped with her family, carrying all they could on one bicycle. After 28 years, as the Soviet Union had declined, the wall was taken down. Let freedom ring!
Posted on: Tue, 13 Aug 2013 13:42:18 +0000
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