Berlin in the Cold War

by Thomas Flemming

No other conflict has such a powerful influence on the modern world as the Cold War between the two Superpowers of the USA and the Soviet Union. Berlin, divided by the Wall, was the front-line city of the conflict. In no other city but Berlin did East and West stand face to face with such proximity and menace. This book lavishly illustrated book describes the dramatic events of the blockade and the airlift, the people's uprising on 17th June 1953, the escape stories, the espionage missions and the eventual collapse of the Iron Curtain.

Genres: History

Paperback

First published September 1, 2008

Reviews

[Dipanjan]

This book is the first one about the cold war i have gone through recently. In 2009 I passed nearly 1 month in Berlin. I have many sweet memories in this city. Every morning i used to stroll through the places where once the wall stood erect dividing the city into two halves. While reading the book , the memory of my Berlin days came back to me. I feel communism in one hand did show the path of freedom to the down-trodden people while on the other it also had deprived the people of their right of freedom of speech and the right to liberty. It is an irony that the Bolsheviks liberated the people of Soviet Union from the tyranny of the Tsar, but the same Bolsheviks, while in power, tyrannized them by sending millions into the dark gulag after putting the label of 'counter-revolutionary' upon them. The Stalinist system itself became a thorn in the throats of freedom-loving people of the Soviet Union. Definitely the sacrifice of the communists for the sake of defeating the fascists cannot be denied by even the keen anti-communists. But Stalinist Russia definitely committed an unpardonable crime by dividing the people of Berlin through the forceful division of the city itself. This book is an eye-opener to thousands like me , who think that the common innocent people suffer the most due to the nasty power politics of narrow-minded politicians ( be it Hitler, Stalin, kennedy or George Bush). How shocking it is when i imagine a wall dividing my city Kolkata into two halves and myself being forced to confine my existence into the periphery of North Kolkata for 30-40 years without any opportunity to visit my relatives who r staying in South Kolkata on the other side of the wall!! What right do the politicians have to decide which part of the city i am willing to live in?? I also express my utter sympathy for those poor souls like Peter Fechter , who lost their lives for daring escape attempts from East to West.

[PottWab Regional Library]

SM