My Memories of The Berlin Wall

Everyone going from West to East Berlin (and back) was required to pass through an allied/East Germany checkpoint on the border between West and East Berlin. That included members of congress. In each instance, as we were being inspected on our military bus by East German police and eventually passed through what became known as Checkpoint Charlie, you could hear a pin drop and I felt a physical sensation knowing we were entering a police state while leaving our individual freedom behind.

During my sixteen years as a member of congress spanning the years 1977-1993, the Cold War was in full force. Because of the importance for members of congress to understand world affairs, I often had the opportunity to travel to areas of the world to witness first hand how our tax dollars were being spent and learn from the leaders of our military and diplomatic corps vital information on what was needed to conduct our foreign policy.

Germany was front and center during those years. While the country was physically divided between the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) it was also separated by the fundamental beliefs and differences between the democratic freedom enjoyed in the West and a totalitarian society that had imposed communism in the East. Germany was not always our final destination, but rather the entry or exit from the Soviet Union where our congressional delegation would hold meetings with Soviet officials and political dissidents.

On my first visit to Germany in 1981, our delegation met with the Mayor (and future German President) of Berlin, Richard von Weisacker in his city hall offices. The Wall had been built right up to the edge of City Hall so it loomed large when looking out at it from the Mayor’s office window.

In those Cold War days, Germany was the tension point between East and West, as well as between Europe and the Soviet Union. West Germany was a critical ally of the United States. We had thousands of U.S. troops stationed there.

Before the Wall was built, the divided city of Berlin had free flow of people between the two sectors. That ended abruptly in August 1961. It was constructed to keep East Germans from permanently leaving the East and later it served as a barrier for those attempting to escape to freedom in the West.

During that first trip I met many members of the German Bundestag, its parliament. One of them, Volker Ruhr, became a good friend who would become Germany’s Defense Minister under Helmet Kohl. On a later congressional fact finding tour we would meet with Erich Honecker, the Communist head and leader of East Germany. During the two hour-long meeting, one of our members from Michigan suggested to Honecker that he should tear down the wall. I thought it an audacious remark since I believed I would not see the wall come down in my lifetime. It’s permanency was accepted in both the East and West. Approximately a year later, on June 12, 1987 President Ronald Reagan, standing in front of the Brandenburg Gate in the heart of Berlin, delivered his famous call: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”

During my congressional career, I developed a keen interest in foreign policy in general and German affairs in particular. In 1988 Indiana Democratic congressman Lee Hamilton and I founded the Congressional Study Group on Germany. As a group and individually, we met with visiting German officials, academics and media. In 1989 I became the Chairman and in July headed our congressional delegation to Bonn, then the capital of West Germany. We met with Chancellor Kohl, Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher as well as our counterparts in the Bundestag. During the visit, there was no inkling that within a few months the Wall would come down as it did on November 9, 1989.

In the subsequent years Germany has remained one of our strongest allies. But even after reunification there still exist economic and political differences between East and West. Ironically, there are enclaves in the old communist eastern part of Germany where people today look nostalgically upon their life under communism. For those of us who saw how drab life was under a police state was during those years and who supported Germany’s reunification thirty years ago, it is hard to understand why.