Map Of Cold War Germany

Edge crossings between East and Westward Frg

Crossing points on the inner High german border, 1982^[one]

Crossing the inner High german border remained possible throughout the Cold War; it was never entirely sealed in the fashion of the edge between the ii Koreas, though there were severe restrictions on the movement of East High german citizens.^[two] The postal service-war agreements on the governance of Berlin specified that the Western Allies were to have access to the city via defined air, road, rail and river links. This was by and large respected past the Soviets and East Germans, albeit with periodic interruptions and harassment of travellers. Even during the Berlin Occludent of 1948, supplies could be brought in by air – the famous Berlin Airlift – and Allied war machine convoys could pass through East Frg en route to Berlin.

The border could be crossed legally only through a limited number of air, route, rail and river routes. Travellers to and from Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Czechoslovakia could likewise pass through East Germany. Admission rights for non-Germans were otherwise very restricted. Foreigners had to submit an itinerary to the East German language country tourist function upwards to nine weeks in advance, paying booking fees and registering with the local police on arrival, purchasing fuel only from specially approved petrol stations and spending a prescribed minimum of money each twenty-four hours.^[iii] They were required to stay in country-owned "Interhotels", where rooms cost five to ten times more than than the price of the (very few) ordinary Due east High german hotels.^[4] Given these restrictions, not surprisingly, East Frg did not develop much of a tourist industry; even every bit late equally May 1990, there were merely 45,000 hotel beds in the unabridged state.^[5] Westerners found crossing the inner German border to be a somewhat disturbing experience. Jan Morris wrote:

Travelling from west to east through [the inner German edge] was like entering a drab and disturbing dream, peopled by all the ogres of totalitarianism, a half-lit world of shabby resentments, where anything could be washed to you, I used to experience, without anybody always hearing of it, and your every stride was dogged by watchful optics and mechanisms.^[six]

Each of the different means of crossing the border had its ain complications. Only aircraft of the iii Western Allies were allowed to fly to or from West Berlin; civilian traffic was principally served by Air French republic, British European Airways (afterward British Airways) and Pan Am.^[7] River traffic was hugely of import to the survival of W Berlin, conveying around v 1000000 tons of cargo a yr to the city, but was subjected to numerous inspections and piddling restrictions past the East High german authorities.^[8] Rail traffic was excruciatingly slow; locomotives and train crews had to be changed at the edge, the East German Send Law (Trapos) carried out inspections using sniffer dogs to uncover stowaways, passports and visas had to be processed at border stations and the condition of the track was so poor that trains were limited to a maximum speed of 70 kilometres per hour (43 mph).^[nine] Road crossings were adequately straightforward but irksome considering of the extensive border formalities and inspections. Drivers were required to stay on designated transit routes across East Germany.^[ten]

Crossing points [edit]

Vehicles queuing at the E German passport control at the Marienborn border crossing signal, 1989

The West German border crossing facility at Herleshausen in 1985, looking west along Bundesautobahn 4

Before 1952, the inner German edge could be crossed at almost any point along its length. The fortification of the edge resulted in the severing of 32 railway lines, three autobahns, 31 main roads, eight primary roads, most 60 secondary roads and thousands of lanes and cart tracks.^[xi] The number of crossing points was reduced to three air corridors, three road corridors, two railway lines and two river connections giving transit access to Berlin, plus a handful of additional crossing points for freight traffic.^[12] The situation improved somewhat afterwards the rapprochement between the two German states in the 1970s. Additional border crossings for so-chosen kleine Grenzverkehr – "small-scale border traffic", essentially for West German language mean solar day trippers  – were opened at various locations along the border.

The crossings [edit]

East German stamps from the Marienborn crossing.

By 1982, in that location were 19 border crossings: six roads, iii autobahns, viii railway lines plus the Elbe river and the Mittellandkanal.^[1]

Road crossing (East/West checkpoints, from due north to south)

• Selmsdorf/Schlutup
• Zarrentin/Gudow
  • Located on Bundesautobahn 24 between West Berlin and Hamburg.
• Horst/Lauenburg
• Salzwedel/Bergen
• Marienborn/Helmstedt
  • Largest crossing, on Bundesautobahn 2 between Hanover and W Berlin. Used as primary transit checkpoint for those going to or coming from West Berlin.
• Worbis/Duderstadt
• Wartha/Herleshausen
• Meiningen/Eussenhausen
• Eisfeld/Rottenbach
• Hirschberg/Rudolphstein

Railway crossing

• Herrnburg/Lübeck
• Schwanheide/Büchen
• Oebisfelde/Wolfsburg
• Marienborn/Helmstedt
• Ellrich/Walkenried
• Gerstungen/Bebra
• Probstzella/Ludwigsstadt
• Gutenfurst/Hof

H2o crossing

• Cumlose/Schnackenburg
• Ruhen/Buchhorst

The largest crossing point or Grenzübergangsstelle (GÜSt) betwixt East and West Federal republic of germany was at Marienborn on the Hanover–Berlin autobahn. It was originally a set up of elementary huts straddling the edge, where British and Soviet military machine constabulary checked travellers between the eastern and western zones. In 1971–72 the East High german government expanded information technology into a 35 hectares (86 acres) complex through which 34.6 million travellers passed betwixt 1985 and 1989. The British, French and Americans worked alongside the Westward High german Bundesgrenzschutz and Customs to maintain a corresponding checkpoint near Helmstedt. Codenamed Checkpoint Alpha, this was the offset of three Centrolineal checkpoints on the route to Berlin.^[13] The others were Checkpoint Bravo, where the autobahn crossed from East Deutschland into West Berlin, and nearly famous of all, Checkpoint Charlie, the merely place where non-Germans could cross by road or pes from West to East Berlin.^[14]

Stasi secret law officers interviewed travellers entering or leaving Due east Germany in this room at the Marienborn border crossing point

On the other side of the edge at Marienborn, over 1,000 East German officials worked effectually the clock to process travellers. A large proportion of the staff were officers of the Stasi, the much-feared secret police force, although they wore the uniforms of the regular Grenztruppen. The real Grenztruppen were as well present to provide war machine backup, every bit were Eastward German customs officers and Soviet military officials who were responsible for inspecting Allied military machine vehicles inbound East Germany. The main functions of the staff at Marienborn and other border crossing points were to gainsay smuggling, to "defend the state border" – by which was meant preventing escapes from East Deutschland – and to stop whatsoever items accounted politically or socially unacceptable from inbound or leaving the country.^[13] A broad diverseness of items were forbidden to be imported or exported. Western magazines and newspapers, recorded materials, films, radios and medicines were among the more anticipated prohibited items, though it was unclear why items such as eels and asparagus could not be brought beyond the edge.^[15]

The prevention of escapes was a key priority at crossing points such as Marienborn. Information technology was non possible to just drive through the gap in the border fence that existed at crossing points, equally the East Germans installed high-bear upon vehicle barriers mounted at chest height. These could (and did) kill drivers who attempted to ram through them. As a last resort, massive rolling barriers (Kraftfahrzeugschnellsperre) 11 metres (36 ft) long and weighing vi tons apiece could be catapulted across the carriageway using hydraulic rams. They were capable of stopping a 50-ton truck travelling at 80 kilometres per 60 minutes (fifty mph). The guards at border crossings were, every bit elsewhere, authorised to use weapons to stop escape attempts.^[16]

Vehicles were subjected to rigorous checks to uncover escapees. Inspection pits and mirrors immune the undersides of vehicles to be scrutinised. Probes were used to investigate the chassis and even the fuel tank, where an escapee might be concealed, and vehicles could be partially dismantled in on-site garages. At Marienborn there was even a mortuary garage where coffins could exist checked to confirm that the occupants actually were dead.^[thirteen] From the late 1970s, East Germany also installed concealed gamma-ray detectors ("gamma guns") at border crossings which used radioactive caesium-137 sources to observe people concealed inside vehicles. The discovery of this do acquired a health scare after reunification. A subsequent investigation by federal authorities establish that these involuntary screenings did not event in "a harmful dose" despite violating bones radiation safety protocols.^[17]

Passengers, too, were checked thoroughly with an inspection of their papers and frequently an interrogation virtually their travel plans and reasons for travelling. The organisation was slow and low-engineering science, relying largely on vast card indexes recording travellers' details, only it was effective notwithstanding; during the 28 years of functioning of the Marienborn circuitous, no successful escapes were recorded.^[18]

Edge crossing regulations [edit]

A visa to enter the GDR, July 1989

Westward and E Germans were treated very differently when inbound or leaving East Federal republic of germany. Westward Germans were able to cantankerous the border relatively freely to visit relatives, though they had to go through numerous bureaucratic formalities imposed by the East German government. These included applying in advance for permission, registering with the local constabulary on arrival, remaining within a specified area for a specified flow and obtaining an go out visa from the police force on departure.

East Germans were subjected to far more stringent restrictions. The Eastward High german constitution of 1949 granted citizens a theoretical right to go out the country, though it was inappreciably respected in practice. Even this limited right was removed in the constitution of 1968 which bars citizens' liberty of motion to the expanse within the land borders.^[xix] It was not until November 1964 that they were allowed to visit the Due west at all, and even then only pensioners were allowed. This gave rise to a joke that only in East Germany did people look frontwards to former historic period.^[20] East German language pensioners were able to visit the West for up to four weeks in a year, just were not permitted to have more than than a token 10 East German marks with them, requiring them to depend on the back up of relatives, churches and the West German government. Equally they were retired, they were seen by the Due east High german authorities as economically unimportant and no great loss if they defected. The vast majority, though, chose to render home at the end of their stay.^[21]

Not until 1972 were younger East Germans permitted to travel to the West, though few did so until the mid-1980s. They were rarely permitted to take their ain car but had to get by train or bus instead. A lengthy process had to be endured to register with the police for a passport and leave visa and to undergo close questioning about their reasons for wanting to travel. An application to travel had to be submitted well in accelerate of the planned difference. They also had to submit an application and undergo a personal evaluation at their workplace. Their employer would so submit a statement and various forms to the police. Applicants were left in the dark about the success of their application until the twenty-four hour period before their divergence. They were required to go over again to the police and present various items of paperwork earlier obtaining a passport and visa, for which a 60 DM fee was charged – a substantial fraction of an East German's monthly salary.^[22]

The odds were confronting successful applications, as simply around forty,000 a twelvemonth were approved^{[ clarification needed ]}. Refusal was quite frequently arbitrary, depending on the goodwill of local officials.^[23] A few categories of citizens were permitted relatively gratis travel. Members of the Party elite and cultural ambassadors such every bit sportspeople, singers, film directors and writers were frequently given permission to travel, as were essential transport workers such as barge crewmen, railway workers and truck drivers. However, they were not permitted to accept their families with them.^[24]

Until the belatedly 1980s, ordinary East Germans were only permitted to travel to the Due west on "urgent family business concern" such every bit the marriage, serious illness or death of a shut relative. In February 1986, the authorities relaxed the definition of "urgent family business", though it still required travellers to leave backside "collateral" (in outcome, a earnest) such as a spouse, child or other close relative. This massively increased the number of citizens able to travel to the West.^[25] The number of legal E German edge-crossers rose from 66,000 in 1985 to 573,000 in 1986, 1.ii 1000000 in 1987 and 2.2 1000000 in 1988. The "pensioner traffic" increased greatly as well, from i.6 million a twelvemonth in 1985 to 3.8 million in 1987.^[26] And more 99.5% of the border-crossers returned habitation.^[27] The relaxation of the border restrictions was said to have been motivated past a desire on the part of the E German leadership to reduce their citizens' want to travel and shrink the number applying to immigrate. In practise, notwithstanding, it had exactly the opposite effect. An April 1988 article in The Washington Post wondered prophetically whether the policy would atomic number 82 to East Frg "fac[ing] the prospect that the freer travel policy could be destabilizing by whetting desires for additional liberties."^[25]

Even if East Germans got a visa to cantankerous the border, they were nonetheless subject to East German government restrictions on the western side. Groups visiting West Germany were required to leave backside all of their identification, without which they could not prove their entitlement to West German citizenship. Individual members were forbidden from walking alone or collecting the 100 DM "welcome money" that the West High german regime gave to all Eastward German language visitors. The grouping as a whole was responsible for making certain none of its members defected. They could all look penalty if someone did "take off". Such rules provided a powerful incentive to keep potential defectors in line.^[28]

Ordinary East Germans strongly resented the travel restrictions. Most holidays had to be spent at dwelling or in state-run vacation resorts. Husbands and wives ofttimes had to accept dissever holidays because of the difficulty in getting approval for exit from employers. Those who could travel were only free to go to "fraternal Socialist states" – Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the Soviet Wedlock (though Poland was taken off the listing later on 1981 to prevent the spread of the Solidarity trade unionism "infection"). Fifty-fifty then, they had to pay loftier prices to stay in second-course adaptation and were often shocked by the poor living conditions, particularly in the Soviet Union, which GDR propaganda had promoted every bit "the almost modern and progressive state in the world."^[29]

Emigrating from E Germany [edit]

Crossing the edge by track at Oebisfelde railway station, Apr 1990

The GDR did non encourage emigration, perhaps non surprisingly considering that the inner German language border fortifications and Berlin Wall had been erected specifically to stop emigration. There was no formal legal ground under which a denizen could immigrate from the state. In 1975, nevertheless, Eastward Germany signed up to the Helsinki Accords, a pan-European treaty to improve relations between the countries of Europe. The Accords were regarded past the Due east High german government as existence hugely important. German democratic republic leader Erich Honecker commented that the Accords "fixed" the "territorial and political outcomes" of the Second Earth State of war, in effect ratifying the sectionalization of Germany.^[30]

However, the Accords also included a provision on liberty of move that was to lead to the regime's authority being increasingly undermined. As Due east German citizens learned about this provision – which was non publicised past the German democratic republic's state-controlled media – an increasing number sought to use it to emigrate. They applied for exit visas, citing Helsinki in their applications. The numbers were relatively small at first, averaging effectually seven,200 first-time applications and the granting of four,600 exit visas annually during the late 1970s. By the tardily 1980s numbers had snowballed to over 100,000 applications with effectually fifteen,000–25,000 get out visas being granted annually.^{[31] [32]} Legal emigration posed a dilemma for the regime; although it provided a prophylactic valve of sorts and immune East Germany to portray itself equally adhering to the Helsinki norms, information technology ran the hazard of the Due east German population coming to demand a general right to emigrate.^[31] A Central Commission report prepared in 1988 warned that fifty-fifty Party members were not sufficiently motivated to oppose emigration:

The necessary commitment to preventing attempts to immigrate is not nonetheless nowadays in many Party branches, workplaces and [FDGB] collectives, or amongst citizens. The required prevailing temper of opposition to these phenomena has non yet been achieved. Even Party members, FDGB functionaries or brigade leaders sometimes state that they fail to understand why these citizens are non permitted to emigrate.^[31]

The regime sought to dissuade would-exist émigrés through a variety of measures. The process of applying for an go out permit was deliberately intended to be ho-hum, demeaning and frustrating, with a low gamble of success. Applicants were pushed to the margins of society. They were demoted or sacked from their jobs, excluded from universities and subjected to ostracism.^[33] If the applicants were parents, they could face the threat of having their children taken into state custody on the grounds that they were unfit to bring up children.^[34] The heavily politicised East High german police code was used to punish those who continued to employ for emigration despite repeated rejections. Those who repeatedly submitted emigration applications faced charges of "impeding ... the state and social activeness". If they sought assist from contacts in the West, such as relatives or Due west German land bodies, they were guilty of "illegal contact" or "traitorous data transfer or activities as an amanuensis." Criticising the political system was a crime of "public disparagement". Over 10,000 applicants were arrested by the Stasi between the 1970s and 1989 on such charges.^[35]

Such repressive treatment may well take reduced the number of people who were willing to apply for an leave visa; however, it as well provoked the cosmos of a modest merely vocal pro-reform movement willing to directly and publicly challenge the regime.^[36] The government establish information technology difficult to deal with such people; equally ane historian comments, "the scale and spontaneity of demonstrative actions, and the obstinate delivery of the applicants, repeatedly forced the [Due east German] power apparatus to make concessions on travel and emigration bug in guild to forestall ... massive, uncontrolled eruptions." This was to have important consequences at the terminate of the 1980s. A report for the Fundamental Committee'southward security section noted: "The emigration trouble is confronting u.s.a. with a fundamental problem of the German democratic republic'southward development. Experience shows that the current repertoire of solutions (improved travel possibilities, expatriation of applicants, etc.) have not brought the desired results, but rather the opposite." The agitation for emigration, the report concluded presciently, "threatens to undermine behavior in the correctness of the Party's policies."^[37]

Ransoms and "humanitarian releases" [edit]

In improver to the emigration programme, East German citizens could also emigrate through the semi-secret route of existence ransomed to the West German language government. Between 1964 and 1989, 33,755 political prisoners were ransomed. A further two,087 prisoners were released to the West under an amnesty in 1972. Another 215,000 people, including 2,000 children cutting off from their parents, were allowed to leave Due east Federal republic of germany to rejoin their families. In substitution, Due west Germany paid over 3.4 billion DM – nearly $ii.3 billion at 1990 prices – in goods and hard currency.^[38] The annual ransom fees became such a fixture, and so essential to the running of the Due east High german economy, that the East German authorities deemed for the ransoms equally a stock-still item in the German democratic republic's state budget.^[39] Those who were ransomed would be taken to a detention centre in Karl-Marx-Stadt (now Chemnitz) earlier being driven beyond the border in coaches and officially expelled past the German democratic republic regime.^[twoscore]

Every bit the two governments did non have whatever formal relations when the ransoms first began, they were arranged betwixt two lawyers, East German language Wolfgang Vogel and West German language Jürgen Stange. The initially hush-hush arrangement was revealed by Rainer Barzel, the Federal Minister for All-German Diplomacy at the time, who wrote in his memoirs (published in 1978): "The toll for the prisoners was determined on an private footing. Information technology was fixed according to the prisoner's human and political weight. Those serving life sentences cost more." The prices ranged from effectually 1,875 DM for a worker to around 11,250 DM for a physician; the justification, co-ordinate to Due east Frg, was that this was compensation for the money invested by the state in the prisoner's training. For a while, payments were made in kind using goods that were in short supply in East Federal republic of germany, such equally oranges, bananas, coffee and medical drugs. The average prisoner was worth around 4,000 DM worth of goods.^[41] Ultimately the ransoms became unproblematic cash payments, funded by a shadowy network of agencies and rich individuals that included the federal government, the Evangelical Lutheran Church building and the fervently anti-communist millionaire publisher Axel Springer. The scheme was highly controversial in the West. It was denounced past many as human trafficking only was dedicated by others as an "deed of pure humanitarianism".^[42]

Encounter also [edit]

• Border guards of the inner High german border
• Escape attempts and victims of the inner German border
• Development of the inner German border
• Fortifications of the inner German border

Notes [edit]

1. ^ ^{a b} Based on the list in the appendix to §18 of the regulation implementing the Police on the State Edge of the German language Democratic Democracy of 25 March 1982
2. ^ Buchholz, p. 57
3. ^ Fowle, Farnsworth (8 February 1981). "Dresden's Salvaged Treasures". The New York Times.
4. ^ Gleye, p. 135
5. ^ Kiefer, Francine South. (eleven May 1990). "Tourists Inundation Into Due east Germany". The Christian Science Monitor.
6. ^ Morris, January (1997). Fifty years of Europe: an album . New York City: Villard. p. 71. ISBN978-0-679-41610-4.
7. ^ Shears, p. 142
8. ^ Shears, pp. 138–139
9. ^ Shears, p. 131–137
10. ^ Shears, p. 141
11. ^ Shears, p. 18
12. ^ Rottman, p. twoscore
13. ^ ^{a b c} Display materials, Gedenkstätte Deutsche Teilung Marienborn
14. ^ "History hits the wall – Tourists warm to Berlin's Cold War". The Dominicus Telegraph. London. xxx May 2004.
15. ^ Shears, p. 144
16. ^ Brandish materials, Grenzlandmuseum Eichsfeld
17. ^ Hertle, p. 129
18. ^ Cowell, Alan (12 September 1996). "Abreast the Autobahn, a Common cold-State of war Retention Lane". The New York Times.
19. ^ Bailey, p. 31
20. ^ Shears, p. 15
21. ^ Shears, p. 146
22. ^ "The formalities to exist carried out by citizens of the German democratic republic wishing to enter the Federal Democracy." Grenzmuseum Eichsfeld
23. ^ Childs (2001), p. 29
24. ^ Bailey, p. 32
25. ^ ^{a b} McCartney, Robert J. (sixteen April 1988). "Due east. Federal republic of germany Relaxes Curbs on Working Citizens' Visits to West". The Washington Post.
26. ^ Childs, David (1989). "The SED faces the challenges of Ostpolitik and Glasnost". In Childs, David; Baylis, Thomas A.; Rueschemeyer, Marilyn (eds.). East Frg in comparative perspective . London: Routledge. p. 5. ISBN978-0-415-00496-1.
27. ^ Comas, José (8 March 1985). "Polémica en Alemania Oriental sobre si se autoriza la vuelta de los que emigraron a la RFA". El País.
28. ^ Gleye, Paul (1991). Behind the wall: an American in East Germany, 1988–89. Carbondale, Illinois: SIU Printing. p. 137. ISBN978-0-8093-1743-ane.
29. ^ Childs (2001), p. xxx
30. ^ McAdams, James A. (1985). East Germany and détente: building dominance later the wall . Cambridge: Cambridge University Printing. p. 148. ISBN9780521268356.
31. ^ ^{a b c} Dale, p. 87
32. ^ Hertle, p. 124
33. ^ Dale, pp. 87–88
34. ^ Childs (2001), p. 44
35. ^ Hertle, pp. 123–124
36. ^ Dale, p. 88
37. ^ Dale, p. 89
38. ^ Hertle, p. 117
39. ^ Pohl, Manfred (2000). "Goodbye to a Model? German Experiences with Unification and Its Implications for Korean Strategies". In Radtke, Kurt Werner; Feddema, Raymond (eds.). Comprehensive security in Asia: views from Asia and the Westward on a changing security environment . Leiden: BRILL. p. 338. ISBN978-ninety-04-11202-5.
40. ^ Hertle, p. 118
41. ^ Buschschluter, Siegfried (xi Oct 1981). "Trade in human being beings costs Bonn honey". Guardian Weekly.
42. ^ Shackley, Theodore; Finney, Richard A (2005). Spymaster: my life in the CIA. Dulles, Virginia: Brassey's. pp. 100–101. ISBN978-i-57488-915-4.

References [edit]

• Berdahl, Daphne (1999). Where the world ended: re-unification and identity in the High german borderland. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. ISBN0-520-21477-3.
• Buchholz, Hanns (1994). "The Inner-German Border". In Grundy-Warr, Carl (ed.). Eurasia: World Boundaries Volume 3. World Boundaries (ed. Blake, Gerald H.). London: Routledge. ISBN0-415-08834-8.
• Cramer, Michael (2008). German-German Border Trail. Rodingersdorf: Esterbauer. ISBN978-3-85000-254-7.
• Faringdon, Hugh (1986). Confrontation: the Strategic Geography of NATO and the Warsaw Pact. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Books. ISBN0-7102-0676-3.
• Jarausch, Konrad Hugo (1994). The rush to German unity. New York City: Oxford University Printing US. ISBN978-0-19-508577-viii.
• Rottman, Gordon L. (2008). The Berlin Wall and the Intra-High german border 1961–89. Fortress 69. Oxford: Osprey. ISBN978-1-84603-193-nine.
• Schweitzer, Carl Christoph (1995). Politics and regime in Federal republic of germany, 1944–1994: basic documents. Providence, Rhode Isle: Berghahn Books. ISBN978-i-57181-855-iii.
• Shears, David (1970). The Ugly Frontier. London: Chatto & Windus. OCLC 94402.
• Stacy, William E. (1984). US Army Border Operations in Germany. US Army Military History Part. OCLC 53275935. Archived from the original on 2010-11-06. Retrieved 2009-10-24 .

Map Of Cold War Germany,

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_the_inner_German_border_during_the_Cold_War

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