aug 13, 1961 - Berlin Wall went up

Description:

Taking a week, East German troops lined the border around West Berlin - barricading it and preventing the crossing of trains and people. Barbed wire fence and then a concrete wall was put up on the exact border - splitting families and even houses. In case of resistance, the USSR placed Soviet tanks just outside the city.

Khrushchev was initially against the wall because it would make communism seem as a prison and would mean accepting a divided Berlin but high defection rates (especially of skilled and educated workers) and easy passage for Western spies eventually changed that. By the time the wall was built 20% population of East Germany had defected).

There was a delayed response from Kennedy because the timing meant that he wasn't told until the next morning (because of the time difference). When told, he sent an official complaint to Moscow but as there had been to aggression towards the West he took no action - a wall was better than a war.

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