History - Cold War, Berlin

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American Veterans return to Germany for Anniversary of the Berlin Airlift on June 27, 2008.
Dub Southers recalled the grueling hours he worked at Celle Air Base at the start of the Berlin Airlift as a flight engineer and crew chief. He remembered well the coal being shipped in from local coal fields, the 196 missions he flew over Berlin and being a 20-year-old Air Force Staff Sergeant keeping the C-54 Skymaster aircraft flying. Air bases in Rhein-Main, Wiesbaden, Celle and Fassberg served as the supply depot for food, coal and other items to be delivered, as well as home and repair shop for the C-47s and C-54s that flew daily roundtrips into West Berlin. It wasn't until 1998 that he started really thinking about the importance of the airlift mission, which lasted from June 1948 to May 1949 and provided vital resources to the German city (of Berlin) cut in half by Soviet rule. For the 60th anniversary of Berlin Airlift they will re-enact the first flight of the airlift, Dub Southers said, and visit the memorial at Rhein-Main Air Base, get on a C-47 and fly the corridor from Frankfurt to Templehof Air Base in Berlin, where there will be another memorial service. "When I first got over there (Celle Air Base), we were working around the clock, 12 hrs on, 12 off, seven days a week. They eventually hired local German aircraft mechanics who worked alongside us. I remember them being very good, as they were older and more experienced .." He said by observing the anniversary and remembering the 31 Americans who died in aircraft accidents during the mission, Americans learn about the importance of the Berlin Airlift. "At this point, I'm very proud of being a part of it," he said. "I know that we affected history big-time. We call it the first victory of the Cold War. Because of the Berlin Airlift, Europe is free. All of Europe would have ended up communist if we were run out." He said during his first return to Germany, Germans actually approached him with appreciation. "We were wearing caps that identified us as Berlin Airlift Veterans, and I don't know how many times we were stopped and thanked for what we did," he said. He said he does not feel like a hero. "The real heroes were the German people in Berlin who suffered the things they put up with in the Eastern Zone," he said. "People just disappeared under the communist rule, because they were speaking out for freedom. We provided what they needed to get by. They are the ones who held out and persevered."

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A little away from the tourist trail on the northern fringes of now-yuppified Prenzlauer Berg the past, as so often in Berlin, intrudes, but only to demonstrate how much the city has changed in a few short years. When we visited in 1985 Bernauer Straße was a curiosity for tourists and a tragedy for its own inhabitants – a street divided along its length by the Berlin Wall. Former neighbour faced neighbour across one of the narrowest strips of No Man’s Land. And this was also the site of some of the most famous escape attempts, including that of Conrad Schumann, a 19 year old GDR border guard who leapt the barbed wire here while the Wall was being constructed. Schumann made it safely but others did not, and today a memorial to some who died in the attempt can be found part-way along Bernauer Straße on its northern side (about halfway between Bernauer Straße station (U8) and the Mauerpark). Photo one shows Bernauer Straße in 1985, at its junction with Ackerstraße, while photo two shows the memorial to those who died near here.

See http://iconicphotos.wordpress.com/2009/05/11/conrad-schumann-defects/ for more about Conrad Schumann – his story has a sad ending.

This wooden cross on my picture stood on the western side of Ebertstraße between Branderburg Gate and Reichstag. It commemorated death of Heinz Sokolowski from Frankfurt/Oder (East Germany) who was shot on the wall by East German border guards at age 47 on November 25, 1965.
There was the inscription on the cross: "Heinz Sokolowski 48 J. Ost-Berlin + 25.11.65 nach 7 Jahren DDR-Haft erschossen auf der Flucht." I was a little surpriced because the name Sokolowski ("ski" at the end) sounded more Polish or rather Slavic than German. Poland and Germany had common history and partly territory and population of both countries mixed in the past.


GENESIS
Over 2.6 million of East Germans escaped to West Berlin or West Germany from 1949 to 1961.
Many people suffered repressions of the Communist regime or wanted to live a better life in the West.
The East German communist government put to power in real by Soviet Union authorities decided to build the wall to prevent from escaping to the West via West Berlin and closed the border between East and West Berlin on August 13, 1961.

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Within Treptower Park in the former East Berlin, there is a cemetery dedicated to the Soviet soldiers that died fighting during the battle for Berlin in the last weeks of WWII. The cemetery was quiet when i visited, i was one of the few people there. In the centre of the cemetery there is a statue of the 'ideal soviet soldier' holding a child and crushing the swastika with a sword. On either side of him are murals dictating the soviet peoples' struggle throughout the war with quotes from Stalin translated to German. The Red Granite flags apparently came from Hitler's Chancellery.

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It happened in 1987 when I was 19 years old. We made a car tour throughout Europe; in 13 countries with my boyfriend of that time. We wanted to visit DDR and East-Berlin too. It was exciting to drive the "Transit BRD" highways, meant only for western visitors' use. Stopping was allowed only at certain marked places; to avoid contact with the locals.
First to West-Berlin of course. When I was about to hand our passports on the border of West- and East Germany, the frontier guard just said, without taking our passports, "Ah, Finnland, gehen sie".
Spent some days in West-Berlin. Then left the car beside the colourful Berlin wall and walked towards the east. Then, on the border of West and East Berlin our passports were verified and checked four times.
It was a strange experience to see how the western life and joy (Berlin had its 750's anniversary) changed immediately to something weird. Like we'd dived back in time some 50 years. No cars, perhaps one or two Trabants or Wartburgs every now and then. Nobody nowhere. The Polizei seemed to have Wartburgs as their official cars.
The Berliner Dom (church) was great, and a couple of other buildings. Otherwise I don't remember anything worth remembering.
I always remember, when coming back to the west waiting at Checkpoint Charlie, those few American guys near us. They seemed to be serious when they stated to each other "Oh I love to see the stars and stripes again".

Berlin is a city where there is so much history around it, but where a lot of the time you just don't actually realize it. On the first night of my visit I stayed in the East near Rosenhalter Platz. The following morning I went for a wander in the neighbourhood and ended up in Bernauer Strasse. This street was the scene of many daring escapes and brave escape attempts while the wall divided the city (one half of the street was in the west, the other in the east) - yet it barely got a mention in my guidebook.

Along the street there were signs describing some of these escapes, in particular the famous run and jump by Conrad Schumann, an East German soldier. Further down the street, heading west, there was a memorial for wall victims and a remaining piece of the wall. It felt rather eerie standing there, trying to imagine how the people would have felt being boxed in.

I spent well over an hour exploring this street, but it made me think that since little of this history is told in the tourist books, what other interesting streets and stories had I missed?

Rathaus Schöneberg is the place where a former US president called himself a donut!

On his visit to the city in 1963, President John F Kennedy, in a famous speech, said "Ich bin ein Berliner". This sounds reasonable to me, but what he really wanted to say was "Ich bin Berliner".

Nevertheless he was extremely popular with the people of West Berlin and the square outside the Rathaus was renamed John-F.-Kennedy-Platz after his visit.

Rathaus Schöneberg was the city hall for west Berlin while the city was divided but since reunification it has resumed its former role as city hall for the Schöneberg district.

Today, most of the Berlin Wall has been taken down. You'll see parts of it in Museums such as the "History of Berlin Museum" in Berlin's Charlettonburg District. You'll see portions of it still standing in an area near the Brandenburg Gate.

You'll see pieces of it sold as souvenoirs. But they may be fake. But, what you'll also see is two bricks side-by-side. In this picture is says: "Berliner Mauer 1961-1989." Mauer means "wall" in English.

Here I am standing in East and West Berlin at the same time 16 years later. In Berlin, one the reminder of the wall is now two bricks in a path. This one is near Potsdammerplatz.