The Wall
Toolbox
Published: November 10, 2009
Twenty years ago this week the exhilarating response to the opening of the Berlin Wall appeared to presage a period of hitherto unimagined international stability because, as much as anything else, it appeared to signal the end of the fear-heavy Cold War that had cruelly dominated our world since the end of World War II.
Historians have compared the events of that exceedingly exciting week in 1989, in terms of their enduring political importance, to those that swept through Europe in 1848, when the French Revolution was merely the most memorable of the several extraordinary uprisings that essentially reshaped the continent and greatly advanced the idea of western democracy.
Yet all the benefits that were expected to flow from the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the fast-approaching demise of the Soviet Union were not immediately appreciated by some contemporary political figures. For example, French president Francois Mitterand and British prime minister Margaret Thatcher expressed fears that a unified Germany might be drawn away from the still-young European Union, spurn the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and, worse, return to its more extreme nationalistic ways.
"The fear was that this thing in the center of Europe, if it were allowed to become unified, was going to be a cancer once again and lead to Act III of the great European tragedy," Robert E. Hunter, a senior adviser at the RAND Corporation and an ambassador to NATO under President Bill Clinton, told a reporter, adding that "the German problem, which emerged with the unifying of Germany beginning in the 1860s, is one of the few problems in modern history that has been solved."
In fact, it is clear that Germany has fully embraced important Western institutions and values and has even helped bring neighbors such as Poland and the Czech Republic (both former German enemies) with it into what is now generally referred to, in geo-political terms, as "the west."
This week's celebration has taken on an interesting cultural tone for, besides the usual politicians (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former Polish leader Lech Walesa and former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev) who are so often a part of such observances, it includes famous musicians ranging from the American rocker Bon Jovi to classical music's Daniel Barenboim, who was in Berlin the night the wall fell.
On the night the wall fell, he was recording with the Berlin Philharmonic, Barenboim remembered. The orchestra members, excited by the events, suggested they perform a concert for the people of East Berlin. And so they did. The conductor recalled people lining up all morning for tickets. The concert was free, but only those holding an East German identity card were given tickets.
Despite the uncertainties, those were heady days and nights. No longer was the concept of "mutually-assured destruction" a common element in any American-Russian military philosophies. German reunification and the collapse of the Soviet Union would have their complications, but broadly speaking the feeling was one of unbridled optimism … and relief.
As we celebrate the demise of the barrier between East Berlin and West Berlin, however, we are reminded that just as the revolutions of 1848 didn't guarantee lasting international harmony, the totally natural euphoria of 1989 has yet to lead to anything resembling universal peace. The issues may be totally different now – for example, the religious hatreds we're witnessing today weren't as big a factor back then — but they all somehow reflect seemingly permanent defects in human nature, defects that aren't so easily overcome.
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