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25th Anniversary: When the Berlin Wall Fell
Lasrick writes Today is the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. This retrospective describes how quickly the Wall was erected, and how Berliners were completely caught off guard by its construction: "Berlin's citizens woke up one morning in August 1961 to find coils of barbed wire running down the middle of their streets; the first inkling some people had that anything was amiss was when their subway train didn't stop at certain stations. Later, the first strands of wire were replaced with a cement wall, along with watchtowers, a wide 'death strip,' and an electrified fence."
If anyone in the U.S. is really interested in what helped to tear down the Wall, look at Helsinki and at the Helsinki Final Act. All the discussions and dissents in the former Communist bloc were based on the Helsinki Final Act, and on the signatures the East European countries put under the agreement on free speech and free travel. This is, what fueled the hope and the struggle. Not a propaganda show by the U.S. president who was in the same moment talking bad about the very documents that were so dear and important to us.