25 Years Ago Today – The Berlin Wall Falls

Gateway Pundit ^ | November 9,2014 | Jim Hoft

[Hojczyk]

“Mr. Gorbachev, Tear down this wall!” It was the challenge delivered by United States President Ronald Reagan to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to destroy the Berlin Wall, in a speech at the Brandenburg Gate near the Berlin Wall.

Contributor Andrea Ryan added: A special credit should be given to Peter Robinson, President Reagan’s speechwriter who wrote this speech. He is currently Editor-In-Chief for Ricochet. You can read his three short posts here describing the courage and conviction Reagan had to keep these words under strong objection by the National Security Council and the State Department…wanting those words removed.

Two years later the Berlin Wall came down – on November 9, 1989.

Today German Chancellor Angela Merkel hailed the fall as “a dream come true.” The BBC reported:

The fall of the Berlin Wall has shown the world that dreams can come true and “nothing has to stay as it is”, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said.

Speaking 25 years after the event, Mrs Merkel said the message for those in countries where rights were threatened was that things could get better.

Earlier she attended a service for the former East German regime’s victims.

The Berlin Wall was built in 1961 to stop people fleeing from communist East Germany to the West.

Its fall in 1989 became a powerful symbol of the end of the Cold War.

Later in the day, some 7,000 white balloons – perched on 3.6-metre poles to match the height of the wall and stretching for 15km (nine miles) – will be released to symbolise its disappearance.

[cornelis]

U2: Zoo TV

[dfwgator]

Goodbye, Lenin!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZzQuRgaG24

[Publius]

That was one of the funniest foreign language films I’ve ever seen. The scene where the son explains to his militantly communist mother that the Berlin Wall came down because all the West Germans wanted to escape into East Berlin had me falling off the couch.

[dfwgator]

And it had me crying like a baby at the end, one of my all-time favorite movies.

[struwwelpeter]

Medics?

At the time... very happy drunks ;-)

I'll never forget the feelings of surprise and optimism that accompanied Wiedervereinigung, reunification. All this time you think the enemy was this 20-foot tall monolith, and it turns out that he is more afraid of you than you are of him.

An Ossi officer told me that the job of the East German Nazionale Volksarmee was "to hold the border until professional help could be summoned." Another showed me something he'd hidden in the roof panel of his jeep - a white sheet with a large red cross. "If the Amis ever invaded, I'd tie this to the window posts and drive home to my family."

[cornelis]

Ich habe es gesehen.

Wenn man sagt, "Der Mauer ist aus" und gibt Sie dann die Antwort mit, "Welches Mauer?" dann muss es wieder antworten, "Das Mauer zwischen Himmel und Erden."

[Kakaze]

We were in Flight School at Laughlin and no one could believe it at first.

Yet Amazingly the enemy we thought we lost that day is back, in putin and the islamic states are more trouble then we imagined..........we had those bastards beat. Iraq should have been the Germany of this century but we gave it away.

pissed it all away.

[dfwgator]

I know a little German......he's sitting over there...

[dfwgator]

Looking back, it’s amazing how many movies that took place in cold war era Berlin were among my favorite movies.

One, Two, Three
The Lives of Others
Gotcha! (Yes, I would have killed or died to make love to Sasha, too)
Goodbye, Lenin!

[dfwgator]

Geez, how could I leave out Top Secret!

[cornelis]

The Promise/Das Versprechen (von Trotta)

[cornelis]

Big German voice born in Berlin: Ivan Rebroff

I don't know what planet Bowie is on. He doesn't either: Where Are We Now?

[cornelis]

Is it supposed to outline something?

[M1903A1]

It denotes the path followed by the Berlin Wall and how it cut across the city.

[dfwgator]

Later in the day, some 7,000 white balloons

Wonder if Nena recorded a new version of that song?

[cornelis]

Ah, yes, of course.

[dfwgator]

Cool song about Berlin.

Marillion - Berlin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ecCX7CE06E