Editing Berlin Wall (section)

==Start of the construction (1961)==
[[File:Aerial View of Divided Berlin.webm|thumb|right|200px|Aerial footage of the wall as filmed by the [[CIA]] in 1961]]
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-85458-0002, Berlin, Mauerbau, Kampfgruppen am Brandenburger Tor.jpg|thumb|East German [[Combat Groups of the Working Class]] close the border on 13 August 1961 in preparation for the Berlin Wall construction]]
[[File:Berlin Wall 1961-11-20.jpg|thumb|East German construction workers building the Berlin Wall, 20 November 1961]]
[[File:So wurde die Berliner Mauer gebaut (CC BY 4.0).webm|thumb|Animation showing how the Berlin Wall was constructed]]
{{main|Berlin Crisis of 1961}}
On 15 June 1961, First Secretary of the [[Socialist Unity Party of Germany|Socialist Unity Party]] and [[State Council of East Germany|GDR State Council]] chairman [[Walter Ulbricht]] stated in an international press conference, {{lang|de|"Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!"}} (No one has the intention of erecting a wall!). It was the first time the colloquial term {{lang|de|Mauer}} (wall) had been used in this context.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Berlin Wall and the Intra-German Border 1961–1989 |last=Rottman |first=Gordon |publisher=Osprey Publishing |year=2008 |location=Oxford, UK |page=29 |isbn=978-184603-193-9}}</ref>

The transcript of a telephone call between [[Nikita Khrushchev]] and Ulbricht, on 1 August in the same year, suggests that the initiative for the construction of the Wall came from Khrushchev.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=http://einestages.spiegel.de/static/topicalbumbackground/4246/_wir_lassen_euch_jetzt_ein_zwei_wochen_zeit.html |title=Wir lassen euch jetzt ein, zwei Wochen Zeit |last=Wiegrefe |first=Klaus |magazine=Spiegel Online |department=Einestages |date=May 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140209044353/http://einestages.spiegel.de/static/topicalbumbackground/4246/_wir_lassen_euch_jetzt_ein_zwei_wochen_zeit.html |archive-date=9 February 2014 |language=de}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.welt.de/politik/article3828831/Das-Gespraech-zwischen-Ulbricht-und-Chruschtschow.html |title=Transcript of the telephone call between Khrushchev and Ulbricht on August 1, 1961 |newspaper=Die Welt |language=de |publisher=Welt.de |date=30 May 2009 |access-date=6 August 2011 |archive-date=21 August 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110821163514/http://www.welt.de/politik/article3828831/Das-Gespraech-zwischen-Ulbricht-und-Chruschtschow.html |url-status=live }}</ref> However, other sources suggest that Khrushchev had initially been wary about building a wall, fearing negative Western reaction. Nevertheless, Ulbricht had pushed for a border closure for some time, arguing that East Germany's existence was at stake.<ref name=Revolution1989/>{{page needed|date=August 2020}}

Khrushchev had become emboldened upon seeing US president [[John F. Kennedy]]'s youth and inexperience, which he considered a weakness. In the 1961 [[Vienna summit]], Kennedy made the error of admitting that the US would not actively oppose the building of a barrier.<ref>{{cite book |last=Kempe |first=Frederick |title=Berlin 1961 |year=2011 |publisher=Penguin Group |isbn=978-0-399-15729-5 |page=[https://archive.org/details/berlin1961kenned0000kemp/page/247 247] |url=https://archive.org/details/berlin1961kenned0000kemp/page/247}}</ref> A feeling of miscalculation and failure immediately afterwards was admitted by Kennedy in a candid interview with ''New York Times'' columnist [[James Reston|James "Scotty" Reston]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://blogs.reuters.com/berlin1961/2011/05/27/the-worst-day-of-jfks-life/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110530005247/http://blogs.reuters.com/berlin1961/2011/05/27/the-worst-day-of-jfks-life/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=30 May 2011 |title=The worst day of JFK's life |first=Frederick |last=Kempe |date=27 May 2011}}</ref> On Saturday, 12 August 1961, the leaders of the GDR attended a [[Party#Garden party|garden party]] at a government guesthouse in {{lang|de|Döllnsee}}, in a wooded area to the north of East Berlin. There, Ulbricht signed the order to close the border and erect a wall.<ref name="cnn.com"/>

At midnight, the police and units of the East German army began to close the border and, by Sunday morning, 13 August, the border with West Berlin was closed. East German troops and workers had begun to tear up streets running alongside the border to make them impassable to most vehicles and to install barbed wire entanglements and fences along the {{cvt|156|km|mi}} around the three western sectors, and the {{cvt|43|km|mi}} that divided West and East Berlin.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.historytoday.com/archive/berlin-wall-secret-history |title=The Berlin Wall: A Secret History |website=www.historytoday.com |access-date=9 April 2019 |archive-date=27 February 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190227114956/http://www.historytoday.com/archive/berlin-wall-secret-history |url-status=live }}</ref> The date of 13 August became commonly referred to as [[Barbed Wire Sunday]] in Germany.<ref name="cnn.com"/>

The barrier was built inside East Berlin on East German territory to ensure that it did not encroach on West Berlin at any point. Generally, the Wall was only slightly inside East Berlin, but in a few places it was some distance from the legal border, most notably at [[Berlin Potsdamer Bahnhof|Potsdamer Bahnhof]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Exchanges of Territory |url=http://www.berlin.de/mauer/zahlen_fakten/gebietsaustausch/index.en.html |publisher=City of Berlin |access-date=23 January 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304085918/http://www.berlin.de/mauer/zahlen_fakten/gebietsaustausch/index.en.html |archive-date=4 March 2016}}</ref> and the Lenné Triangle<ref>{{cite web |title=Exchanges of Territory: Lenné-Dreieck |url=http://www.berlin.de/mauer/zahlen_fakten/gebietsaustausch/index.en.html#lenne |publisher=City of Berlin |access-date=23 January 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304085918/http://www.berlin.de/mauer/zahlen_fakten/gebietsaustausch/index.en.html |archive-date=4 March 2016}}</ref> that is now much of the [[Potsdamer Platz]] development.

Later, the initial barrier was built up into the Wall proper, the first concrete elements and large blocks being put in place on 17 August. During the construction of the Wall, [[National People's Army]] (NVA) and [[Combat Groups of the Working Class]] (KdA) soldiers stood in front of it with orders to shoot anyone who attempted to defect. Additionally, chain fences, walls, minefields and other obstacles were installed along the length of East Germany's western border with West Germany proper. A wide [[no man's land]] was cleared as well to provide a better overview and a clear line of fire at fleeing refugees.<ref name="autogenerated1961">{{cite web |url=http://www.upi.com/Audio/Year_in_Review/Events-of-1961/Wall-Goes-Up-in-Berlin/12295509433760-7/ |title=Wall Goes Up in Berlin – Events of 1961 – Year in Review |publisher=UPI.com |date=29 May 1998 |access-date=6 August 2011 |archive-date=26 July 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130726230428/http://www.upi.com/Audio/Year_in_Review/Events-of-1961/Wall-Goes-Up-in-Berlin/12295509433760-7/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Immediate effects===
With the closing of the east–west sector boundary in Berlin, the vast majority of East Germans could no longer travel or emigrate to West Germany. Berlin soon went from being the easiest place to make an unauthorized crossing between East and West Germany to being the most difficult.<ref>Keeling, Drew (2014), business-of-migration.com [http://www.business-of-migration.com/migration-processes/other-regions/berlin-wall-and-migration/ "Berlin Wall and Migration," ''Migration as a travel business''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225032330/https://www.business-of-migration.com/migration-processes/other-regions/berlin-wall-and-migration/ |date=25 February 2021 }}</ref> Many families were split, while East Berliners employed in the West were cut off from their jobs. West Berlin became an isolated [[exclave]] in a hostile land. West Berliners demonstrated against the Wall, led by their Mayor ({{lang|de|Oberbürgermeister}}) [[Willy Brandt]], who criticized the United States for failing to respond and went so far as to suggest to Washington what to do next. Kennedy was furious.<ref>{{Harvnb|Daum|2008|pp=27–28}}</ref>  Allied intelligence agencies had hypothesized about a wall to stop the flood of refugees, but the main candidate for its location was around the perimeter of the city. In 1961, Secretary of State [[Dean Rusk]] proclaimed, "The Wall certainly ought not to be a permanent feature of the European landscape. I see no reason why the Soviet Union should think it is to their advantage in any way to leave there that monument to communist failure."<ref name="autogenerated1961"/>

United States and UK sources had expected the Soviet sector to be sealed off from West Berlin but were surprised by how long the East Germans took for such a move. They considered the Wall as an end to concerns about a GDR/Soviet retaking or capture of the whole of Berlin; the Wall would presumably have been an unnecessary project if such plans were afloat. Thus, they concluded that the possibility of a Soviet military conflict over Berlin had decreased.<ref>Taylor, Frederick. ''The Berlin Wall: 13 August 1961 – 9 November 1989''. Bloomsbury 2006</ref>

The East German government claimed that the Wall was an "anti-fascist protective rampart" ({{langx|de|"antifaschistischer Schutzwall"}}) intended to dissuade aggression from the West.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.goethe.de/ges/ztg/thm/ddg/en1748571.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080409133940/http://www.goethe.de/ges/ztg/thm/ddg/en1748571.htm |archive-date=9 April 2008 |title=Goethe-Institut – Topics – German History  |date=9 April 2008 |access-date=6 August 2011 |url-status=live}}</ref> Another official justification was the activities of Western agents in Eastern Europe.<ref>{{lang|de|"Die Regierungen der Warschauer Vertragsstaaten wenden sich an die Volkskammer und an die Regierung der DDR mit dem Vorschlag, an der Westberliner Grenze eine solche Ordnung einzuführen, durch die der Wühltätigkeit gegen die Länder des sozialistischen Lagers zuverlässig der Weg verlegt und ringsum das ganze Gebiet West-Berlins eine verlässliche Bewachung gewährleistet wird."}} {{lang|de|[https://www.welt.de/print-welt/article252861/Berlin_wird_geteilt.html Die Welt: Berlin wird geteilt]}}</ref> The Eastern German government also claimed that West Berliners were buying out state-subsidized goods in East Berlin. East Germans and others greeted such statements with skepticism, as most of the time, the border was only closed for citizens of East Germany traveling to the West, but not for residents of West Berlin travelling to the East.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.zlb.de/projekte/millennium/original_html/nd_1961_1408.GIF.html |language=de |title=Neues Deutschland: Normales Leben in Berlin,14 August 1961 |publisher=Zlb.de |access-date=6 August 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110718025112/http://www.zlb.de/projekte/millennium/original_html/nd_1961_1408.GIF.html |archive-date=18 July 2011}}</ref> The construction of the Wall had caused considerable hardship to families divided by it. Most people believed that the Wall was mainly a means of preventing the citizens of East Germany from entering or fleeing to West Berlin.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Collapse: The Accidental Opening of the Berlin Wall |last=Sarotte |first=Mary Elise |publisher=Basic Books |year=2014 |location=New York |page=114 |isbn=978-0-465-06494-6}}</ref>

===Secondary response===
[[File:1962-08-16 The Wall.ogv|thumb|right|[[Universal Newsreel]] of the 1st anniversary of the Berlin Wall]]
[[File:Kennedy in Berlin.jpg|thumb|right|[[President of the United States|US President]] [[John F. Kennedy]] visiting the Berlin Wall on 26 June 1963]]
The [[National Security Agency]] was the only American intelligence agency that was aware that East Germany was to take action to deal with the brain drain problem. On 9 August 1961, the NSA intercepted an advance warning information of the [[Socialist Unity Party of Germany|Socialist Unity Party's]] plan to close the intra-Berlin border between East and West Berlin completely for foot traffic. The interagency intelligence Berlin Watch Committee assessed that this intercept "might be the first step in a plan to close the border."<ref name="TNSA20130925" /><ref name="AidBurr20130925" /> This warning did not reach John F. Kennedy until noon on 13 August 1961, while he was vacationing in his yacht off the [[Kennedy Compound]] in [[Hyannis Port, Massachusetts]]. While Kennedy was angry that he had no advance warning, he was relieved that the East Germans and the Soviets had only divided Berlin without taking any action against West Berlin's access to the West. However, he denounced the Berlin Wall, whose erection worsened the relations between the United States and the Soviet Union.<ref name="TNSA20130925">{{cite web |title=Berlin Crisis After Dividing Berlin, August 1961 |url=http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB441/docs/berlin%20crisis%20after.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130928114740/http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB441/docs/berlin%20crisis%20after.pdf |archive-date=2013-09-28 |url-status=live |publisher=The National Security Archive at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. |access-date=26 September 2013}}</ref><ref name="AidBurr20130925">{{cite web |title='Disreputable if Not Outright Illegal': The National Security Agency versus Martin Luther King, Muhammad Ali, Art Buchwald, Frank Church, et al. |url=http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB441/ |publisher=The National Security Archive at the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. |access-date=26 September 2013 |author1=Matthew M. Aid |author2=William Burr |name-list-style=amp |date=25 September 2013 |archive-date=26 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130926223814/http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB441/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

In response to the erection of the Berlin Wall, a retired general, [[Lucius D. Clay]], was appointed by Kennedy as his special advisor with ambassadorial rank. Clay had been the Military Governor of the US Zone of Occupation in Germany during the period of the Berlin Blockade and had ordered the first measures in what became the [[Berlin Airlift]]. He was immensely popular with the residents of West Berlin, and his appointment was an unambiguous sign that Kennedy would not compromise on the status of West Berlin. As a symbolic gesture, Kennedy sent Clay and Vice President [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] to West Berlin. They landed at [[Tempelhof International Airport|Tempelhof Airport]] on the afternoon of Saturday, 19 August 1961 and were greeted enthusiastically by the local population.<ref>{{Harvnb|Daum|2008|pp=51–56}}</ref><ref name="cnn.com"/>

They arrived in a city defended by three Allied brigades—one each from the UK ([[Berlin Infantry Brigade]]), the US ([[Berlin Brigade]]), and France ([[Forces Françaises à Berlin]]). On 16 August, Kennedy had given the order for them to be reinforced. Early on 19 August, the 1st Battle Group, [[18th Infantry Regiment (United States)|18th Infantry Regiment]] (commanded by Colonel Glover S. Johns Jr.) was alerted.<ref>See also [[David Hackworth|Hackworth]], About Face</ref>

On Sunday morning, U.S. troops marched from West Germany through East Germany, bound for West Berlin. Lead elements—arranged in a column of 491 vehicles and trailers carrying 1,500 men, divided into five march units—left the Helmstedt-Marienborn checkpoint at 06:34. At [[Marienborn]], the Soviet checkpoint next to [[Helmstedt]] on the West German-East German border, US personnel were counted by guards. The column was {{cvt|160|km|mi}} long, and covered {{cvt|177|km|mi}} from Marienborn to Berlin in full battle gear. East German police watched from beside trees next to the [[autobahn]] all the way along.<ref name="cnn.com"/>

The front of the convoy arrived at the outskirts of Berlin just before noon, to be met by Clay and Johnson, before parading through the streets of Berlin in front of a large crowd. At 04:00 on 21 August, Lyndon Johnson left West Berlin in the hands of General Frederick O. Hartel and his brigade of 4,224 officers and men. "For the next three and a half years, American battalions would rotate into West Berlin, by autobahn, at three-month intervals to demonstrate Allied rights to the city".<ref>{{Cite book |title=Escaping The Bonds of Earth: The Fifties and the Sixties |last=Evans |first=Ben |publisher=Praxis Publishing |year=2014 |location=Chichester, UK |page=38 |isbn=978-0-387-79093-0}}</ref>

The creation of the Wall had important implications for both German states. By stemming the exodus of people from East Germany, the East German government was able to reassert its control over the country: despite discontent with the Wall, economic problems caused by dual currency and the black market were largely eliminated. The economy in the GDR began to grow. However, the Wall proved a public relations disaster for the communist bloc as a whole. Western powers portrayed it as a symbol of communist tyranny, particularly after East German border guards shot and killed would-be defectors. Such fatalities were later treated as acts of murder by the reunified Germany.<ref>Goodman, Micah (1996) "After the Wall: The Legal Ramifications of the East German Border Guard Trials in Unified Germany," ''Cornell International Law Journal'': Vol. 29: Iss. 3, Article 3. p. 728</ref>