17 August 1961
A gang of bricklayers puts two rows of hollow blocks on top of the Wall on Sandkrug Bridge (Invalidenstrasse border crossing) to make it higher; it is now 1.70 metres high. At the Brandenburg Gate and in the surrounding area, additional barricades of cement blocks and barbed wire are set up. Houses on Harzer Strasse (Treptow) with exits facing West Berlin are walled or nailed up.
Once again, several People’s Police flee to West Berlin. They tell RIAS about the alert they received on the night between 12-13 August, and their impressions and feelings while on duty at the border in recent days.
The British ambassador in West Germany, Christopher Steel, states in Berlin: "Whatever happens in East Berlin, we’ll stick by West Berlin." – British troops set up iron posts around the Soviet memorial in their sector in Strasse des 17. Juni and then fence it off with barbed wire. An official British statement says the memorial is to be protected from "any demonstrators". Later, the British ambassador adds that the barbed-wire barrier is also intended to show the Soviet guards at the memorial how isolated they are.
The Protestant Church in Germany writes identical telegrams to Walter Ulbricht and the East Berlin mayor Friedrich Ebert, requesting them "to meet the elementary human needs and rights of members of one and the same people by liberally granting passes, travel approval and residency permits, and to remove the separation of one half of Germany from the other. We believe that fulfilling this request of ours will help people to live in peace with one another."
The author Stephan Hermlin responds to the open letter from Günter Grass and Wolfdietrich Schnurre and defends the barbed wire and tanks. "The violation of 13 August? What violation are you talking about?" Hermlin goes on to say that, although he has not written a telegram of thanks to the SED rulers, he gives "the measures taken by the government of the German Democratic Republic my unrestricted, earnest approval."
The worker who had dared to interrupt Walter Ulbricht’s speech in the Oberspree cable factory on 10 August 1961 and demand free elections speaks to RIAS about his experiences during the meeting and the personal consequences of his interjections. The 33-year-old metalworker Kurt Wismach fled to West Berlin in the night of 13 August 1961.
In Moscow, the three Western Powers submit protest notes objecting to the sealing-off measures in Berlin. They describe the restriction of freedom of movement in Berlin as a "flagrant and particularly serious violation of the Four-Power status of the city and consider the measures to be "illegal". They say the sealing-off of East Berlin would go towards increasing the existing tensions and dangers. In conclusion, the notes say, the three governments were expecting the Soviet government to put "an end to these illegal measures". Attentive observers remark that the notes do not contain a direct demand to rescind the GDR’s actions.
Paris: After a meeting of the French Defence Council chaired by President Charles de Gaulle, it is announced that decisions have been taken to reinforce both infantry forces and the air force both in Germany and on French territory.
Press comments – West:
Under the headline "Disappointment among the people of Berlin", the "Neue Zürcher Zeitung" reports on the mood in West and East Berlin: "In West Berlin, especially in the industrial plants in the districts of Neukölln, Wedding and Reinickendorf, the absence of counter-measures by the Western Powers and West Germany against the annexation of East Berlin is causing growing bitterness. This evening, a large number of unionists are standing in front of some entrances to the metropolitan train system and calling on the passengers not to use this communist-controlled means of transport so that they do not give the communists Western money to buy barbed wire. (…) The predominant mood among East Berlin residents is one of resignation and hate. (…) If you go over the Kurfürstendamm in West Berlin of an evening, the street, which, before 13 August, was frequented mostly by East Berliners, seems empty. It is now dawning on the West Berliners for the first time what really happened on 13 August: the complete division of the city and its separation from its surroundings."
The "Frankfurter Rundschau" comments: "Any talk of ‘Western counter-measures’ against the closure of the sector border has now died away after the clear negative indications given by the Western Powers. This has caused great disappointment in Bonn; but even greater is the shock prompted by the fact that the Western Powers are giving the cold shoulder to their loyal ally Konrad Adenauer and with such ruthlessness. Now, the only question is how many German interests the Western Powers are willing to sacrifice to avoid a world war."
Annamarie Doherr, also writing in the "Frankfurter Rundschau", says in her commentary piece: "The Berliners, who until now believed they were particularly close partners of the West, are now forced to see that they too have become a mere political object for the Western Powers. This is a bitter pill to swallow, even if the Western Powers’ objective of maintaining the peace is certainly shared by all. But the Berliners have suddenly, and with a harshness that was unimaginable even a few days ago, been confronted with a reality that was unfamiliar to them for many reasons, including a certain colour-blindness: the fact that the establishment by treaty of the German division is the price Khrushchev is demanding for keeping world peace and one that the Western Powers are obviously ready to pay in one or the other still to be negotiated form."
The "Süddeutsche Zeitung" writes: "Many people who were reassured by reports about a constantly updated emergency plan for Berlin will now realise for the first time that this so-called ‘contingency planning’ did not take into account a closure of the eastern sector. (…) If the West does not want to risk a Third World War, it has no choice but to accept what has happened, just as five years ago it had to accept the suppression of the Hungarian revolt and eight years ago that of the rebellion in central Germany. Anyone who has not comprehended these realities until now should not put the blame on the Western Powers, but on the German politicians who have deliberately kept them hidden from their people."
GDR press:
Commentary in "Neues Deutschland": "Since Sunday, posts have marked the border in Berlin. These posts protect the people of the GDR, because these posts offer the people of the GDR the best protection from the West German militarists. (…) The security measures around Berlin without a doubt represent a considerable strengthening of the GDR."
