Construction of the Berlin Wall

Overnight, East Germany strung barbed wire and then built a wall between East and West Berlin. The Berlin Wall became the symbol of the Cold War and of division.

Between 1949 and 1961 some 2.7 million East Germans left for the West through the still-open city of Berlin. As young skilled workers and professionals drained away, the East German government, with Soviet approval, sealed off West Berlin with barbed wire in the early hours of 13 August 1961 and soon replaced it with a concrete wall.

In October American and Soviet tanks faced each other at Checkpoint Charlie, and in 1963 Kennedy declared in West Berlin, “Ich bin ein Berliner.” More than 140 people died trying to cross the wall, which stood for twenty-eight years until it fell on 9 November 1989.