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Yeah, I wrote about this on HN before. Americans tend to imagine that WW2 ends and then East Germany immediately puts up a wall and now nobody can leave but it
by tialaramex 2mo ago
Yeah, I wrote about this on HN before. Americans tend to imagine that WW2 ends and then East Germany immediately puts up a wall and now nobody can leave but it was way more gradual than that. The year the European war ended you could just walk across the border, you'd need to show some ID but you have ID because it was the war and Germans issued everybody with ID in the war. The Allies are manning the borders, they want to arrest Nazis, so ID saying you're a Nazi is a bad idea, but if you're just some farmer from outside Leipzig (so East Germany) you can easily cross. More than a Million people flee West. Are they foolish? You already know the answer.
By the end of the 1940s, things are tightening up, there are now armed "police" who in effect work for the Soviets "protecting" East Germany at the border, barbed wire and deep trenches now block unofficial crossings, but it is still definitely possible to leave, in the worst case maybe you bribe a guard. Hundreds of thousands are able to flee by "just" walking (or driving) West.
In 1952 the "Special Regime" begins to "keep out spies". Most of the border is sealed, you can't bribe your way when there is no official crossing, the remaining guards are told to shoot people who try to cross, after all none of them are legitimate. However since Berlin still has a crossing, and the West still seems hell bent on holding their half despite the fact it's cut off from the world, you could travel to East Berlin and sneak across to West Berlin. Over the next decade or so millions do, East Germany tried very hard to stop this, but because it was physically possible it seemed like there wasn't much they could do...
In 1961 they built the wall. It was no longer physically possible to escape.
- inigyou 2mo agoThe USA has already cancelled all passports of trans people, so they can't leave. I wonder who will be next.
- detourdog 2mo agoI know they cancelled these passports but can anyone describe how they specifically communicated to our effected citizens?
- inigyou 2mo agoI was told the famous Berlin crossing is called Checkpoint Charlie because checkpoint Alpha was on the Iron Wall (the one dividing Germany) and checkpoint Bravo was midway. At each checkpoint they would note the time. If you didn't make it to each checkpoint at exactly the right time they would consider that you'd stopped to do something illegal in between (you were only allowed to drive straight from the iron wall to Berlin), and you would be disappeared.
- tialaramex 2mo agoNot quite. Alpha is at the edge of West Germany, once past Alpha you are on an Autobahn (a highway) to Berlin and physically in East Germany but the Soviets have agreed that they won't do anything so long as you never stop until you reach Bravo at the border between East Germany and West Berlin. The route between Bravo and Charlie is inside West Berlin. Charlie's significance is that the Soviets will not (by the time Charlie is created) allow non-Germans to enter East Germany legally except via this point. The West has argued that this isn't what they agreed, but have eventually relented because it's apparent that arguing isn't helping.