Page 15 - NOV 2018 proof 1 The Castle Pines Connection

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A CITY DIVIDED: ORIGINS OF THE COLD WAR
Article and photos by Joe Gschwendtner
The Wall, erected in 1961, fell in 1989. The wall was actually two walls as depicted. Between them was no-man’s land of mines, dogs, and machine guns.
The Third Reich’s defeat was bloody. By military agreement, the Russian Army reached Berlin rst. Under siege by tanks and artillery, defending soldiers (mostly boys and older men) were captured or annihilated. So vicious was the carnage, German soldiers ed westward, seeking more reliable mercy from western
allies. With Adolf Hitler’s fate sealed, he committed suicide in his underground bunker.
European victory came in April, 1945. At the Cecilienhof (Potsdam) Conference, Stalin, Churchill and U.S. President Harry Truman met, striking a tenuous post-war military administrative settlement creating the Allied Control Council housed in the Kammergericht. There, Prussian land
was distributed to Poland, Lithuania, and Russia and thus permanently eliminated from all maps forever. The German remainder was split into four occupational zones as was Berlin – a predicament for the German people. Notwithstanding freedom of movement allowed for family and commerce, geopolitical tensions rose. Winston Churchill raised it a notch with his 1947 Iron Curtain speech and the Cold War began...
Since Berlin was entirely within the Soviet sphere, all roads and air corridors were controlled by the Russian military. Their intent was always to overwhelm the whole of Germany politically and militarily.
Not so the allies; their plan was to unify their three sectors making Germany an independent state again. A boiling point was reached when the Soviets withdrew from the Allied Control Council in March 1948.
On June 24, 1948, all land and sea
routes into Berlin were shut down by the Soviets, blockading Berlin. In response, “Operation Vittles” commenced and the Berlin Airlift began. Americans believed
an aerial lifeline could save the besieged city because the Soviets would not commit armed aggression by shooting a plane down. Though proven right, the task was Herculean. Eleven months later, after 278,228 ights and 92 million miles own, the Soviets backed o . The cost: over $5 billion (today’s dollars) and 104 fatalities. A monument at Berlin’s Templehof Airport honors those who perished.
Crosses on the Spree River commemorating 3 of 239 deaths of East Berlin Escapees.
The Mansion Cecilienhof in Potsdam, Germany, site of Post-war meeting with Churchill, Truman, and Stalin.
As the Marshall plan pumped money into Germany, capitalism worked wonders.
West Berlin also became increasingly prosperous and like the mythical Phoenix bird, rose from the ashes. At the same time, East Berlin remained largely unrehabilitated and drab.
While borders were still open, 2.7 million Germans had ed westward by 1961, an embarrassment to the Soviet Union and visible proof of Communism’s failure. On August 13, 1961, the Berlin Wall was thrown up to stop the exodus. It began with barbed wire, morphing into a massive concrete barrier with guard towers, machine guns, land mines, and dogs. Not until 1989 would it fall....
Most Cold War debris has been buried or hauled o ; pieces of the Wall remain. Lines on the street mark where it once lanced
the city. Crosses sit eerily on the Spree River commemorating those gunned down trying to escape. Should this tale of two cities continue to jade future dealings with Russia? You decide...
Third and last in the series: A city like no Other
*Tourist attractions in bold.
(Luftbrucke) Monument to the Berlin Airlift and 70 men who died in it. At Templehof Airport, Berlin.
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