Constructed in 1961, this Berlin Wall both physically divided Berlin, and symbolized the still wider ideological rift between Western countries and the Eastern Bloc in the Cold War. East Germany was building walls to keep its people from leaving for the West. In this blog article, I’m going to talk about the main response of the West to the Berlin Wall, and the benefit of this response on international events.
Initially,
Once knowledge of the wall’s construction got to the Western world, shock and fury greeted it. The sudden breakup of families and the barbed wire walls separating Berlin’s two sides heightened East and West’s struggle. The West denounced the wall as a repressive policy breaching human rights. Western politicians, most famously US President John F. Kennedy, made public comments expressing their disdain.
1. Diplomatic Efforts
The West answered the Berlin Wall by stepping up diplomatic campaigns meant to discredit its existence. Officially protesting both the Soviet Union and East German government, the United States and its allies denigrated the wall as an illegal barrier. Still, their protests had little bearing on the conditions of the ground. The wall maintained both a psychological and a physical mark of the division between East and West Berlin.
2. Fiscal Policies
Apart from diplomatic activities, the West implemented a set of financial policies meant to strengthen West Berlin and thereby compromise the East German administration. The West provided West Berlin with large financial support to ensure the continuation of an affluent society notwithstanding separation. East Berlin was able to flourish economically and driven Easterners to flee to the West with this help. Especially West Germany provided financial incentives to East German defectors, therefore worsening the brain drain from the East.
From the Western Point of View
For the West, the Berlin Wall served as a physical emblem of the failed communism and the totalitarian Soviet Union administration. Berlin’s split was seen as a straightforward juxtaposition between the values of freedom, democracy, and capitalism in the West and the East’s control, censorship, and restrictions. The wall became quite vividly symbolic of the Cold War and the struggle against communism.
Western Reaction: consequences
The response of the West greatly affected the outcome of the Berlin Wall and its fall in 1989. The Western countries’ unrelenting opposition to the wall demonstrated to their commitment to democracy and freedom. It also underlined how inadequately the East German administration maintained control and prevented citizens from fleeing.
West diplomatic pressure and economic support over time severely taxed the East German administration. As the economic inequalities between East and West grew increasingly evident, the wall turned into a stark image of the failure of the socialist experiment of the Eastern Bloc. This along with growing Eastward citizen dissatisfaction finally brought down the Berlin Wall and Germany was reunited.
Conclusion Thought
It provoked a big Western reaction when the Berlin Wall was built. Economic programs followed diplomatic efforts to challenge the repressive character of the wall and support the independence of its citizens. But the products of the Western reaction absolutely needed to emerge were the fall of the wall and the reunion of Germany. The Berlin Wall will continue to haunt, an ever present reminder of the battle for freedom, human rights and their victory to resistance to oppression.
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