Editing Berlin Wall (section)

===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>