only a physical barrier for the people of Germany, but an ideological divide that split

the world in two. What many people don’t know about the Berlin Wall is that it did

not run along the border between East and West Germany. Actually, it only encapsulated

West Berlin, which was located deep in the heart of East Germany. So we wanted to know:

why was the Berlin wall built in the first place, and how did West Berlin end up as a

political island?

Well, to put some of this in perspective, it's important to note the state of Germany

just after World War Two. The Germans lost the war, ceding the former Nazi power to the

victorious Allies. The US, The UK, France, and The USSR carved up Germany. The easternmost

portion, running along what was called the Oder Neisse line, was allocated to Poland

to make up for land lost during the war.

The rest of the country was split into four zones. The Soviet Union took over the zone

to the east. The US, the UK, and France occupied their own zones in the Western half of the

country. This just left Berlin.

Technically, Berlin was in the Soviet Union’s territory. But since Berlin was the capital

of Germany, as well as the former home of the Nazi regime, it held significant historical

and political value. So to keep things fair, Berlin was carved up into four zones, mirroring

the rest of Germany.

Now, this arrangement worked … briefly, but soon, the USSR began planning to take

over the rest of Berlin, then Germany, then Europe. At the time, the USSR was making a

big push to expand socialism throughout its territories, including East Germany.

So to accomplish this, the Soviet Union started restricting access to West Berlin, creating

one of the first flashpoints of the Cold War, known as the Berlin Blockade. And things only

got worse from there -- the USSR began restricting emigration from their half of Germany. They

built a massive wall, known as the “Inner-German Border” running down the middle of the country,

with barbed wire, alarms, mines, and thousands of East German soldiers…

By many accounts, life in the socialist, East Germany was pretty abysmal, particularly compared

to the democratic and prospering West Germany. Thousands of East Germans defected, using

a direct subway line between West Berlin and West Germany to bypass the closed border.

To put an end to this, the Soviets erected the Berlin wall in 1961, running nearly 100

miles long. It completely surrounded West Berlin, which may seem counterintuitive because

you’d think they’d create a border to protect their own territory. But actually

this wall was to keep their citizens from defecting to the West.

The wall would stay in place for nearly three decades. Even though this wall was much smaller

and less elaborate than the “Inner-German Border,” the Berlin wall came to symbolize

the conflict between socialist and democratic nations. In 1989, the Berlin Wall came down,

marking an end to the USSR’s stranglehold on East Germany.

If you want to learn about what actually brought down the Berlin Wall, check out this video

by Seeker Daily up at the top. And to see more of me, check out my videos on Fusion,

including this one about how robots and avatars can be used to treat depression down at the

bottom.