The fall of the Berlin Wall

And that, incidentally, is what happened in 2004 when the largest ever expansion of the European Union took place with nine countries becoming members, six of which were former members of the Soviet bloc.In one of his interviews William H Hill, an expert at the Wilson Center in Washington DC, USA, reminisced about learning of what was happening in Berlin. In 1989 he was European Division Chief for Voice of America and was in the thick of things. According to what the former diplomat remembers, on 9 November Tom Brokaw, a Voice of America reporter on the NBC channel, broadcast live standing in front of the Berlin Wall with people climbing all over it. 'It was a remarkable event which none of us expected,' said Mr. Hill.At that time, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, the American nation as well as the Soviet peoples had been preparing their entire life to live in the conditions of the Cold War. However, the events that took place in summer and autumn 1989 were a total surprise. Following a round table meeting in Poland literally everything changed when Hungary and Czechoslovakia opened their borders so that people leaving East Germany were able to travel to Austria and continue onwards.'The Wall, built in 1961, was a symbol of a divided Europe and when it fell it was spectacular. And it was ordinary people on the streets who did it,' William H Hillremembered.1989 and 1990 were a time of great hopes, in particular in regard to mending the relationship between the USSR and the USA. For example, at that time representatives of the USA and the USSR, Secretary of State James Baker and Minister Eduard Shevardnadze, worked together to implement the United Nations Security Council resolution on the threat posed by Saddam Hussein as a result of his aggressive policy towards Kuwait. What is more, as was to be seen, the most important fact was not so much the implementation of the resolution as the feeling that the conflict between the two countries had ended and they were able to build diplomatic relations and work together.However, there have also been some negative consequences. Historian Frederick Taylor: 'The thaw in the Cold War allowed all these strange monsters - and we’re talking about probably Islamist terrorism and various other things - to emerge out of the kind of murk as the ice melted.And I think we’re still dealing with those problems. We have a world which is much more open. But in a way, that frozen world controlled fairly rigidly by two power blocs was, as long as you weren’t actually directly on the fault-line, a safer place to live in. Whereas now anything can happen.”In my view the fall of the Berlin wall was not a miracle but rather a ramification of the historically unprecedented peaceful German revolution. We have to acknowledge those people without whom such changes would have been impossible. Having come such a long way, today Germany is one of the most successful countries in the world and is actively involved in world level international proceedings.ConclusionThe Second World War was a true ordeal for the entire world. Almost all the countries in the world were drawn into its military operations. One of the results of the War was the dividing of Germany into two countries within the borders of one. In that way the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic were created. But the basis for their division was the personal interests of the Four Powers: the USA, the USSR, France and Great Britain.It should also be noted that the newly created states also had their own legal governments acting on the basis of the body of law in accordance with the constitutional system announced at the time of their being formed.After the division of the country into two independent states the question of their unification became an important issue in the international arena.In conclusion it should be noted that in 1989 in world diplomacy as a whole, not only Soviet diplomacy, there was no effective formula for reunifying parts of one country which had differing social structures. In reality, the only previous experience was that of Vietnam, but that had been a forcible unification. Moreover, the Vietnamese experience could not be called successful. The unification of Vietnam led to serious political conflict between the political groups of the 'north' and 'south' into parties, and in the end to the initiating of campaigns of mass repression and breaches of socialist legal order.Returning to the German question,it is essential to note that nevertheless the vast majority of researchers view negatively the actions of Soviet diplomats in resolving the difficulties of unifying Germany in 1989. Then again, the hard to explain passiveness of the East German government, the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, must also be noted. Mikhail Gorbachev was too carried away by the realities of the 'new political thinking' and overestimated his own charms and personal qualities as a diplomat. As a result what happened was not the unification of Germany but the absorption of East Germany by the Federal Republic of Germany. West Germans acquired a version of a unification of the countries which far exceeded their wildest expectations. Nevertheless, events in Eastern Europe in the autumn of 1989 made it possible to dismantle the system of Socialism in that region and to seriously weaken the foreign policy stance of the USSR. The unification of Germany was carried out in a hurry, for example, the question regarding the property of the Western Group of Forces (the military) in East Germany was not resolved. It should be noted that this created significant problems for the East Germans themselves regarding integration and the difference in living standards in West and East Germany which still exist today.These days Germany plays an essential role on the world stage, in both political and economic relations. It is a state which has great potential whereby it is capable of vigorously defending its national interests in the international arena. Today Germany is considered the strongest player in the Old World.BibliographyAkhtamzyanA. 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