Berlin Wall Dbq

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After World War II, the last remaining Superpowers became the two most powerful countries in the world. These two nations being the United States and Soviet Union. But because of each country's strong and different views on things like economics and government, a Cold War was started. This war was a battle fought of ideas, not a physical clash. One of the main differences in ideas was communism. The Soviet Union were communist which basically meant the government was in charge of/controlled everything and everyone was paid relatively the same. The United States, on the other hand, were capitalists, which means the people of the US control the production of goods, what they did as work, etc. The Soviet Union had control over Eastern Europe and …show more content…

One of the main reasons was The Berlin Blockade. The Berlin Blockade was the Soviet Union's attempt to try and keep the superpowers controlling West Germany, the United States, France and Great Britain, out of Eastern Germany's counterpart. Basically, cut off Berlin's communication with the outside world. This was a problem for the United States, France, and Great Britain because without access to Berlin, they wouldn’t be able to come and help Berlin and Germany. It also meant that they wouldn’t be able to come and have any say in executive meetings in Berlin. In 1948, the Soviet Union basically tried to limit the other superpowers ability to travel to their sectors of Berlin. An excerpt from the speech Winston Churchill gave in 1945, when the boundary and isolation started to become a problem, explains what is about to start between the Soviet Union and other countries. He says that “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an "Iron Curtain" has descended across the continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe.(Churchill, 1945)” This new blockade caused worry to the superpowers controlling it. The Western side was losing its supplies because its superiors couldn't come in and help by sending things due to the surrounding …show more content…

“During the wall's existence there were around 5000 successful escapes into West Berlin. (RAF Museum Staff, 2013)” People in East Berlin would get really creative with how they would try to escape. According to the RAF Museum, it was reported that people started these escapes with things like people straight up climbing and jumping over the wall, people jumping out of buildings to get and eventually escalated to long tunnels, sliding along aerial wires, flying ultralights and even driving under a checkpoint barrier in a very low sports car. Unfortunately, there were about 200-240 reports of people being killed because they tried to escape. People, from both East and West Berlin, would help people from East Berlin escape even though it made their life.
Thankfully, in the end there was a solution. The Berlin wall was taken down/ opened on November 9, 1989. This was due to the Communist Government falling and losing power throughout

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