Putin worked for the KGB in the former Soviet Union.
These were stationed up and down the border overlooking the minefields but didn't seem to have much to do with the border operations. You rarely saw the Russians except when they rode out to the tower with a new shift and a full load of whatever Russians eat and a load of vodka bottles.
They'd get drunk and start tossing bottles. That's all we heard all night long from over there ~ breaking bottles.
Then they'd change shift and a new crew would come in to do the same thing.
At the same time you saw East German and Czech border police going up and down the area on foot or in vehicles. Sometimes you'd see a West German Bundesgruenzenschuss officer. He'd always have a great story about how stupid the folks on the other side were.
People could get hurt accidentally if they got too near the border. Out in the mountains there'd be horrendous storms and the mined area would turn into a sea of flowing mud. The little anti-personnel mines sewn all over the place would come loose and they could end up on the West German side.
Whenever that happened the Commies would come out with a steamroller and blow up the whole place ~ you wouldn't see any of them walking around over there until it was rolled clear.
Sometimes they'd set off the anti-vehicle mines and then plant new ones. Wouldn't have liked to have been the guy driving the steamroller then.
A regular feature of life on the border consisted of West Germans employed by GDR to walk thorugh US Army observation posts. These pukes would sometimes show up at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning.
Frankly, a lot more than a mere 1300 people could have been easily killed on that border if the West Germans and NATO didn't have troops on the job just watching what was going on. Wouldn't have been VOPO just shooting people up either ~ it'd been accidents with sloppy mine work. The other side really had no idea much of the time where their mines were.