Immediately after the Wall’s construction, Berlin represented something of a political embarrassment, a place to avoid, since Western leaders—Adenauer of West Germany, Macmillan of Britain, Kennedy of the United States—were criticized for their failure to respond to it, and since they could scarcely admit to being relieved at its construction. Before long, however, West Germany and its allies began to exploit the propaganda value of the Wall as a symbol of Communism’s failure.
