The Soviets desired Berlin to be partitioned by a Wall, surely? Not so, Im afraid. To Khrushchev and the rest of the hierarchy of the USSR, a physical barrier separating East and West Berlin was a last resort an undesired acceptance of the status quo that had become ingrained in the make-up of the city. Joseph Stalin before him, and Khrushchev himself, both hoped that they could force the Western Powers out of Berlin a pocket of capitalism in a sea of socialist East Germany and reunite the city under communism. That is one of the main reasons why it took until 1961 for a physical barrier to erected it was a begrudging acceptance that the West would not leave Berlin and the free city would remain as such. Khrushchev gave Walter Ulbricht and the GDR government the go-ahead to build the Wall, albeit reluctantly and solely as a defensive measure, having exhausted all methods of ridding Berlin of the Western Powers. To Khrushchev, the Wall was there to diffuse a potentially toxic situation in Berlin that could realistically have resulted in World War Three if it had escalated once more. The Soviets did not want to build the Wall, it was merely erected as a last resort to maintain control over East Berlin.
NUFC editor for WhatCulture.com/NUFC. History graduate (University of Edinburgh) and NCTJ-trained journalist. I love sports, hopelessly following Newcastle United and Newcastle Falcons. My pastimes include watching and attending sports matches religiously, reading spy books and sampling ales.
