Jump to the West from a bulldozer, Berlin, 9 September 1963 (Photo: Polizeihistorische Sammlung/Der Polizeipräsident in Berlin)
Two border soldiers who are meant to be doing earthmoving work with a bulldozer on the border to Spandau manage to escape to West Berlin: they jump from the bulldozer over the barbed-wire fence.
30 September
1963
Albert Norden, a member of the SED Politburo and Central Committee, tries to persuade the Berlin Border Brigade to give up their scruples about killing people: "You are rapping the knuckles of all the people who want to stick their pig's snouts into our socialist garden. (...)
So you're not shooting at brothers and sisters when you use weapons to stop border violators. How can someone be a brother who is leaving the Republic, who is betraying the power of the people, who is infringing upon the power of the people? Showing humanity to traitors means being inhuman to the population as a whole."less
