The Rise and Fall of the Berlin Wall

“Why the Berlin Wall Rose–and How it Fell” by Erin Blackmore in National Geographic

For nearly 30 years, Berlin was divided not just by ideology, but by a concrete barrier that snaked

through the city, serving as an ugly symbol of the Cold War. Erected in haste

and torn down in protest, the Berlin Wall was almost 27 miles long and was protected

with barbed wire, attack dogs, and 55,000 landmines. But though the wall stood between 1961

and 1989, it could not survive a massive democratic movement that ended up bringing down

the the socialist German Democratic Republic (GDR) and spurring on the Cold War’s end.

The wall had its origins in the end of World War II, when Germany was carved into four